Dragon's Curse (The Dragon and the Scholar Volume 1) by H. L. Burke

   Shannon is a young lady who wants adventure.  She has never been far from where she grew up and wishes to see more of the world.  She wants excitement.  When her friend Martin is asked to send a healer to Regone for King Edmond, she knows this could be her chance.  But Martin warns her that Regone is a cursed place.  I don't think even he knew just how true that actually was.
   On reaching Regone, Shannon is immediately introduced to Roderick, a knight who thinks well of himself and happens to take a keen interest in Shannon.  Being a free woman though, Shannon has the ability to choose who she wants to be with.  Edmond, on the other hand, is a young king, but is sullen and hate driven after the death of his brother at the hand of a dragon.  Edmond is bent on killing any dragon that comes around.  However, dragons are very hard to kill and the king is in no shape to be out slaying dragons.  He was severely burned by one after he went out seeking revenge for his brother, Ewan.  But it had not ended well and only a handful of knights came back alive.  Shannon was here to try and help the suffering king.  But she has a way of saying what she thinks and feels about things that are not exactly suitable for the times, and especially not suited for a king.  She begins to get curious about Ewan and the circumstances surrounding his death.
   Unfortunately life in Regone is rather lonely for Shannon.  She doesn't really have any friends and constantly has to fend off Roderick and his unwanted advances.  To make things worse, the king's distant cousin, Adonna, constantly hovers over Edmond and interferes often with her treatments.  Adonna seems kind of like a creepy woman; one that Shannon wants to stay far away from.  One day though, a dragon is seen in Regone and it stays.  Edmond is crazy over it being there and wants to get rid of it.  Roderick decides he will go slay this dragon and if he does he wants Shannon to marry him.  Shannon protests wildly about it and decides to do something drastic.  She goes to see the dragon herself.  It turns out that he is much better company than anyone else she has met in Regone so far and starts visiting him on a regular basis.  The dragon tends to like her company as well.  Shannon isn't like other women.
   A large twist comes in the story when it is revealed who that dragon really is and what happened to this man to turn him into a dragon.  The circumstances are very strange and lots of things don't add up to Shannon.  The deeper she digs though, the more her life is in danger.  The one that she, the dragon, and her friend Martin are looking for is right under their noses and they have no idea.

   This book is very clean and would be safe for your younger teens to read.  It was a really enjoyable read about castles and knights, magic and curses.  And to top it off you have a heroine that falls in love with a cursed dragon!  However strange it may seem, she sees something else within this dragon that later on in the book reveals itself.  Shannon is a great heroine too.  She is very forward for the times.  She likes to speak her mind and have intelligent conversations.  Brutish men are not her thing and she is in no hurry to settle down with the first knight to ask for her hand.  She is willing to believe in the good in all people and dragons while not being fooled by them either.  Funny enough, she is the only one to be able to win the heart of a cursed prince who doesn't like the normal silly women around him.  I enjoyed this book so much I sat down and read it in one night!  You should check it out!  The next in the series will be coming out in May!