Customer Reviews

Dragonsdawn

5 star:		(60)
4 star:		(17)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

When one goes through countless reviews, some good, others bad, you stop to think if anyone ever reads these and if you are just saying what others have said. You know what I have come to think? I don't care. I just have to write something to praise the books I am reviewing... like this one.

I read this book after I read Dragonflight. I know it is not how the series should be read but I could not find Dragonquest and I needed, urged for a Pern book. So I decided to read Dragonsdawn. And I made no mistake. I loved this book. It has so much in such a wonderful way. You can actually believe that this may happen... fiction is no longer fiction. It all seems to plausible. And it's wonderful.

You are faced with the Coloners from Earth in search of a world to colonize. They have come to the Rukbat System and found the third planet to be ihabitable. They named it Pern. And so it all begins. What they did not know was that Pern, for calmer and more beautiful it may seem, hides a dangerous and deadly secret. The threat of the Threads, brought by the Red Star, catches the coloners unware, unexpectedly. And from then on it is a race to protect the survivor's lives from certain death. You witness in this book the birth of the Dragonriders, and the beginning of the amazing relationship with the dragons. From the delicate fire-lizards there comes the dragons of Pern... to fight Thread, to breathe fire, to protect humans. And you can't keep yourself from suffering in the harsh times, bellowing in joy with the fight of this danger, and shedding a tear when the multi-faceted eye of a dragon crosses your own eyes...

If you love Dragonriders of Pern... Dragonsdawn will surely amaze you. Though if you want to keep the many mysteries of your world away from your knowledge, then you should not read this book. But then you'd miss a great book.

This book is excellent! I absolutely fell in love with Dragonsdawn. I had not heard of Anne McCaffery until a few years ago when I randomly picked up her book. I am obessed with imagination, but always disapointed when I realize that it can NEVER be real. Yet, when I read Dragonsdawn, it let an "impossible" myth that dominated my fantasy become a reality. Not by some magic or undefinable subtance, but by a "logic" by science that doesn't seem incrediable. As for the charaters, I was enchanted by the young, red-headed Sorka and the free spirited, son of the Roaming folk Sean. And I fell in love with the loyal dragonet/firelizards. To me the greatest test of a book is weather I want to read another book about the same place and people. I loved this beginning hope of Pern, trashed by disater and conspiracy only to find another way to hope again, so much that it took me a whole year to read anymore about Pern. Afraid that the sequels whould distroy the greatness built by the one book. I highly recommend this book, an ultimate beginning.

Dragonsdawn is one of a line of books centered around the original trilogy based on Pern. Anne McCaffrey does a good job explaining the origins of humans on Pern, and what many of the "missing" capabilities that their ancestors miss so much actually are. Although this is the most science-fictiony of her Pern books, it by no means gets mired in the details. The book is much more character and plot oriented than technology oriented. Although many things are explained in this book, there are still some mysteries to keep the readers guessing.

This was the first Dangonbook I read. I didn't expect to like it--fantasy is not usually my cup of tea. Not only did I like it, I went straight to the bookstore and bought every one of the series and immersed myself in the world of Pern. By the end of Dragonsdawn, I wanted a dragon so badly that it almost broke my heart. You can lose yourself totally in the fantastic world of the Weyrs and Holds of Pern, and fall head-over- heels for the dashing Holders and Weyrleaders; ache with the young Pernese who wait to be chosen by a dragon; and soar in triumph with the Dragons as they fight their battles against Thread. Please, Anne McCaffrey, don't stop writing about Pern and all the generations that follow the discovery of the original landing!!!! All the books that follow, or precede, Dragonsdawn are just as compelling and fascinating--I'm hooked on Dragons!

