Dragonsdawn, By Anne McCaffrey
I would like to give a brief introduction to this series before I start on the specific review for this book. I think that would be slightly helpful for those of you who have no prior experience with the Dragonriders of Pern. For so the series is called. Anne McCaffrey originally wrote a trilogy of books, Dragonflight, Dragonquest, and the White Dragon. The world is named Pern, and the Dragonriders and their dragons protect Pern from the deadly Thread that falls from the Red Star. If the Thread were to fall unchallenged onto the ground, all organic matter would be consumed and humans would have no chance of survival. From this original trilogy many books have expanded in either directions, chronologically speaking. Dragonsdawn is a book that occurs a couple thousand years before the trilogy, and is the story of humans landing on Pern, and discovering the menace and disaster of Thread. Even though it was written after the original trilogy, I’m slightly obsessive with reading books in chronological order: not necessarily in the order they were written.
Earth has long been colonizing other planets, and along the way has come across some very unfriendly alien species as well as some friendly ones. But three spaceships full of colonists are leaving occupied space for the planet Pern, in hopes of finding some peace and a place to forget tragedies. This is a strictly one way trip: the ships do not have the fuel to make it back to Earth. But the colonists are hardy types with good strong leaders whom everyone trusts to lead them through difficult times. Or I should say, most everyone. There are some who do not plan on staying on Pern forever, but the authorities know who they are and are keeping a strict eye on them. Life proceeds fairly well for eight years after landing, until disaster strikes. What looks like a harmless rain squall turns out to be a deadly thread-like spore that devours all organic material it touches. Many lives are lost and many are badly injured in this first Threadfall, but the colonists refuse to lay down and die. The colony asks Kit Ping—a talented geneticist—to redesign Pern’s native dragonets into full size fighting flaming dragons. They would be a renewable resource to combat Thread and protect the inhabitants of Pern. But it takes time for Kit Ping to design the proper DNA, and it takes time for the species to grow. Everyone wonders whether it will take too much time, and whether there will eventually be anything left to protect.
Okay, that was a really long summary. It could have been longer, especially if I got into all the different characters that weave in and out of Dragonsdawn. I didn’t. But I’d like to mention the names of my favorites, because I feel like it would be an injustice to the books not to. I love Admiral Benden and Emily Boll, the colony leaders. All they really want is to retire in peace and quiet and forget the trials they endured, but duty calls when the colony is threatened and they rise to answer. Sorka and Sean are just priceless. We get to see them grow up and I always love that. (as a funny note, when I first read this I didn’t know that the name Sean was pronounced Shawn instead of Seen. It took me a bit to get used to calling him a nearly different name) They’re the first people to discover the dragonets (or fire-lizards) and I love the fact that they’re Irish. I just like imagining accents.
This hasn’t really been much of a review so far, just mostly information spewed at you. Succinctly I’d just like to say that this is not the best of the Pern books. I like it because it tells the beginning of the story, but it is not the most interesting or the best written. In all seriousness, there are many places you can come into this series without having read the previous books. Some of them are nearly stand alones that don’t require previous knowledge. Some of them belong to a continuous set, but you can jump in almost anytime. The way I got started in my Pern kick, was when I read The White Dragon. That book happens to be the third in a trilogy inside the larger Pern series. But I read it, liked it, and understood it enough to want to know more about Pern. I’ll be review the entire Pern series, mostly, and if one book doesn’t appeal to you, wait to see if another will. You can jump in then and ignore the rest.
Earth has long been colonizing other planets, and along the way has come across some very unfriendly alien species as well as some friendly ones. But three spaceships full of colonists are leaving occupied space for the planet Pern, in hopes of finding some peace and a place to forget tragedies. This is a strictly one way trip: the ships do not have the fuel to make it back to Earth. But the colonists are hardy types with good strong leaders whom everyone trusts to lead them through difficult times. Or I should say, most everyone. There are some who do not plan on staying on Pern forever, but the authorities know who they are and are keeping a strict eye on them. Life proceeds fairly well for eight years after landing, until disaster strikes. What looks like a harmless rain squall turns out to be a deadly thread-like spore that devours all organic material it touches. Many lives are lost and many are badly injured in this first Threadfall, but the colonists refuse to lay down and die. The colony asks Kit Ping—a talented geneticist—to redesign Pern’s native dragonets into full size fighting flaming dragons. They would be a renewable resource to combat Thread and protect the inhabitants of Pern. But it takes time for Kit Ping to design the proper DNA, and it takes time for the species to grow. Everyone wonders whether it will take too much time, and whether there will eventually be anything left to protect.
Okay, that was a really long summary. It could have been longer, especially if I got into all the different characters that weave in and out of Dragonsdawn. I didn’t. But I’d like to mention the names of my favorites, because I feel like it would be an injustice to the books not to. I love Admiral Benden and Emily Boll, the colony leaders. All they really want is to retire in peace and quiet and forget the trials they endured, but duty calls when the colony is threatened and they rise to answer. Sorka and Sean are just priceless. We get to see them grow up and I always love that. (as a funny note, when I first read this I didn’t know that the name Sean was pronounced Shawn instead of Seen. It took me a bit to get used to calling him a nearly different name) They’re the first people to discover the dragonets (or fire-lizards) and I love the fact that they’re Irish. I just like imagining accents.
This hasn’t really been much of a review so far, just mostly information spewed at you. Succinctly I’d just like to say that this is not the best of the Pern books. I like it because it tells the beginning of the story, but it is not the most interesting or the best written. In all seriousness, there are many places you can come into this series without having read the previous books. Some of them are nearly stand alones that don’t require previous knowledge. Some of them belong to a continuous set, but you can jump in almost anytime. The way I got started in my Pern kick, was when I read The White Dragon. That book happens to be the third in a trilogy inside the larger Pern series. But I read it, liked it, and understood it enough to want to know more about Pern. I’ll be review the entire Pern series, mostly, and if one book doesn’t appeal to you, wait to see if another will. You can jump in then and ignore the rest.
posted by Tai Schutz | Monday, March 26, 2007
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