Dragonflight Book Review

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As November kicks off (and I realized I accidentally scheduled a Saturday post for Sunday, whoops), I thought I would write a book review for a book I recently finished. I’m talking about Anne McCaffrey’s first novel in The Dragonriders of Pern series, Dragonflight.

Ballantine Books published this book in 1968. However, the book previously appeared as two separate novels that McCaffrey combined into a novel. Fun fact: Anne McCaffrey became the first woman to win both a Hugo and a Nebula for this book. The novel appears in three parts, almost like three separate stories, but first, some background.

In the world of Pern, humans arrived at the planet long ago and colonized it. However, a deadly virus called Threads appeared in the sky after a red planet orbited close by. The humans lose their technology and develop an agrarian society. With the help of fire-breathing creatures similar to dragons, the humans combat the Threads and inhabit the planet for hundreds of years.

The first part of the book introduces us to Lessa, a young woman who belonged to a noble family. However, tyrannical ruler Fax usurped her family. She disguised herself as a servant, though she has mildly magical abilities that influence others and allow her to communicate with dragons. F’Lar, a dragon rider, and several others arrive at the Hold where Lessa lives to find someone with these abilities. When they arrive at the Hold, they announce that Lessa is the prime candidate to become the next Weyrwoman and ride the queen dragon. When Lessa and F’lar return to the Weyr, Lessa attaches herself to the queen dragon.

Later, conflict arises among the Weyr. Some dragonriders don’t believe that the planet that spreads the Threads will return and cause damage. F’lar remains concerned that many Weyrs have disappeared. Lessa eventually figures out that dragons maintain the ability to travel through time, or between. Lessa goes back in time to understand what happened to the other dragonriders.

To me, this feels like the perfect balance between science fiction and fantasy, which I constantly crave. The beginning also pulled me in with its delightful imagery and the sense that the worldbuilding went deep. On top of that, I enjoyed reading about dragons, of course. After reading books like Fourth Wing, I spotted where the inspiration came from.

That being said, it was obvious to me that this book used to be made up of separate stories. The last section felt especially rushed within the context of the world and what the characters experience. I experienced sections where the book seemed to slow down before picking up again for the next part. Also, both of the main characters are kind of terrible people. Like soap opera levels of terrible. But that made things entertaining.

I look forward to continuing this series with the next book, Dragonquest. And I look forward to seeing you all this week for another writing post! Turns out I accidentally scheduled my last post for Sunday rather than Saturday, so you get three posts this week. Happy reading!

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