---

---

It’s been many years since I read Moby-Dick, so I don’t remember many details. What mostly stuck with me was, of course, Captain Ahab’s fiery quest for vengeance and the fact that Herman Melville could switch from incredibly detailed descriptions of whaling to hilarious sketches of the crew. Reading Melville over several years (including my favorite story of his, “Bartelby, the Scrivener”) cemented his genius in my mind. So it’s no surprise that writers from around the world would want to pick up on his most famous work and make of it something all their own.

Perplies seems quite prolific in his native German, having written, among other novels and stories, installments in the Perry Rhodan and Star Trek universes. Only Black Leviathan, though, has been translated into English. This Moby-Dick-but-with-dragons tale is a pretty straightforward fantasy revenge story. While serving on a floating dragon-hunting ship, a young man named Adaron and his crew encounter a monstrous dragon in the Cloudmere (the misty expanse off the coast that seems limitless and contains dragons and other creatures). The dragon emerges out of the clouds and attacks the ship on which Adaron and his new wife are serving and kills most of the crew. Only Adaron and his winged crewmate Ialrist (a Taijirin) survive.

As the story progresses, we learn that special crystals (called “kyrillian crystals”) grow naturally around the coastal towns and the mountains floating in the Cloudmere and can keep everything from said mountains to ships aloft. This technology was introduced to the humans by another species among whom they live (the Nondurier) many years before. In fact, humans, Taijirin, Nondurier, and many other species co-exist (sometimes peacefully, sometimes tensely) in the coastal town of Skargakar and the areas around it. Black Leviathan, then, is its own contained universe with its own religions, magic, and traditions. The characters, though, behave very much like humans, with their jealousies, desire for vengeance, and hope for love and companionship.

We’re left wondering what happened to Adaron when we meet yet another young man (Lian), this time a kyrillian crystal carver down in Skargakar. After his often-drunk dragon-hunting father (retired) is killed by one of the town bullies, and Lian exacts revenge by killing the son of that powerful man, the young man realizes that he needs to leave town, fast. Bringing his father’s spear with its mysterious runes, and his best friend, with him on a ship called the Carryola, Lian relaxes a bit, thinking that danger is behind them. After all, hunting various kinds of dragons, from silverwings to bronzenecks, does carry its risks, but it’s generally not too difficult if one has a good crew. Every part of a dragon is then broken down and used as food or clothing or weaponry, sold in the markets in the coastal towns.

Of course, it’s never that simple. Lian and his friend find out quickly that Captain Adaron (yes, that Adaron) is on a mission: to find and kill the massive and dangerous dragon that killed his wife. Adaron plans to stop at nothing to carry out his mission, though along the way, the ship will still hunt regular dragons and process them. The name of this dragon, “Gargantuan” (also called the “Black Leviathan”) is never far from the crew’s lips:

Lian had heard the name before, in a legend told by a jäger [hunter] at Cliff House. He couldn’t remember the details, only that Gargantuan was no ordinary dragon. He was one of the Firstborn, a direct descendant of the Starborn–whatever that ws supposed to mean. But from the way the hunter told the tale, Lian had been sure it wasn’t true. Such a terrible creature couldn’t possibly exist. (111)

Perplies spends a lot of time and detail discussing the different crew members and their work on the ship, as well as the hand-to-hand battles that the jäger’s have with various dragons that happen by. We learn about how the crew uses the special crystals to maneuver the ship and keep it aloft, while other members shoot the equivalent of harpoons to capture the dragons in mid-air. Then, hunters like Lian literally jump onto the dragons and drive their spears into the creatures’ heads or necks. At one point, during a fight with a dragon, Liam falls overboard and finds himself on a strange floating island with magical mushrooms and rocks, as well as frightening, zombie-like creatures. With the help of some kyrillian crystals and a blanket, he manages to fly back up into the Cloudmere, only to be captured by some Taijirin and held as a prisoner in their city. A daring rescue on the part of his crew allows Lian (and a slave named Kris) to escape and return to the Carryola.

Eventually, Captain Adaron believes that they have found the trail of the Black Leviathan and it’s all hands on deck. Even a mutiny can’t stop Adaron in his mad quest to exact revenge, and a much-diminished crew sails into uncharted territory, hot on the heels of this massive dragon. A magical vision that Lian has had (following a trip to a floating island) makes him question exactly what his role is in killing the dragon. Other questions follow: did the dragon that destroyed Adaron’s ship attack out of malice or was it protecting its territory? Is it wrong to kill such an ancient, powerful creature that never ventures near land?

Perplies paints a compelling picture of a world like our own in many ways but possessing its own unique magic and creatures. The dragons of Black Leviathan are as varied in their body types and colors as the humanoid creatures living on land, and the entire civilization has grown around learning about, hunting, and processing dragons. What Lian’s journey reveals, however, is that one can go too far in hunting a creature of the natural world, especially when it’s only in a misguided quest for vengeance. Black Leviathan is an entertaining tale of vengeance and love, and though its pretty formulaic, it’s still a good read.