Love of Science and Dragons: Memoirs of Lady Trent by Marie Brennan

Reviewed by Patrick Icasas

Marie Brennan, the author of the five-part series The Memoirs of Lady Trent, has created a cohesive fictional work that trumps many sagas that have been pumped out in the last ten years.

I love epic, multi-part sci-fi and fantasy series, but I’m always wary of how they end. Some authors try to milk the property too long and let it drag out, while others rush the ending and leave me frustrated. And yet more are disjointed; books that just happen to share a world and characters but feel like completely unrelated works.

The series starts with A Natural History of Dragons. This first novel introduces us to Isabella, a precocious girl living in a Victorian era-style society who grows up to be the world’s premier dragon naturalist across five books. It’s a journey filled with adventure, political intrigue, and oh-so-many scientific observations and discoveries.

The entire tale is narrated by Isabella herself—older, retired, and saddled with the tedious task of transcribing her younger days into a volume of memoirs. Isabella the Elder is one of my favorite parts of the series. She’s witty and charming, and not above a sly wink at how patently absurd and unlikely Isabella the Younger’s adventures are when viewed from the outside.

The other stars of the series are the dragons. More specifically, the science behind the dragons. Marie Brennan is a scientist herself (anthropology) and infuses her love for the intellectual into Isabella’s obsession with investigating and cataloging dragons. Marie has put an insane amount of effort into creating dragons that could conceivably exist as actual living creatures.

I mean, really insane. The shape of their scales. The thickness of their eggshells. Pages-long discourses on evolution theories. You’d be forgiven if you thought dragon naturalism was an actual science by the end of the series. And it never feels burdensome or tedious, because every observation is infused with the characters’ love for the study of dragons. They want to learn all of it, and therefore, so should you as the reader.

Even better, Isabella’s advances in dragon naturalism impact the plot: from the dragon’s skeletal structure to their reproductive cycle, Isabella’s revelations change the world’s scientific and political landscape. Her discoveries are not fluff for the sake of scientific geekery (although that would be enough reason to put them in). They are narratively relevant across the entire series, not just within a single novel.

Her discoveries increase in scale and importance with each book and culminate in the ultimate scientific coup in Within the Sanctuary of Wings (which I will not spoil).

And oh, the politics. Every nation in the series is an expy of an actual period-accurate nation. Isabella’s native Scirland represents England, for example, and Yelang represents China. But Marie Brennan doesn’t turn them into empty caricatures of the real thing. She treats each culture with respectful and laboriously thorough detail—even those cultures she invented from scratch (did I mention she’s an anthropologist?).

The setting is based on Victorian England, and much of the main conflict in the series (and some of the humor) deals with gender politics and society’s tendency to minimize women’s contributions in any field. Many of the struggles can still be seen today. Women face glass ceilings and are given less recognition and compensation in both corporate and academic circles. It’s just as stupid and frustrating in real life as it is in the series.

Isabella wades into this battle head-first at every opportunity. She butts heads with stubborn patriarchs who refuse to give her her due, and local leaders who dismiss her for her gender. It’s a struggle for her to even win over a fellow academic and traveler. Her bitter rivalry with the greater academic society of Scirland covers the length of the entire series, who keep cutting her down for the most ridiculous of reasons.

A major part of Isabella’s struggles is her identity as a woman and the prejudices of each society she encounters. One memorable encounter even sets her up as a lesbian demon. This results in some hilarious escapades as she tries to circumvent local convention while still keeping her eyes on the draconic prize.

The Memoirs of Lady Trent is, at its core, about a woman and her love of science. It’s a joy to watch Isabella pursue dragons with such reckless abandon. The series, which spans fifty years in-universe, speeds by thanks to the brilliant narration, powerful main characters, clever plotting, and thorough world-building.

Marie Brennan has successfully tackled the challenges of portraying science in fiction, gender politics, female empowerment, and narrative cohesion in five powerful volumes that should serve as an example to other authors who want to follow in her footsteps.

As Sir Isaac Newton said, “If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”

And the Lady Trent series is one of those giants.

If you liked this post, you might also like Augur’s review of Kelly Robson’s Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach.