My Father's Dragon

My Father's Dragon

Book cover
Author	Ruth Stiles Gannett
Illustrator	Ruth Chrisman Gannett
Language	English
Series	My Father's Dragon trilogy
Genre	Children's novel
Publisher	Random House
Publication date	1948
Publication place	United States
Media type	Print (hardback & paperback)
Followed by	Elmer and the Dragon

My Father's Dragon is a 1948 children's novel by Ruth Stiles Gannett, with illustrations by her stepmother Ruth Chrisman Gannett. The novel is about a young boy, who runs away to Wild Island to rescue a baby dragon.

Both a Newbery Honor Book and an ALA Notable Book, it is the first book of a trilogy whose other titles are Elmer and the Dragon and The Dragons of Blueland. All three were published in a 50-year anniversary edition as Three Tales of My Father's Dragon.

A Japanese animated film based on the original novel and its illustrations premiered in 1997, while the character Boris the Dragon was produced into a plush toy designed by Sunflower Publishing Company and released in the fall of the same year. A second animated film, based on the trilogy in general, with animation production by Cartoon Saloon, is being produced for Netflix for release in 2022.

The narrative mode of the original novel is unusual in that the narrator refers to the protagonist only as "my father", giving the impression that this is a true story that happened long ago. The other two books in the trilogy are narrated in the third person.

The illustrations are by Ruth Chrisman Gannett and hand-drawn in black and white with a grease crayon on grained paper. Gannett also illustrated a number of other children's and adult books, including Tortilla Flat by John Steinbeck.

Awards, nominations, and recognition

My Father's Dragon was one runner-up for the 1949 Newbery Medal, by which the American Library Association annually recognizes the year's best American children's book. It was also nominated for the Ambassador Book Award in 1948.

Based on a 2007 online poll, the National Education Association listed it as one of "Teachers' Top 100 Books for Children". In 2012 it was ranked number 49 among all-time children's novels in a survey published by School Library Journal.

Film, TV, or theatrical adaptations

The book was made into a Japanese animated film, Elmer's Adventure: My Father's Dragon, which premiered in 1997. It starred the voices of Yu-ki of the pop group TRF as Elmer Elevator and Megumi Hayashibara as Boris the Dragon.

In 2011, the book was adapted into an American children's stage musical by Travis Tagart.

In 2018, Netflix announced that the book will be adapted into an animated feature film of the same name by Irish animation studio Cartoon Saloon for a 2022 release. Nora Twomey was announced as the director with Meg LeFauve as the film's screenwriter.