Written by Sharon Green between 1996 and 2002, The Blending takes place in a Constructed World where Every One is a Super, capable of using Elemental Powers. There are two critical details to their magic system; everybody has a Talent and an Aspect. and are called Adepts. Their Talent determines how much magic they can use, with most people having a Low Talent to such a degree that they might as well not have it, to those who have a High Talent and are capable of immensely impressive magical feats. Their Aspect determines which of the four classical elements and Spirit magic that they can use. Finally, their magic allows them to create a Mental Fusion known as a blending, which combines the magical aspects of five individuals to create an entity that is akin to Astral Projection.
In the Empire of Gandistra, where every twenty-five years, a competition is held to determine who will hold the Fivefold Throne as the Ruling Blending, five people from all walks of life from every corner of the empire are brought together. Tamrissa Domon, the sheltered and youngest daughter of a cruel and ambitious merchant, is a Fire Adept, fresh from a terrible, abusive marriage; she sees the yearly competitions as an escape from her parents and their planned second marriage for her. Earth Adept Lorand Coll is the youngest son of a farming family on the edge of the empire's border with a neighboring country and seeks adventure and freedom from the backbreaking, thankless work of a commoner's life. Noble Air Adept Clarion Mardimil has lived his entire life in a bubble, smothered by his mother's love to the point where he has no idea what the world is truly like. Seafaring Vallant Ro is a Water Adept, the son of a loving merchant couple, deathly afraid of small, indoor spaces, and only longs to spend his days on his ship. Lastly is Jovvi Hafford, a famous Courtesan who only wants to open up her own residence and take control of her life for the first time. They are thrown together by the nobles, who have gleefully taken control of every aspect of the competition, all in an effort to keep a stranglehold on every facet of their society, from the throne itself to the lowliest peasant.
Yet, it is a twenty-fifth year, and the nobles have set the stage for a massive conflict that even they can't control, as the five come together in order to survive threats, known and unknown. Even if it means claiming a throne none of them could have dreamed of holding.
The Blending contains examples of the following tropes:
- Abusive Parents: Almost a requirement for The Blending as most of the main characters have parents who are abysmal people.
- Tamrissa's parents practically sold her into marriage for a financial deal, completely uncaring of the simple fact that the man was an abusive monster who saw chasing Tamrissa around their estate before forcing himself on her as fun.
- Clarion's mother takes My Beloved Smother to insane degrees, especially since she's not even his biological mother, having kidnapped him from a servant in her household who Died In Childbirth, then banished his father from her estate for good measure.
- Selendi Vas, the Air Adept from the Noble counterpart blending to the main cast, is implied to have been sexually molested by her father, which only further damaged her as a person.
- Even Lorand's father is aggressive and controlling; though he has his reasons, he is simply unwilling to explain them to his youngest son, leaving it up to Lorand to be exposed to the graft, cruelty, and corruption that has been a boot to the neck of Lorand's farming community.
- The only real exception to this is Vallant Ro, whose parents are mentioned in passing or described through his memories. They were tough but fair and loved all of their sons equally, and encouraged them to work hard for their lot in life.
- All Your Powers Combined: More or less how a Blending is treated. It requires five people of each Talent to combine their power and consciousness to form a Blending.
- Those who describe the process do so in the vaguest terms. Though even that much knowledge is too much information to have.
- Aristocrats Are Evil: In Gandistra, the nobles have systematically diminished the power and liberty of their citizens. They did this by seizing not only the levers of power but by placing puppet rulers on the Fivefold Throne who lack the magic they are meant to possess to protect the Empire from dangerous threats. By the time of the main series, there hasn't been a High Talent on the throne for at least seventy-five years.
- Benevolent Conspiracy: Parallel to the government conspiracy is a group comprised of Sight Magic Users who have been hidden in plain sight for years to protect themselves, and those who they have identified as being the empire's only hope of surviving the coming threats.
- Big Fancy Castle: The Palace of the Five is a structure composed of six wings, five of which radiate out from the primary wing where each member of the current Five maintain their royal household. Despite being larger than the standard noble's country estate, it is noted by Rion while they're Storming the Castle that it had been sold to him by his mother as far too important and expensive for him to venture beyond the central lounge when he was a child. In fact, despite its size and number of rooms, he considered it to be little better than your average noble's house.
