I'll admit I'm still very fond of dragons, in spite of all the bad press they seem to get these days. And I enjoy seeing them presented in a variety of ways, from highly intelligent or superior beings, to bestial, and from benign to malevolent, and from cooperative with humans to having their own agenda. Sometimes I despair of world building that doesn't consider the effect that large, flying, carnivorous creatures (even if tame or relatively benign) would have on an ecosystem or on human economics and activities, though. I enjoyed Novik's dragon books, but I had a bit of a problem with history being exactly the same (in terms of where cities were located, in terms of which countries existed and where their borders were, and in terms of how the economy worked) even though there were these domesticated flying creatures who ate an awful lot of meat (I don't think it's a coincidence that carnivorous domestic animals are generally on the smaller side compared to, say, horses and cows even). I ignored it, as these assumptions were kind of needed for the premise (Napoleonic wars but with humongous Dragon "airships"), but it reminded me I was reading a book from time to time.
I also like "wise beasts," or fantasy where there are certain animals who can think and communicate as well as humans and who have their own goals and agenda. I prefer it when these animals still have values, personality traits, and abilities that make sense for members of their species, though, and aren't simply humans in fur suits. I kind of like beings that are modeled after animal types too, like the badgerlike "gnols" in T Kingfisher's books, or the Kajiit in the Elder Scrolls worldbuilding.
