If you’ve never heard of the Temeraire book series, read my introduction in my reviews of book 5 and book 6

![Cover of Crucible of Gold by Naomi Novik. It features an iridescent green and purple bird with a long neck and spread wings. The elegant title lettering weaves through the design, with the author’s name in script below. A muted green background shows faint clouds and a distant estate.]https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1736709524i/223533001.jpg

Crucible of Gold is book 7 in the Temeraire series, and this time dragon Temeraire and his bonded rider Laurence make a journey to and in South America.

At this point I really wish the author had used exactly this Tin Tin style naming for the episodes, as I remember book 6 as “Temeraire in Australia”, book 4 as “Temeraire in Africa”, etc.

As in previous books involving travel to other continents, here again they discover a whole new type of dragon - this time covered in featherlike scales. As interesting as the different types of dragons are, what I like even more is how the different human societies have integrated with the dragons. Where in Europe at the start of the series the dragons are seen as “beasts” to be controlled by their riders and used for war, most of the other continents treat the dragons as whole creatures on their own. Here in South America it’s the dragons that lead societies of “their” humans, whom they are very protective of.

Like in all books in this series, this leads to a lot of adventures, political intrigue (and a mutiny), and the occassional battle between dragons. 🐉⚔️

I liked that Laurence is back in the military, rather than constantly feeling sorry for himself. I also liked the continuing evolution of Temeraire’s feelings about dragons, their place in society, and justice in general.

I intend to finish the final two books in this series in the next few weeks. Next up: Temeraire in Japan (at least that’s what it seems like from the first few pages).