Dragonhaven

Jake Mendoza grows up at the Makepeace Institute of Integrated Dragon Studies, which sits inside Smokehill National Park. The park protects roughly two hundred draco australiensis, a species that no longer exists anywhere in the wild. Opinion about the preserve is sharply divided. Critics argue that dragons are dangerous and too costly to maintain, and they want the animals destroyed. Conservationists and supporters counter that no dragon has ever been recorded eating a person, that the species is a remarkable product of specialized evolution, and that it deserves protection. Dragons can reach eighty feet in length and breathe fire.

During his first overnight trip alone into the wilderness, Jake comes across a dragon lying dead beside a man she has killed. He understands that the discovery could bring disaster to Smokehill. The man was plainly a poacher who attacked the dragon first, but that detail is likely to vanish in the public uproar against dragons. Then something more pressing draws his attention. The dragon has just given birth, and one of her young is still alive. The choice Jake makes next will shape the futures of the baby dragon, the mother's surviving family, and Smokehill itself.