Dragon Blind by Iman Christians

 Dragon Blind

by Iman Christians 

My Rating: 🟊🟊🟊🟊🟊

Spice Rating: 🌶

Blurb:

Princess Asha has always defied the brutal expectations of her warrior empire. When a life-altering injury shatters her vision and her future in the Ujuima military—she’s cast into the dragon pits.

In a kingdom where dragons are nearly extinct and their eggs are myth, Asha, now a blind dragonkeeper, inherits three. Although a pawn in their political games, her lack of sight sharpens her other senses, allowing her to perceive truths no one else can. But when the eggs’ existence makes her a target, she’s forced into an arranged marriage to secure her family’s power.

Enter Adriel, a morally gray prince from a rival kingdom, who offers her an alliance instead of a wedding ring. He wants the eggs for his own reasons, but neither expects the electric pull between them—or the dragon, Drakkar, who whispers to Asha of a hidden dragon colony in the northern mountains.

As their journey unravels the eggs’ secrets, Asha faces an impossible reclaim her birthright as a royal pawn or ignite a revolution to restore dragonkind’s freedom. But in an empire where trust is lethal and blind girls are meant to be silent, survival will demand she rewrite the rules with fire.

Once cast out into the belly of dragons, she will take her power back and burn the empire to the ground.

My Review:

I have been on a hunt. A very specific, very determined hunt for a dragon book that was going to grab me by the collar, pull me in, and refuse to let me go until the very last page. I have picked up and put down more books than I care to admit looking for that one, the one that scratches that particular itch in just the right way. And then Dragon Blind landed in my hands, and let me tell you, the search is over.

This book did exactly what I needed it to do. It caught my eye and it kept me entertained from beginning to end, but what surprised me the most was how much more it turned out to be than I expected going in. Yes, there is an enemies to lovers storyline woven through it, and listen, I am never mad at that trope when it is done well. But calling this just an enemies to lovers story would be doing it a serious disservice, because at its heart this book is about something far deeper and far more fascinating than that.

At the center of everything is a battle for blind loyalty, and no, that is not a pun, though I will say the irony is not lost on me because our female main character is actually blind. And what an absolutely brilliant and unique way to build a story. A woman who has lost her sight, navigating a world that is harsh and unforgiving and that she simply cannot see. The way the author uses that limitation to shape the entire perspective of the story is nothing short of creative genius. Reading the world through her experience, feeling the darkness she moves through, watching her figure out how to survive and connect and fight in a world that was not built with her in mind, it is unlike anything I have read before.

And can we talk about the world building for a moment? Because it is stunning. The glimpses you get of this world painted entirely through senses that are not sight, through sound and touch and instinct and trust, are genuinely breathtaking. There is something so moving about watching someone be brave enough to take a step they cannot even see coming. That alone made my heart clench more than once.

I also need to address the family situation because why is the family always the number one source of chaos and betrayal? I hate it. I genuinely hate it every single time. And yet I understand it because someone has to be the villain, and there is nothing quite as gut wrenching as when that villain shares your blood. It adds a layer of pain to the story that no outside enemy ever truly could.

My absolute favorite part though? The dragons. Making friends with dragons when you cannot see them, learning to trust creatures that the rest of the world fears or ignores, building those bonds in the dark. That element of the story filled my heart in the best possible way.

If you are looking for a romantasy that brings something genuinely fresh to the table, and if dragons are anywhere on your list of things that make a book instantly better, then please do yourself a favor and pick up Dragon Blind. You will not regret it for a single second.