History Literature / Worldwar

* MotiveDecay: David Nussboym was originally a Lizard collaborator because he felt they were the best hope for Jewish survival in Poland, and because he hated the Nazis enough to override his concern that the entire would would become an outpost of the Race. Mordechai himself admits that David is an honorable and brave man, and that just because they have opposing viewpoints does not make him a greedy and self-serving fool. However, once David is sent to a Soviet ''gulag'' he becomes a collaborator solely to support himself, and betrays friends and enemies alike to the head of the camp in order to advance his own agenda. This would normally count as [[CharacterDevelopment a change in the character because of his surroundings]], but his own thoughts and memories now reflect on how he did the same things back in Poland and throughout his life, and his very nature is self-serving.

* OneWorldOrder: Averted. While humanity at large works together to fight the Race, it quickly becomes clear that the notion gets cast aside, since no one is all that eager to let any particular nation, group or ideology take charge over all mankind. It's telling that even after several decades, the human-controlled portions of Earth are still divided between nation-states, albeit most of that territory is part of one of four major powers (USA, USSR, German ''Reich'' and the Japanese Empire).

* GoingNative: The males of the Conquest Fleet [[DownplayedTrope never completely go over to the Big Ugly way of thinking]], but they have all been so changed by life on Earth that [[StrangerInAFamiliarLand they are unable to integrate into the cities established by the newcomers from the Colonization Fleet]].

** In an inverted example, two Race hatchlings are [[RaisedByHumans raised as humans]] by Sam Yeager, who names them [[MickeyMouse Mickey]] and [[WesternAnimation/DonaldDuck Donald]]. Though they hide it somewhat better than Kassquit, they also experience significant emotional distress at living in the wrong society.

** In the first novel Atvar reacts to radio signals from Earth by thinking someone else had beaten them to the punch, hinting they brought so many weapons for this situation... That they considered next to impossible, as they believed themselves far more advanced than anyone else in the universe.

* PointDefenseless: The Race has anti-missile missiles as their main protection against enemy missiles and rockets. However, they fail to do anything about the Dora rail cannon rounds, as their shells are too thick. They also aren't 100% reliable against much more primitive human rockets, which the Germans and the Americans start using. Other close-in weapon systems are mentioned, but they are stated to be ineffective against rockets and missiles and do little to protect their starships.
** By the War of 1965 the Race has taken steps to correct this, as shown when Drucker launches the Reich's last attack on the orbiting starships and is foiled by an autocannon shooting down the missiles.

* WeAREStrugglingTogether: Despite the fact that they are united against a common enemy, the Axis and the Allies do not exactly like each other, and still engage in diplomatic and sometimes literal skullduggery.

* SlippingAMickey: Males of the Race who have been aroused but cannot find any females in heat start spiking drinks with ginger and giving them to females to spur them into heat.

** Played with. The Race tries ''not'' to use nuclear weapons in order to keep Earth as clean as possible. They do destroy Berlin and Washington, D.C. early on, but their strategy there was intimidation and retaliation, since they do not want to go overboard and end up wrecking the entire planet. After the humans develop nukes of their own the two species settle into a horrific boxing match of sorts; for each nuke that humanity detonates - sometimes within their own Lizard-occupied cities like Miami and Saratov - the Race nukes a city in the corresponding "not-empire". The lizards eventually realize that humans would rather waste the whole planet rather than submit to the Race and sue for peace.

* StrangerInAFamiliarLand: The closing chapters of ''Homeward Bound'' have Sam returning to Earth in the 2030s after being put into cold sleep in the mid/late 20th century. One thing that surprises him is the relaxed attitude towards sexuality: his family goes to the theater to see a monster movie, and they're all quite surprised when it features an explicit sex scene between the monster and the female lead. Johnathan gets another shock when he realizes that the movie's aged professor character is played by Creator/MattDamon, who had just entered the public eye as a young man when Johnathan went on ice in the late 90s.

* SmartBall: Once David Goldfarb decides to no longer be Roundbush's pawn in the ginger business and emigrates to Canada, he takes every possible proactive step to protect himself and his family. This includes informing the police of all threats and suspicious activity, using the research and development company he works for to develop technology to let him identify his tormentors over the phone, and making specific and detailed reports after each subsequent attempt on his life. This results in the arrest of four armed and dangerous individuals before they manage to make good on their threats, earns him and his company a large revenue stream and gratitude from the local police force, and the incarceration of the one person to actually get close enough to follow through on his threats. All from taking simple and common sense steps to protect himself using publicly and privately available resources.

* ChuckCunninghamSyndrome: Liu Han is a major point-of-view character in the ''Worldwar'' and ''Colonization'' series. In ''Homeward Bound'', she gets one mention by Ttomalss remembering how Liu Han had him kidnapped back during the events of ''Worldwar''. Neither Liu Han's nor her daughter Liu Mei's fate is known or remarked upon.

Finally, a standalone book, ''Homeward Bound'', was added to the series. A whole bunch of humans get on a human-made starship and head towards the Race's homeworld, in an effort to negotiate a lasting peace between humans and the Race. The Race, for its part, is still contemplating the possibility of utterly destroying Earth to end the threat to the Empire, even though it would mean killing hundreds of millions of their own colonists. But in the end, they discover that it's already far too late to contain the humans, and they need to begin adapting to compete, [[spoiler: especially since ''more'' Humans show up at Home in a ''second'' starship, this one having artificial gravity and a Faster-Than-Light stardrive]].

* ConflictBall: Not once do Major Samuel Yeager or Lieutenant Colonel Glen Johnson receive official cease-and-desist orders through the proper chain of command. Instead high-ranking officers go straight to intimidation, blustering, and (with Yeager) ''attempted murder'', which only prompts Yeager and Johnson to dig deeper. The characters themselves state that a simple explanation of "Sorry, that's classified" from their immediate superiors would have ended their nosing around with them none the wiser.

* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: Emperor Risson, whom we finally meet in ''Homeward Bound'', is very level-headed and sensible in his dealings with the humans and with Atvar. This actually stands in stark contrast to many Race authority figures, who tend to start out LawfulStupid before a long and painful education.

* InformedAbility: Sam Yeager is constantly mentioned to be the only human capable of thinking as the Race do, but few actual examples are provided of him doing it. Most of his "insights" are common sense and real-world techniques of communicating between people who don't speak the same language (generally pantomime, slow repetition and emotive expressions/sounds). It may simply be that Sam is actually willing to ''try' communicating with the Race, whereas just about everybody else (especially in the military) would just as soon kill them and call it a day.

* DesecratingTheDead: While preparing for the Lizard invasion of Warsaw, Moishe Russie happens to catch sight of German troops manning an anti-aircraft gun set up in a cemetery.
One of the soldiers takes a brief break to go to the bathroom, and Moishe decides that seeing a German soldier [[ExcrementStatement pissing on Jewish graves]] and ''laughing about it'' is the sign he needs to assist the Lizards.

* NoSell: What happens when the Race tries to use anti-missile defences, intended for use against fragile and sophisticated guided missiles, against the big dumb ''[[UpToEleven seven-ton]]'' Dora rounds. To say the Lizards are flabbergasted is an understatement.