Customer Reviews

The Dragonlover's Guide to Pern, Second Edition

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I found this book good reading, for the most part. Like any "instructional" type companion book for a series, it can be dry at times...but it's still a good read! I found out some things that the series books had left out, or didn't explain too thouroughly. The illustrations were really great, too! My perception of just how big Ramoth was definitely changed after I read this book! All in all...not bad, if you're a McCaffrey/Pern fan. Worth buying!

While it's nice to have a historical view of Pern, and the short story "The Impression" by the Lady Herself is a must-have, the book, (even the second edition) is severely hamstrug by the amount of mistakes. Names are misspelled, descriptions contradict the novels, and as was mentioned, several graphs are not labeled or are improperly labled (the dragon memory/empathy graph makes no sense, as the shading is reversed. This was wrong in the first edition and hasn't been repaired.) While the addition of an index is very helpful, it would have been better if they'd devoted some time to fixing the mistakes from the first version.

The Dragonlovers Guide to pern is a perfect companion to Anne McCaffrey"s classic Dragonriders of Pern series of books. It gives a warm , detailed look at the three diverse types of society on Pern, Crafthalls, Lord Holders, and the Weyrs of Pern. Beautiful drawings fill this fine volume, and the heraldric emblems for the Halls, Holds, and Weyrs are given, except for the newer ones in the books written since this volume was published. This guide also gives a very complete overview and quick get-acquainted introduction to Pernese life and ways. No self-respecting fan of the world of Pern should be without it!!!

Do you love Anne McCaffrey's Pern books? Did you ever wonder exactly what a bubbly pie was or how klah really tastes? Want the recipe? It's all in this book. I took this home and kicked my family out of the kitchen for hours. Klah is fabulous if you like coffee, cinnamon, and chocolate. Do you want to know what the Rukbat system looks like? There's a map of Rukbat here. And what are those bloody threads made of anyway? And how do the dragonriders predict where they'll fall next? It's all right here in this cover-to-cover learning experience

I've been reading Pern since I was nine(9) years old and while it was entertaining, some of the facts were a bit confusing until I obtained my first copy of "The Dragonlovers Guide to Pern". This book answers many questions and is a must buy for any true Pern fan! It is a decided plus for anyone running an online game based on Pern as well!

This was when it was issued an excellent reference for Pern, but it has since been very dated by the publication of books such as Masterharper of Pern and Skies of Pern. And the information in it is extremely shallow compared to some of the excellent wesites that are available online. I would be delighted if Jody Lynn Nye and Annne McCaffrey would sit down and incorporate some of the work Pern fans have been doing in the interim years and make this a truly authoritative Pern reference book.

Has some marginally interesting tidbits, but on the whole I'd rather see more maps, diagrams of the Hold and Weyr layouts, etc. A lot of the stuff covered here is already covered in "Dragonsdawn" and in other similar short stories. I did enjoy the short story on F'lessan, although having read "The Littlest Dragonboy" already, the novelty of the idea of Impression is diminished. Why not write on something different?

And what is with some of the portraits throughout the book? Menolly looks downright goofy, Jaxom looks....WEIRD.... and Lessa looks kinda gaunt. There are several other drawings of "anonymous" people that are much better, what gives!

. . . of both editions of this book onto a single site, so let me be clear from the outset that I am reviewing the First edition, published in 1989.

I have been a fan of the Pern universe since receiving several of the novels as gifts for Christmas in 1988. I've since read all the books; most of them more than once.

I found "The Dragonlover's Guide to Pern" to be a very good -- but not excellent companion source. Like any guide or atlas to a fictional world, every detail is not going to suit every person. The material does not cover several of the later books (though there are seeds of ideas which the alert reader will recognize again in later books.) (Hence the need for the 2nd edition).

For me, the single greatest lack in this volume was that the illustrations were all black-and-white. As detailed descriptions of heraldic devices were given -- it would have been nice to actually see them in color! Likewise with the dragons and fire-lizards!

Overall, though, I found this to be a useful and worthy effort -- especially for persons like myself who are greatly interested in "deep background" of stories.

Recommended.

I just finished that last of the books about pern. I really enjoyed the guide because it helped me clear up a few questions i had about time lines. Thanks to ms McCafrey for a wonderful story that gave me many hours of true enjoyment. My sons are reading the series now.

A great book to help comprehend the Dragonriders of Pern series. A good companion to have when reading any Pern book!