Space Dragons: Luxorian's Crew

eBook

English language

Published Nov. 1, 2024 by Witch Key Fiction.

ISBN:: 978-1-7394742-4-9

(1 review)

Luxorian is a dragon without a rider, and that's a problem.

Since ancient times, dragons and riders have worked together to travel the galaxy, which means Luxorian is out of a job. Their rider abandoned them, leaving them with no void rig, no crew, and a whole lot of bitterness.

When Finder-X239, a bot who constantly talks around the truth, offers them a rig and a suspiciously well-paid materials collection contract, Lux has to accept.

But that means assembling a crew, fast, from desperate folk in their backwater spaceport town, including the humans they turned down as replacement riders. And with no rider to be their voice among the crew, the only person who can run this rig is...well...Lux.

Exploring the galaxy rim, Lux and their crew must face hostile wildlife, dangerous weather, and the vast, rig-eating void horrors that hunt through space.

But harder still, Lux must somehow gain …

Luxorian is a dragon without a rider, and that's a problem.

Since ancient times, dragons and riders have worked together to travel the galaxy, which means Luxorian is out of a job. Their rider abandoned them, leaving them with no void rig, no crew, and a whole lot of bitterness.

When Finder-X239, a bot who constantly talks around the truth, offers them a rig and a suspiciously well-paid materials collection contract, Lux has to accept.

But that means assembling a crew, fast, from desperate folk in their backwater spaceport town, including the humans they turned down as replacement riders. And with no rider to be their voice among the crew, the only person who can run this rig is...well...Lux.

Exploring the galaxy rim, Lux and their crew must face hostile wildlife, dangerous weather, and the vast, rig-eating void horrors that hunt through space.

But harder still, Lux must somehow gain the loyalty of the crew even though they are unwilling to give their trust in return. Not all wounds come by way of a claw or fist...

3 editions

enne📚 reviewed Space Dragons: Luxorian's Crew by Veo Corva

Space Dragons: Luxorian's Crew

3 stars

This is a fluffy novella about a space dragon trying to lead a crew for a salvage job in a universe that usually has a human rider running the show. The characters were fun, but this book was too much of a marshmallow for me.

The biggest conflict in the story was Lux's internalized worries about running their own crew. (Other conflicts like space horrors, mud, and dangerous wildlife are quickly and immediately solved with little repercussions.) It's not that I need a story to be gritty and stressful, but in order for a story whose emotional resolution is a space crew bonding together, I need more pulling them apart (either emotionally or via external circumstances) to have that pay off. Ultimately, this novella doesn't quite stand on its own for me, and feels like the first third of a book where everything is going well just before it doesn't. …

This is a fluffy novella about a space dragon trying to lead a crew for a salvage job in a universe that usually has a human rider running the show. The characters were fun, but this book was too much of a marshmallow for me.

The biggest conflict in the story was Lux's internalized worries about running their own crew. (Other conflicts like space horrors, mud, and dangerous wildlife are quickly and immediately solved with little repercussions.) It's not that I need a story to be gritty and stressful, but in order for a story whose emotional resolution is a space crew bonding together, I need more pulling them apart (either emotionally or via external circumstances) to have that pay off. Ultimately, this novella doesn't quite stand on its own for me, and feels like the first third of a book where everything is going well just before it doesn't.

This is the first in a series, and it poses a number of unanswered worldbuilding questions: how dragon and human society got to where it is, what went down with Lux's old partner Sar, and some other mysterious goings-on that are revealed at the end of the book. I enjoyed the worldbuilding about a universe seemingly built for humans that only grudgingly makes room for space dragons even as it depends on them, and I hope future books get into this more.

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