"It's about time you attended to more than Ruatha."
In Anne McCaffrey's first "Dragonriders of Pern" novel, Dragonflight, Lessa is the unrecognized heir to Ruatha Hold. Fax, the man who usurped her family's power and took over the Hold, thinks the ruling family of the Hold is long dead, but Lessa, using her inborn telepathy, disguises herself as a drudge and does whatever she can to sabotage Ruatha's productivity. If Ruatha Hold proves itself worthless, Fax will have no choice but to remove his claim on it, and she can take over. But when the legendary dragonmen come Searching for a new Weyrwoman, Lessa may have found a way to take him out even more quickly than she'd planned. The only problem? The dragonmen discover her ploy, and her powers, and recruit her to Impress the dragons' one and only queen egg. Now Lessa must make a choice: take back what is hers, or become the Weyrwoman of Benden Weyr, and queen of the dragon riders?
This book has it all: high stakes, rivalries, politics, action, and fire-breathing dragons. But this isn't your typical fantasy novel. It's a science fiction story of epic proportions, featuring everything from telepathy to teleportation and time travel.
Many, many years ago, humans set out to colonize every inhabitable world they could find, leaving Pern, the world where this story takes place, with several sizable settlements. What they didn't know was that the planet's "adopted" sister planet, the Red Star, was home to Threads, silvery life forms large enough to stretch across certain space gaps and burrow into the fertile soil on Pern's surface, obliterating everything in their wake. Every two hundred Turns, the dragons and their dragonmen are called upon to burn these Threads to a crisp...but today, with only one Weyr still standing, dragonmen have lost their respect and their numbers. They are no match for the Threads that are about to fall. Only Lessa, utilizing an accidental discovery, has any chance of saving Pern from total destruction.
If you have any difficulty keeping track of characters, this book may present you with a bit of a challenge. Weyrwomen, who Impress queen hatchlings, may have exotic names, but it is the men you must watch out for, as dragonmen use an apostrophe to shorten their names, which can lead to identity confusion. For example: F'nor, F'lar, K'net, and R'gul are all dragon riders. While you won't necessarily mix the dragons up, their names are very unique as well: Mnementh and Ramoth are dragons who feature prominently in this story. Despite all this, characters are well-written and well-rounded, and once you get to know them it becomes a simple matter to tell one from the other. It just takes time.
This is an adult-level novel. There aren't many big words, but the writing is thick enough to cause some readers pause. And the dragons and their riders are emotionally, as well as telepathically, connected. When the queen rises to mate, everyone in the Weyr knows it...and the Weyrwoman goes through a ritual that lands her a partner, in the form of the winning dragon's rider. Although nothing is pornographic, if you are or have in mind a younger reader for this book, I would highly advise taking into account what you/they have read and what you/they ought to be exposed to.
I would recommend Dragonflight to anyone looking for a sci-fi tale of dragons, adventure, romance, and high stakes. Characters are unique and believable, the world is logically structured, and it's interesting to note that this is one book where greenery is illegal. You may be tired of reading this sort of assessment, but McCaffrey's novel fully deserves five stars. Pack your bags and bring a camera, because Dragonflight is going to be an adventure you'll never forget.
Many, many years ago, humans set out to colonize every inhabitable world they could find, leaving Pern, the world where this story takes place, with several sizable settlements. What they didn't know was that the planet's "adopted" sister planet, the Red Star, was home to Threads, silvery life forms large enough to stretch across certain space gaps and burrow into the fertile soil on Pern's surface, obliterating everything in their wake. Every two hundred Turns, the dragons and their dragonmen are called upon to burn these Threads to a crisp...but today, with only one Weyr still standing, dragonmen have lost their respect and their numbers. They are no match for the Threads that are about to fall. Only Lessa, utilizing an accidental discovery, has any chance of saving Pern from total destruction.
If you have any difficulty keeping track of characters, this book may present you with a bit of a challenge. Weyrwomen, who Impress queen hatchlings, may have exotic names, but it is the men you must watch out for, as dragonmen use an apostrophe to shorten their names, which can lead to identity confusion. For example: F'nor, F'lar, K'net, and R'gul are all dragon riders. While you won't necessarily mix the dragons up, their names are very unique as well: Mnementh and Ramoth are dragons who feature prominently in this story. Despite all this, characters are well-written and well-rounded, and once you get to know them it becomes a simple matter to tell one from the other. It just takes time.
This is an adult-level novel. There aren't many big words, but the writing is thick enough to cause some readers pause. And the dragons and their riders are emotionally, as well as telepathically, connected. When the queen rises to mate, everyone in the Weyr knows it...and the Weyrwoman goes through a ritual that lands her a partner, in the form of the winning dragon's rider. Although nothing is pornographic, if you are or have in mind a younger reader for this book, I would highly advise taking into account what you/they have read and what you/they ought to be exposed to.
I would recommend Dragonflight to anyone looking for a sci-fi tale of dragons, adventure, romance, and high stakes. Characters are unique and believable, the world is logically structured, and it's interesting to note that this is one book where greenery is illegal. You may be tired of reading this sort of assessment, but McCaffrey's novel fully deserves five stars. Pack your bags and bring a camera, because Dragonflight is going to be an adventure you'll never forget.
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