- During The latter half of The Blending and most of The Blending Enthroned trilogy, the Palace takes on a larger role, and its grandiosity is explored in greater detail. Each wing was designed to be self-sufficient, with the Five wanting for literally nothing. It was the picture of decadence before Jovvi, Lorand, Rion, Vallant, and Tamrissa moved in.
- Big Fancy House: Standard fare for the nobility in Gandistra. Tamrissa Domon - not a noblewoman, but the daughter of a merchant and the widow of another - lives in one. Featuring at least eight bedrooms, the owner's apartment among them, as well as a formal library and a large courtyard out back with gardens and a free-standing bathhouse. It is, unfortunately, decorated in as Nouveau Riche a manner as possible in the formal areas, as her deceased husband thought that the more money he spent on it, the more obvious his wealth and power would be displayed. Clarion, Vallant, and Jovvi disagree, while Lorand was far too gobsmacked to be in such a fancy house that he didn't know any better.
- Each of the opposing Blending live in large homes, owned by their parents of course, but after they are to be formally formed into a Blending they are moved into one of these. Each of them view it as a downgrade, complaining about there only being two rooms in their apartments and that they'll have to practically live in one another's laps. One has to simply take their word for it that the mansion was small.
- Dances and Balls: The second book ends on a cliffhanger at one, where the groups are to be officially informed that they will be formed into Blendings at a reception at the palace. The third book picks up at this point and finishes the scene.
- The nobles, notably Selendi, is disgusted that they have to socialize with them at the palace, let alone compete with them. Granted, the nobles know that the competition is a sham.
- Defeating the Cheating Opponent: Tamrissa's group manages to do this in the first round of the competitions. As an internal power struggle weakens the nobility during the third book leads to one of the Noble Blendings sending critical information regarding a mind control drug that was used on them the very moment after they passed their very first test, they find a way to use it and then immediately dispatch the pet Blending chosen by the Advisors.
- They planned on doing the same to Delin and Kambil's Blending, but the Nobility had other plans. They forced Delin and Kambil's group to compete in each round of the competitions, only saving Tamrissa's Blending for last as the sole request that the Nobiltiy honored for the two because it worked in their interests, too. While Delin and Kambil's group managed to win, it was only just barely, and they still had to cheat to win the last round.
- Elemental Powers: The rule, not the exception, in The Blending. Everybody has control of one of the five Elemental Powers of Earth, Air, Fire, Water, and Spirit - the last of which acts as a cross between psychic powers, such as Mind Control and Emotion Control, rather than flashier abilities such as telekinesis. The amount of magic one can use is based on their level of Talent, which ranges from Low, Medium, to High. The true breakdown of this is explained much further in the series. The only ones who don't have powers are Nulls and Guild Members - the former are powerless Muggles and the latter have all of the Talents but can't use any of them, only detect the power in others.
- Government Conspiracy: The Government of the Empire of Gandistra is anything but transparent. For starters it is widely known that there is no army, and yet Gandistra has been steadily expanding its territory into neighboring countries Astinda and Gracely. This part of the conspiracy is blown wide open in Betrayals after Tamrissa, Vallant, and Rion go on the hunt for Lorand and Jovvi. The government is widely known to control every aspect of the regular competitions for High and to choose the next Fivefold Blending every twenty-five years, stemming from their control of the levers of power has given them bureaucratic capabilities that most peasants lack. In reality they need this control so that they can plant their Pet Blending and 'High Talent' positions comprised of Middles into each slot. If they were to allow the peasants to actually have control, the secret would be blown wide open.
- Maid Corps: The Palace of the Five runs on this. Tamrissa makes a point of complaining about how much effort goes into hiring all of the people to replace the previous staff, and how they're going to pay for all of them since they lack the near unlimited resources that the nobles have or, rather, had.
