In Dragon Keeper, the first volume of The Rain Wilds Chronicles (the second volume, Dragon Haven, is scheduled for May 11 release), Robin Hobb returns to the world she introduced in her Liveship Traders and Tawny Man trilogies. But, although characters from her previous books make cameo appearances, you don’t need to have read them to enjoy this one.

Dragon Keeper follows four storylines. The first one is about the dragons: Fifteen of them. These dragons, unlike their predecessors, are weak, malformed creatures whose underdeveloped wings won’t allow them to fly. Unable to hunt, the once powerful and intelligent creatures that used to rule over humans are now at their mercy.

The second storyline tells us about Thymara, a young girl, deeply marked by the river since birth (her hands have claws, and scales cover part of her skin). Thymara, together with eleven other youths similarly marked and her friend Tats, volunteers to lead the dragons upriver, when the humans tire of taking care of them.

The third storyline follows Leftrin, the captain of the ship that will lead the expedition.

And the fourth introduces us to Alise, a woman stuck in a loveless marriage who has devoted her life to studying the lore of the Dragons and the Elderlings (a race of enhanced humans, designed by dragons to serve them). Alise is thrilled to meet the dragons, while Sedric, her husband’s secretary and her chaperone, has plans of his own.

The four plots converge halfway through the book when dragons and keepers embark on their journey to Kelsingra, the fabled city where dragons and Elderlings used to live in harmony. They have no map to guide them, only the dragons’ unreliable memories and Alise’s scarce knowledge of the city gathered in her studies of old manuscripts.

It is an interesting premise, and the characters, humans and dragons alike, are carefully introduced and characterized.

My complaint is that the chronicles, apparently conceived as one book by the author, were cut in two due to their length, and Dragon Keeper has no resolution, which after reading almost 500 pages was a let down for me.

Still, I do recommend you read this book. Just wait until May so you don’t have to wait for the second part.