story identification - Help me identify this novel about a boy with a dragon egg

This book popped back into my mind the other day, and I can't for the life of me remember its title or author. The cover was an image of a baby dragon emerging from an egg as a boy watches, amazed.

I don't remember much of the plot, except that it involved a boy of primary-school age obtaining this strange (rainbow-coloured?) egg from somewhere, a baby dragon hatching from the egg, and then the troubles the boy had trying to keep a little dragon as a pet. The story took place in the real world, not a fantasy world, i.e. the existence of a dragon was very remarkable. :)

To clarify after a couple comments: the baby dragon was kitten- or cat-sized for the part of the book I remember; this wasn't a case of a "baby" dragon still being much larger than the boy, D&D-style.

I read this book sometime in the (probably mid-)1990s. I suspect it was published around then, and I may have got it from one of the Scholastic book sales they'd run at my school. Anyway, it was a children's/YA book, not an adult novel.

Answer

Probably Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher, by Bruce Coville

cover

From Wikipedia:

Jeremy Thatcher knows a thing or two about raising animals-after all, his dad is a veterinarian. But after he leaves Mr. Elives' magic shop with a strange marbled egg, it soon becomes clear that this is one pet he wasn't prepared for! How is he supposed to keep a flame-breathing dragon with razor-sharp teeth and out-of-control appetite in his bedroom? If the playful baby dragon is ever to grow up to become a magnificent beast of myth and legend, it needs Jeremy. And though he doesn't know it yet, Jeremy needs a dragon.

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