I’m finally back at the book reviews just in time for Spring! Last year for Cannonball Read 11, I read Ruby Dixon’s Ice Planet Barbarians, which was a steamy hot tale of alien-human with a great mix of humor and heart. I discovered she has another set of books that involves DRAGONS!!! and picked up Fire in His Blood from the library.
In the first book of the Fireblood Dragon series, we meet our main character Claudia in jail for scavenging outside the bounds of the city. She is worried about her sister Amy, especially since most women turn to prostitution or scavenging to make ends meet. Makeshift militia governments have emerged after hordes of dragons wreaked havoc across the globe. There are different color dragons, which they have tracked and learned when to hide based on their past behavior. It’s not much, but it’s helped them survive. I immediately thought about the film Reign of Fire with Christian Bale and shaved bald McConaughey. There is a bit more computer tech in this apocalyptic version of Earth, but very rare since most of the world has burned. Most men are in the militia or traders while the woman simply tries to survive it seems. Claudia and Amy have been living in an old school bus for the last few years with a female friend.
Instead of banishment, the asshole mayor lets the military offer Claudia up as bait the dragons. They give her a bath to make sure she smells nice and leaves her essentially naked on a roof in the wastelands. The jerks don’t prepare her mentally and say this is the only way to keep her sister safe. And then, they just run away when the dragon starts flying towards the roof. Moments before she thinks she will get eaten by a golden dragon, it shifts into a human man named Kael. Yes, he still has some tiny horns and tougher skin than most males. But he also has very nice abs and really wants to protect Claudia. She is understandably traumatized when they meet but eventually realizes that Kael would rather kiss her rather than eat her. They don’t speak the same language, so understanding and the mating is not immediate between the two characters. Once they do connect, we learn that the dragons fell into their world through a dimensional rift in the sky by accident. They shift into their dragon “battle form” when they need to fight or attract another mate. The new dimension has caused them all to go mad and especially the female dragons who are go into literal heat and want to burn everything. I can somewhat relate.
Although I prefer Dixon’s other series, this one was interesting. I didn’t empathize as well with the main character. She had spunk, but she seemed to whine for nearly the entire book. Her fear for her sister is the main obstacle of the romance, which I totally get. I was most interested in Kael and the dragon-human backstory. Where did the rift come from? I’m so curious! If you’re looking for sexy times, this book does not disappoint once you hit the half-way mark. I would recommend this to anyone who reads shifter romances and looking for an apocalyptic setting akin to Mad Max.