Rise of the Earth Dragon

This book has it all for the feisty at heart - dragons, a king, wizards and magic; PLUS it is the first book in a series!   Think How to Train Your Dragon by Cressida Cowell for the younger set.  It is engaging and simply loaded with illustrations.  This series by Tracey West is part of the Branches books put out by Scholastic.  They fill a tremendous need for illustrated chapter books for those children ready to move on from beginning readers, but not yet up to a 100+ pages with no pictures.  The story is fun, entertaining, and one I found myself enjoying as my child read it aloud.