- Promoted to Scapegoat: The Nobles have a plan in place in order to conduct the varying competitions that they have to oversee, whether the quarterly scheduled competitions for High Seats, or the quadrennial competitions for The Seated Five. Must of the competitors are Highs, but they all have flaws that make them easily manipulated.
- Much is made of the final preliminary competitions which throw together competitors into prospective Blendings. The nobility pushes Eskin Drowd forth despite his failure because one of their prospects lost his mind and Burned Out during the preliminaries.
- The Psycho Rangers: In the second book, we are introduced to five new POV characters who are built up as the main opponents to Tamrissa, Jovvi, Lorand, Rion, and Vallant. Because they all have elemental powers, this is a given, but the five (Delin, Selendi, Homin, Bron, and Kambil) to share some darker versions of the main five. They (mostly) get a Final Battle between them.
- Royals Who Actually Do Something: As of The Blending Enthroned: Intrigues the main five actually six, characters are in control of the empire of Gandistra after a successful coup. One of their first acts was to depose every noble and send them to their neighboring country as penance for the death and destruction they wrought on it. However, those nobles who were truly innocent, or tried to help were given lighter sentences and ultimately capable of being granted citizenship in Astinda.
- Sixth Ranger: Rion (formerly Clarion) met a ladyfriend who was moonlighting as a courtesan in the first book, Naran Whist, whom he fell madly in love with and ended up becoming a friend of the group. By the fifth book, it's revealed that Naran is a Null. However, before the end of that same book Naran is revealed to have a secret Sixth Talent, that of Sight Magic.
- Tampering with Food and Drink: The number of people who view poisoning as an expedient solution to a problem is not small. If not for Lorand's Earth Magic, and the group's understandable paranoia, they might have been poisoned a dozen times over.
- When Eltrina Razas makes her final move, having watched Delin avoid getting poisoned yet misunderstanding the reason why - he was under Kambil's control at the time, and had to follow specific instructions though he had already broken free, but was hiding that detail, so he didn't eat the food he noticed was poisoned, Eltrina got him the second time by by poisoning the silverware - she tried again on Tamrissa's group, but when that failed, she tried to just stab them to death.
- As soon as the peasants complete - as in survive - their first test, they are given a glass of water to drink. Except, it's not rather, but Puredan, a drug that is used to control another person. The Testing Authority uses Puredan in order to exert mental and physical control over a person, allowing them to give orders that can and will be executed when desired. From the very beginning, the entire competition was rigged against them. All of the peasants were told to lose without realizing it.
- Tea Is Classy: Tea is the beverage of choice in Gandistra. The main characters often have tea while they're meeting with one another, dining together, or just spending time together.
- Token Good Teammate: Subverted with great gusto. The team of Psycho Rangers set up in contrast to the main characters appears to have a token good member and Only Sane Man in the person of their Spirit wielder, Kambil Arstin... until he reveals he's been using his power to control the other members of their team and is probably the most evil of the five — and the most ambitious — just a lot smarter and less obvious about it.
- Tomato in the Mirror: Absolutely no one questions how Blending is conducted, primarily because only a select number of people are legally allowed to do it in Gandistra. Those being the current Five on the Fivefold throne at any given time. Yet, it's mentioned multiple times that the Evil Four was a Blending that was defeated by the first Fivefold Blending several centuries ago. This is because Blending can be initiated by any of the members and, once the full process is completed (which requires all six talent holders of equal power), it becomes permanent. By the time this is discovered, society has been so damaged across all three of the named countries that the main characters realize they have to share the information as widely and as quickly as possible.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: A common tool used by the nobility. Every twenty-five years, they get to really get some mileage out of it, by handing privileged information to those that they consider deadwood all so they can dispose of them by the end of the competition. At the same time they consider every peasant competitor that's too strong to be the same.
- Delin and Kambil are both equally frustrated that they can't do this to the other as they wrestle for control over their Blending. Kambil can't find an Earth Adept of comparable power while Delin doesn't trust anybody as far as he can throw them, on top of admitting that none of their social peers can match Kambil's magic. Ironically, because they were so busy trying to outmaneuver the other, they and their entire Blending ended up poisoned by other enemies they had taken their eyes off of.
