Dinotopia: Difference between revisions

 

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* '''''Dinotopia: A Land Apart from Time''''' - Arthur Denison and his son William are shipwrecked and brought via dolphins to Dinotopia. With their new ''Protoceratops'' translator Bix, they travel across the island and learn about its culture and customs. Arthur learns about the scientific achievements of the Dinotopians, while Will and his new [[Love Interest]] Sylvia train to be [[Dragon Rider|Skybax riders]] together. Has a [[Chekhov's Gunman]] in Lee Crabb, a cranky dinosaur hating man who becomes a recurring villain in later books.

* '''''Dinotopia: First Flight''''' - A [[Prequel]] to the other books that takes place in ancient times. Gideon Altaire is a citizen of the technologically advanced city of Poseidos who is discontent with living in a culture of artificial dinosaurs. He discovers a ''Scaphognatus'' named Razzamult who tells him of a plan to invade the Dinotopian mainland and replace all the dinosaurs there with robots. Gideon rescues a group of captive pterosaurs, steals the [[Mineral MacGuffin|Ruby Sunstone]] that powers the attack force, and escapes to the mainland. There he [[Going Native|Goes Native]] to help repel the invasion, in the process becoming the first human to ride a Quetzalcoatlus.

* '''''Dinotopia: Journey to Chandara''''' - Arthur Denison's exploits have caught the attention of the [[Shrouded in Myth|mysterious]] emperor of the isolated city of Chandara. He and Bix are invited to tour the city, but their invitations are stolen by none other than Lee Crabb, forcing them to sneak past the border guards and find their way into the city through other means. Along the way, they meet a variety of people and dinosaurs.

 

* [[Advanced Ancient Acropolis]] - Poseidos.

* [[Amazing Technicolor Population]] - Where most paleontological art plays the [[Real Is Brown]] trope for all it's worth (probably because the influential paleo-artist Charles R. Knight did), Gurney likes to subvert it. A lot. ([[It's Always Mardi Gras in New Orleans|It's always Mardi Gras in Chandara]].)

* [[And Now for Something Completely Different]]: ''The World Beneath'' is written in third person, switches perspectives between Arthur and Will, and involves having to stop a real antagonist.

** The idea behind the dinosaur language was sound, at least at first. The first book stated fairly early that most dinosaurs speak their own language because they lack the physical structures to speak human languages. Protoceratops and the smaller pterosaurs are the few exceptions, having more parrot-like vocal cords that allow them to pronounce human languages: its why the dimorphodons are used to relay messages, and Bix is an ambassador, able to speak several languages. The skybaxes have different vocal structures again, and so have their own language. A side-plot of the book ''Windchaser'' is the that the eponymous skybax is the first of his kind to learn human languages, and becoming a translator for the skybax.

** Though it should be noted that by "dinosaur language", the first book meant a universal language for all dinosaur species; something very close to the definition of Animal Talk except, as noted above, specific to your Linnean classification. (In other words, imagine humans talking with cats talking with whales talking with aardvarks talking with fruitbats talking with desmostylans talking with tapirs talking with... and it's easy to see why Gurney retconned this.)