Anne McCaffrey has been my favorite author since I was about fifteen. Though my interest in her work started much earlier than that! My mother had picked up the books long before, I even had any idea reading could be fun! I heard her speaking to a friend about it. Though, unfortunately, I had a rather severe case of dyslexia growing up. In fact, it is probably still noticeable from time to time.
Anyway, I wanted to know more about the story I heard my mother talking to her friends about, but it was entirely out of my reading skill area. So it was some years and a lot of hard work before I could finally pick up the books she spoke about so often. So I was about sixteen when I picked up The Dragonriders of Pern. For someone who still had a slight issue with reading, I am it was quiet the large book, three novels in one after all.
Soon however I found I adored this story so much that I sucked it up. Now I had to read it a few times to fully grasp the entire content. My reading comprehension as a teenager was still lacking, I had until this point avoided it as heavily as characters, given it had been so hard for so long.
So what was it that kept me so interested and continues to bring me back years later? The characters.
The characters, you say? But Tawny, why is that? Well, the characters are the type you can get into, realistic and exciting to learn about! I do need to say, it’s not just the Pern series with fantastic characters, its every one she produced, and she gave us a lot of books during her life.
So if you want to get in to Anne McCaffrey’s rather large bibliography, where should you start?
I say start with Dragonflight, the first book in the Dragonriders of Pern!