I saw the first movie years ago before ever reading these books and I LOVED IT. I was enamored with Toothless and I loved the action and the characters in the movies (and shows). Someone from work recommended that if I were to read this book, I should listen to the audiobook as David Tenant's narration is amazing. I have to agree - he does a fantastic job providing not only Hiccup's voice, but Toothless and Stoick the Vast's voice in a way that breathes life into the characters. 

Going from being a huge fan of the movies and shows to reading the book was a big change as I realized that there's pretty big differences between the two. Whereas the movie portrays Hiccup’s village as dragon-killing Vikings, whereas in the book on the island of Berk,

almost EVERYONE is a dragon tamer. If they've been initiated in the Viking Clan (of which there are a few enemy Clans) then they've managed to catch and raise their very own dragon.

Snotlout, Hiccup's cousin, manages to

capture a Monstrous Nightmare dragon - of which is typically reserved for the Chief's son - who is Hiccup.

In the movie, Toothless is a large, and terrifying dragon known as the Night Fury. He's goofy, lovable, and protective of the other dragons and Hiccup. In the book - he's

actually a tiny dragon. Hiccup and Fishlegs lie that he's in fact a rare and deadly dragon breed

. Toothless (book version) requires bargaining to do work, and due to his size prefers to curl up in Hiccup's shirt avoid work if he can. Besides the imagery of that being adorable, Hiccups

is able to speak to Toothless and other dragons in Dragonese - something that no one else in the tribe is able to do.

I found it a little hard to get into right away with the beginning feeling slower than the rest of the book. When jumping into a cast of characters I did have trouble initially following who was who beyond what I knew of movie counterpart names. I probably still love the movie more for the feats of engineering and fighting but I love the witty lines and getting to know more about Hiccup.