Published in 1978, the Hugo and Nebula award winning Dreamsnake was lauded as a feminist reworking of the heroic quest. From the perspective of a reader in the 1990's its a solid blend of fantasy and genetic science set on Earth long after the nuclear holocaust. Snake is a young healer who travels and offers aid by using the venom of her genetically modified serpents. The rarest of them is the dreamsnake Grass who's venom offers a peaceful and painless death to those beyond help. Snake is willing to risk her life to find more dreamsnakes when she learns of an outlaw stronghold that may have some. What she finds is beyond her expectation and the answer to an old biological puzzle.

Much like King Xavier, aka The Immortal, this series just keeps plugging along despite the fact that the plot has reached multiple points where it could have been wrapped up nicely. I can't help but feel that this series is going to keep going until it ends in ruin, but luckily for us that point still hasn't arrived. Book 8, King of the Wastes, centers around the fact that the King has come to the conclusion that the Vanguard Islands are not sustainable. He knows that their recent victories have resulted in a population size that they can no longer provide for, not to mention that the structures that compose the Vanguard Islands are desperately in need of replacement parts that can't be manufactured. They need to expand their reach and a supply chain will need to be set up to allow for scavenging of resources from a much wider area. King Xavier has his eye on establishing an outpost near the Panama Canal in order to provide a means to scavenge both coasts of the Americas, but that idea is not new. It was also tried by his predecessor and it resulted in failure. The difference this time around is that King Xavier has the ability to once again call upon the Hell Divers to risk their lives so humanity can survive

If J.K. Rowling and H.P. Lovecraft had a love child it would be Naomi Novik's Scholomance series. At the end of A Deadly Education El and Orion had survived their attempt to help that year's graduating seniors but wouldn't know if they were successful until their own upcoming Graduation. El is determined to concentrate on preparing for the Graduation Hall gauntlet with her allies, Aadhya and Liu, despite her attraction to Orion and her mother's cryptic warning to "stay away from Orion Lake". Senior year is supposed to be rough but it feels like the school itself is trying to kill her and it apparently wants something from her. If only she can figure out what that is before she dies. It turns out that death is indeed a strong possibility as she starts working on an insane plan to save every student and to destroy The Scholomance itself. She intends to be the very last graduate to exit through the portal or die trying.

As fans of this series know well, Joe Ledger's psyche was fractured by the traumatic experiences of his youth and he is barely able to keep it together on a good day. That makes him rather ill equipped to handle the devastating events that ended the last book, Rage, and it is obvious that he will never be the same. The question then becomes, what will happen to Joe's mind if he loses the battle that rages within him? And then, what damage will he do to those around him? Those questions and more weigh heavily on the minds of everyone that cares about him, but at the same time they all know that Rogue Team International is not able to stand against their current enemies without Joe Ledger. It is a no-win scenario for everyone involved and the stakes have never been higher.

Now that the war is over, it is time to right the wrongs of the prior generations and to undo the damage done by the Magi. It is no small task to establish a new society, especially when it is is being built upon the ashes of two old ones, as both former kingdoms still maintain a lot of strong feelings and biases that don't just disappear because the war is over. Kirron hopes to establish a new role for the dragon jousters in a society no longer dominated by war, while Aket-ten complicates his life as she strives for equal female representation amongst the jousters. Old prejudices die hard though as female dragon jousters is not a concept that Tia or Alta would have been willing to embrace. As everyone pours their hearts into finding a way to build something better for the future they quickly come to realize that they may not have the time to do so as there are other threats out there ready to pounce on them while they are in a vulnerable state.

The existence of vampires and demons in Toronto suggests that Blood Price fits into the urban fantasy genre but since it was published in 1991 it predates the tropes associated with that genre. Vicki Nelson was an amazing homicide detective until she started losing her sight so she left the force and got her license as a PI. One night she's at the subway station when an impossible murder takes place. It is part of a series of brutal serial killings that the press call the Vampire Murders even though everyone knows that's impossible. Henry Fitzroy is the bastard son of Henry VIII, a vampire, and romance novelist who wants to stop the killer because he doesn't want to face the modern equivalent of a pitchfork wielding mob. The killer is actually something worse than a vampire, a demon, and it will take Vicki's investigative skills and Henry's supernatural powers to stop it from releasing Hell on Earth.

The Magi have emerged from the shadows and their power is now openly wielded across both Tia and Alta as the war rages on. Any who dare oppose them are swiftly met with retribution and the people of both countries are suffering greatly. Kirron and his new generation of dragon jousters set their focus on building up Sanctuary in the ruins of an old desert city as a safe haven for those in need. With roots on both sides of the war, the main characters all come together to form the leadership of Sanctuary and they choose to welcome people from both Tia and Alta into their midst. It doesn't take long for this policy to stretch their limited resources too thin as their population continues to swell with refugees.  Amidst the challenges of merging these two cultures together, the dragon jousters are pushed to their limits running night time missions to save as many people as possible. Unfortunately they are too few in number to save everyone. Eventually their efforts catch the attention of the Magi and then things take a turn for the worse.

With book 2 the focus of the story shifts to the other side of the war as Kiron, formerly known as Vetch, returns to his homeland and starts to learn about his own people. Born on a farm and captured by the enemy as a child, Kiron has never really experienced Altan society, but he is about to get a crash course. He hopes that his return will help swing the war in the favor of the Altans once he shares all of the secrets that he learned as a dragon-boy in Tia, but he also knows that he is still too young, as is his dragon, to engage in the conflict directly. Not that he would want to at this point either because even though Ari helped him return home, he also issued him a warning: If the two ever meet in battle, Ari will do his duty for Tia. Kiron owes Ari his life and he has no plans to just throw it away by going up against him in battle because Ari is still the best dragon jouster that has ever lived.

Vetch is a Altan serf and the favorite whipping boy of Khefti the fat, his Tian master. Tia and Alta have been at war for generations and a captured serf like Vetch is lower than a slave in Tian society, with less rights to boot. Vetch was born on the land that is now owned by Khefti and that means he has no hope of ever leaving it. He lives his life fueled by hatred of Khefti and his only dreams involve bad things happening to his overweight master. Then one day a Dragon Jouster named Ari comes out of the sky and stops at Khefti's well for a drink of water. This prevents Vetch from fetching the water that Khefti ordered him to get, so of course he receives a beating as punishment. When Ari witnesses this treatment he decides to take Vetch with him and turn him into a dragon-boy as is his right as a member of the King's army. Vetch knows nothing of dragons but he is accustomed to hard work and he intends to do his best even for his new master. Life as the dragon-boy assigned to Kashet, Ari's dragon, is definitely an improvement for Vetch. However, he still feels very alone as the only dragon-boy in the compound who is a serf, and he still harbors a deep resentment of all Tians for killing his father.

The Raven God's vessel, a possessed raven, is dead. According to the agreement between the people of Vastai and the Raven God, their ruler, the Raven's Lease, must now sacrifice himself to empower the Raven while it incubates in a new egg. The Lease's Heir, his son Mawat, returns from his military post at the border to find that his father has vanished without being sacrificed and his uncle claims to be the new Lease. It's supposed to be impossible to usurp the Lease so Mawat is certain something is very rotten in Vastai. Another god, Strength and Patience of the Hills, tells the story of Mawat's revenge intermixed with its own history to Mawat's faithful retainer Eolo. Only Eolo senses the doom descending on Vastai.