How To Train Your Dragon School: Doom of the Darkwing: Book 1

By Author / Illustrator

Cressida Cowell

Genre

Fantasy

Age range(s)

Publisher

Hodder Children's Books

ISBN

9781444981926

Format

Paperback / softback

Published

08-05-2025

Synopsis

Welcome to HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON SCHOOL. Where Viking and Dragon Heroes are made! Join Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third and his dragons, Toothless and Windwalker, in their hilarious, hair-raising adventures at the Isle of Berk's Training School for Vikings and Dragons. Where they are BOTTOM in pretty much everything.

Disastrous Lesson Number One: The Art of Battle. It was supposed to be a quiet, SENSIBLE lesson. Hiccup never MEANT to get into TROUBLE. But things take an unexpected turn along the way and Hiccup and his friends soon find themselves adrift on stormy seas, in a sinking ship, facing imminent DOOM, in one of their BIGGEST adventures ever...

Packed with illustrations, action and even a Dragonese dictionary, this series is perfect for developing readers, and the millions of HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON fans worldwide.

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Reviews

Tracy

I just love Cressida Cowell: she has that canny ability to create the most wonderful characters and stories. I was first introduced to her works many years ago with the sublime picturebook, That Rabbit Belongs to Emily Brown. It remains one of my favourite children's book, and I urge any of you who are unaware of its existence to seek it out.

But…that, quite literally, is a different story. Doom of the Darkwing: How to Train your Dragon School is the beginning of a new series, set in the world of the main How to Train Your Dragon. Hiccup has Toothless as his dragon, and he's still learning how to be a hero, so in the world of prequels and sequels, it's actually set before most of the books in the original series: I believe that it falls between books six and seven.

In this story, we see Hiccup and Fishlegs - along with the other Vikings their age and all their dragons - attending a new school run by the larger-than-life Gobber the Belch. Their first lesson is to be learning the Art of Battle. But things do not go quite as Hiccup had hoped. For a number of weeks, a mighty storm has been swirling around the islands and a terrific gale is blowing. Suddenly, and just as Hiccup is finding out how well he has (or has not) done in his first lesson, through the deafening roar of the storm, a desperate battle bugle sound is heard. The Bog-Burglar tribe need the help of the Hooligans!

But, there are just too many questions that need answering. Why is there such a storm raging around the islands? Who is this mysterious fortune teller, who suddenly appears on the Isle of Berk? Who keeps sending the messages in the bottles? What do they mean? Where is Camicazi? Will Chief Stoick actually sit on an upturned mast? These questions, and many more can only be answered by reading the books.

As ever, Cressida Cowell writes with an effervescent humour, filling her pages with fantastic illustrations and there is even an opportunity to learn how to speak Dragonese. Great fun for readers aged eight to nine years plus, either on their own, or with any older reader who is willing to be entertained.