This is Dragon of Doom (1983), the ninth and final Endless Quest penned by series creator Rose Estes. For a little context, the series launched in June of 1982 and this appeared in November of 1983. That is an insane pace of writing — I don’t know exactly when Estes started writing EQ novels, but the education department they spun out of was founded in ‘82, so at best we’re talking a gamebook every three months or so, and probably far less time than that. That two of them are legit pretty great (Pentegarn and Brookmere) and another four reasonable decent is a heck of an accomplishment. I doubt I could write that much in so short a time and remain even marginally coherent.
All this to say, Este’s last effort isn’t all that great. The formula is pretty clear — kid, lost relation, talking pet, moral lessons, all the basic bases are covered and there isn’t much more here. There is some nice writing around the titular dragon (undercut at every turn by Harry Quinn’s rather sloppy art) but for the most part I’ve already forgotten the details. There are, I think, two main paths to good endings, and a bunch of crummy endings, but even then, the passages are lengthy and there isn’t a ton of interactivity. Something bugs me about the Caldwell cover, too.
Better to just re-read Return to Brookmere, I think.
My mother wrote Dragon of Doom begrudgingly. She was contractually obligated to do so though, so she did, but now without spite. When reflecting on the book recently with her, I said, “Can you see any resemblance between you a Shen, a dragon that was rousted from his slumber to serve a wizard who wanted to rule the world?” It was only then that she made the connection, she was Shen, and she was serving Gary/TSR against her will when she would rather see him/them consumed by her flames.
Oh wow, this…kind of changes everything, doesn’t it!