DRAGONKING REVIEWS

 PUBLISHER'S WEEKLY STARRED REVIEW

“A "mystical terrorist group" sacrifices an airplane full of innocents to a dragon and uses the deaths to power an event that wreaks magical havoc on Washington, D.C…Second-string journalist Steven Rowan embodies the tarot's Fool and is forced to figure out the card's magic on the fly. Bombshell soldier Ace Morningstar, who used her magic to disguise herself as a man so she could become a SEAL, drafts Steve and his cell phone, which contains the ghost of a Chinese factory worker who now communicates through screen animations and bad auto-translations, to help fix the mess…the team fights off newly transformed demons, dog monsters, and ogres…before the villains embark on the next step of their world-domination strategy. 

      Irving's smart parody of Beltway life and his high-energy storytelling carry through to the end…."

KIRKUS REVIEW  

  "Mystically powered terrorists unleash volatile magic on the world, turning Washington, D.C., into a politically charged fantasyland ripe for human sacrifice.

  A trio of suicide attackers with magical abilities bring down a 747 by summoning a dragon to rip it from the sky, using the hundreds of lives lost as a sacrifice to initiate the Change. The country morphs into a new landscape of swords and sorcery. Now computers and other machines are coming to life, and regular people have started to turn into mythical creatures and forgotten deities, creating a chaotic world easily seized by whoever--or whatever--set this shift into motion. Hope appears in the nation's capital where, along with transforming Democrats into potbellied elves, Republicans into cantankerous dwarves, and Tea Party members into trolls, the Change has granted struggling freelance journalist Steve Rowan the abilities of the Tarot Arcana's Fool card, making him a powerful, yet unreliable, wizard. Realizing his potential, he is "hired" by the trivia-obsessed sentient computer Barnaby and coupled with the attractive, no-nonsense female Navy SEAL Ace Morningstar to uncover the puppet masters behind the plane crash. 

  Irving (Courier, 2014, etc.), a producer of Emmy Award-winning news television and a journalist well-acquainted with the Beltway, makes good use of clichéd Washington stereotypes by mashing them together with fantasy tropes, breathing new life into political satire. 

  ...Like many first books in a genre series, the novel foreshadows a greater enemy behind all this madness while barely hinting at its identity, offering a wonderfully bizarre consolation prize as its denouement.

-SUSPENSE MAGAZINE REVIEW

"Terry Irving has written a science fiction/fantasy thriller that will have you laughing one moment and racing through adrenaline-pumping action the next. "The Last American Wizard" will twist you in knots while expanding your imagination. You will never look at magic the same again." 

BEST-SELLING NOVELIST TERRI REID

"Who wouldn't LOVE a book where Congress is turned into argumentative and belligerent elves, dwarves, and trolls...wait, is this fantasy or non-fiction? This is a fun, suspenseful, and slightly peculiar fantasy set in Washington, D.C., and filled with characters that are larger than life.  Irving brings his own unique style to fantasy, creating a page-turner that is sure to keep you laughing and pondering its subtle truths at the same time. "

Dr. Alma Kadragic President  Alcat Communications International LLC

Irving, who's had an illustrious career as a TV news producer, has been making a name for himself the past two years as a writer of thrillers like Courier and the upcoming Warrior. Now he's turned to the fantasy genre with The Day of the Dragonking, the first book of The Last American Wizard series. The smooth writing with more than a hint of irony, interesting and colorful characters and unusual situations evident in the thrillers carry over to the Dragon King. An impressive debut in this popular genre! Can't wait for Book 2.

-Miss Alister, Woman of Mystery

"Day of the Dragonking" is really good - super-tight structure - suspenseful - well meted-out chaos - chaos in clever check, keeping the reader inside Steve trying to figure out WTF? - the language is perfect - the call is brilliant, literally clicked, not missing a beat -

-Richard Godwin, bestselling author of One Lost Summer, Paranoia, and The Destiny Programme.
"Irving has written a prescient and definitive novel of the modern era, if Robert Heinlein and Philip K Dick had created a love child this would be it."