General Information

Title:                  Victory of Eagles
Author:                 Naomi Novik
Read By:                Simon Vance
Copyright:              2008
Audiobook Copyright:    2008
Genre:                  Historical Fantasy
Publisher:              Books on Tape
Series Name:            Temeraire
Position in Series:     05
Abridged:               No

Original Media Information

ISBN:                   9781415954379
Media:                  Library Download
Number:                 9
Source:                 Library

File Information

Number of MP3s:         9
Total Duration:         10:27:13
Total MP3 Size:         287.20
Parity Archive:         No
Ripped By:              A_S
Ripped With:            Easy CD - DA Extractor
Encoded With:           LAME 3.98
Encoded At:             CBR 64 kbit/s 44100 Hz Mono
Normalize:              MP3Gain, Track 89dB
Noise Reduction:        None
ID3 Tags:               Set, v1.1, v2.3

Book Description

Napoleon's vast armies have consolidated his hold on Europe, and at
last his plans are ready for the invasion of England itself. But Captain
Will Laurence has been jailed for treason, and his dragon Temeraire
consigned to the breeding grounds in Wales. Neither can respond as Napoleon's
forces at last make their move across the English Channel and plant
the eagle standard on British shores. But when Laurence's prison ship
is sunk and he washes ashore near Dover, he begins a desperate search
to rejoin his dragon partner. Meanwhile, Temeraire gathers the motley
band of the breeding grounds around him and turns them into a resistance
force, striking at the French as they press northward from London in
pursuit of the royal family.
Excerpts:

From the book

Chapter 1

The breeding grounds were called Pen Y Fan, after the hard, jagged slash
of the mountain at their heart, like an ax-blade, rimed with ice along
its edge and rising barren over the moorlands: a cold, wet Welsh autumn
already, coming on towards winter, and the other dragons sleepy and
remote, uninterested in anything but their meals. There were a few hundred
of them scattered throughout the grounds, mostly established in caves
or on rocky ledges, wherever they could fit themselves; nothing of comfort
or even order provided for them, except the feedings, and the mowed-bare
strip of dirt around the borders, where torches were lit at night to
mark the lines past which they might not go, with the town-lights glimmering
in the distance, cheerful and forbidden.

Temeraire had hunted out and cleared a large cavern, on his arrival,
to sleep in; but it would be damp, no matter what he did in the way
of lining it with grass, or flapping his wings to move the air, which
in any case did not suit his instinctive notions of dignity: much better
to endure every unpleasantness with stoic patience, although that was
not very satisfying when no-one would appreciate the effort. The other
dragons certainly did not.

He was quite sure he and Laurence had done as they ought, in taking
the cure to France, and no-one sensible could disagree; but just in
case, Temeraire had steeled himself to meet with either disapproval
or contempt, and he had worked out several very fine arguments in his
defense. Most importantly, of course, it was just a cowardly, sneaking
way of fighting: if the Government wished to beat Napoleon, they ought
to fight him directly, and not make his dragons sick to try and make
him easy to defeat; as if British dragons could not beat French dragons,
without cheating. “And not only that,” he added, “but it would not be
only the French dragons who died: our friends from Prussia who are imprisoned
in their breeding grounds would also have got sick, and perhaps it might
even have gone so far as China; and that would be like stealing someone
else’s food, even when you are not hungry; or breaking their eggs.”

He made this impressive speech to the wall of his cave, as practice:
they had refused to give him his sand-table, and he had no-one of his
crew to jot it down for him, either; he did not have Laurence, who would
have helped him work out just what to say. So he repeated the arguments
over to himself quietly, instead, so he should not forget them. And
if these should not suffice to persuade, he thought, he might point
out that after all, he had brought the cure back, in the first place:
he and Laurence, with Maximus and Lily and the rest of their formation,
and if anyone had a right to say where it should be shared out, they
did: no-one would even have known of it if Temeraire had not contrived
to be sick in Africa, where the mushrooms which cured it grew.

He might have saved the trouble. No-one accused him of anything, nor,
as he had privately, a little wistfully, thought just barely possible,
hailed him as a hero; because they did not care.

The older dragons, not feral but retired, were a little curious about
the latest developments in the war, but only distantly, more inclined
to tell over their own battles of earlier wars; and the rest had plenty
of indignation over the recent epidemic, but only in a provincial way.
They cared that they and their own fellows had sickened and died; they
cared that the cure had taken so long to reach them; but it did not
mean anything to them that dragons in France had also been ill, or that
the disease would have spread, killing thousands, if Temeraire and Laurence
had not...
Reviews:
The New York Times

"A new writer is soaring on the wings of a dragon."
Peter Jackson

"These are beautifully written novels: not only fresh, original, and
fast-paced, but full of wonderful characters with real heart."
Time

"Enthralling reading–it's like Jane Austen playing Dungeons & Dragons
with Eragon's Christopher Paolini."
Entertainment Weekly

"A gripping adventure full of rich detail and the impossible wonder
of gilded fantasy."
The Washington Post Book World
BACK PANEL (cont'd)VICTORY OF EAGLESSUMMER 2008 (HC)

"A thrilling fantasy . . . All hail Naomi Novik."
San Francisco Chronicle

"Novik's influences run the gamut from Jane Austen to Patrick O'Brian,
with a side trip through Anne McCaffrey. Her books are completely involving
and probably addictive, their central conceit explored in clever detail
with a great deal of wit and historical insight."
Booklist (starred review)

"So realistic that it drowns disbelief . . . first-class in every respect."-