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Nazi satilites orbit the Earth and the United States is mining asteroids while an alien lizard-like creatures habitat Earth. It's 1965 and the world is in a constant state of flux.
It started back in '42, when the Race first invaded the planet in the midst of a World War. The stakes had been raised and the humans joined forces to fight the Race to a standstill. It ended with a cease-fire treaty with Germany still occupying most of Europe and the world's hotter areas covered by the Race; including Austrailia, Africa, southeast Asia, India, and Mexico.
20 years after the war ended, humans and Lizards (the Race) were living in relative peace. But the Lizard Colonization fleet arrived and several of their starships were destroyed by a human spaceship. It was never discovered with nation fired upon the Lizards, the peace was strained to a breaking point: The Lizards smuggled drugs into the Third Reich while the Germans smuggled ginger (which acted like cocaine to Lizards) into Lizard-held territory. A US Lizard researcher secretly raises a pair of Lizard hatchlings in an attempt to see how human he can make them. Poland is in the hands of the Race while the Germans want it back and the dictator Himmler will do anything to get it back, including a war with the very aliens that nearly destroyed Earth.
Harry Turtledove's 6th book in a great alternate history series. He started with 4 books in a World War saga, from invasion point to treaty. "Down to Earth" is the second book in the post-war series. He touches upon all aspects of life, including drug-usage, race relations, a cold war between the USSR, the Greater German Reich, and the USA.
He is a master in alternate history and shows his touch in this collection of novels, of which, could each stand by themselves as a single book.