After years of putting it off, why, I don't know, I finally broke down and started. What a pity. I have certainly been missing some very good reading. Anne McCaffrey in certainly a natural story teller and so far I am finding her delightful. I realize that this book probably is not truely a good example of the actual Dragonrider Series, but being somewhat familiar with the story line, I found it a good place to start. Yes, there was a bit more "tech talk" than I usually enjoy in a fantasy type novel, but that is okay as it was quite necessary, in this case, to tell the story. It, the tech talk, was not overwhelming and did add to the story which would have been difficult to understand the origins of the Dragonriders without. The story runs smoothly, is interesting and I felt the character development was quite good. All in all, late though it may be, I am glad I started reading these books and will now start with the next. Recommend this one highly.

A small group of settlers have risked everything on the information of a survey of Pern a hundred years or more before. They have traveled 15 years in deep sleep on older spaceships to reach the new planet and to start a whole new way of life. Some come because they want the chance to own their own land, others come for the adventure, others come for riches. When they first arrive on Pern, it truly feels like a paradise. The settlers choose a valley at the base of three inactive volcanoes to be their first settlement, which they call Landing. The settlers are eagerly experimenting with seeds and plants brought from other planets and trying to get animals settled and fertilized. Schools to teach children about their new life are quickly organized. Charter members of the group get first pick of land and set out exploring and claiming their small holdings. Others are content to live in Landing and to wait for their turn to spread out. All seems to be perfect...

Eight years later, the settlers notice an unusual cloud formation and think that there is a storm coming in. But when silver thread-like things start falling from the sky and devouring anything organic that can be found, paradise turns into a kind of living hell. The only bright spot that can be found in the whole tragedy is that the fire lizards seemed to know when the thread was coming and warned their owners to get inside where it was safe. The colony hopes that the thread-fall was a one-time occurrence, but then they notice the star with the irregular orbit that has slowly gotten closer to the planet and they realize that the thread is going to keep coming back. Many colonists despair and demand that the leaders send out the homing beacon to bring help from earth, but that could take 10 years or more, if help comes at all. Others turn to the fire lizards for answers. Finally, in one desperate action, they ask a geneticist to manipulate the genes of fire lizards to build something bigger - something more dragon sized that would be more effective against the thread. With time running out, all of Pern's hopes rest on the project of one woman...

This book is a stand-alone in the Pern series in that you don't need to be familiar with any other background before you read it, but there are many things that won't really make sense or won't seem important if you are not familiar with Pern's later history. Dragonsdawn answers questions such as how the dragons came to be, how they got their mental connection with their riders, how watchweyrs are different from dragons and why, how the colonists ended up in caves on the northern continent instead of the southern continent where they first settled, how the grubs were developed that ate thread, where the cat came from that caused a plague that decimated the population during Moreta's time, who the first dragonriders were and why they named the Holds and Weyrs what they did. The only complaint that I had was that the story was told from so many different points of view and contained so many characters that you really had to be on your toes while you read it. At the first part of the book, it wasn't so bad. McCaffrey refered to people by their first and last names and many of them were familiar to me because they had holds, weyrs and natural landmarks named after then such as Paul Benden, Emily Boll, Sallah Telgar, etc. Then the last names were dropped and we were left with the first names. After a while I got used to it, but then we had those long stretches of time where everyone got older all of a sudden and there are children and other people to deal with. Good thing there are plenty of references in the book to help you keep track of everyone! Although this book could technically be considered the first in the Pern series as far as chronology goes, I think that it is helpful to read the books in the order that Anne McCaffrey wrote them so that you can fully appreciate the detail of the world that McCaffrey has so painstakingly created. This book is a wonderful blend of science fiction and fantasy and I think anyone would thoroughly enjoy it as there really is something for everyone!

I absolutely love this book. The first time I read it, I found it hard to get past the opening section - I wanted to read about PERN, not a bunch of people in a spaceship, even if they were named Benden. But the technical mumbo-jumbo of the colonization is worth fighting through for that first breath of Pernese air! The initial settlement - the first Threadfall - the genetic engineering that created the dragons we know and love - and the volcano that finally forced the settlers to leave the southern continent - this book gives a fascinating background to Dragonflight et al. Make sure to read this one before reading "All the Weyrs of Pern".

DRAGONSDAWN chronicles the origins of human (and dragon) life on Pern. It begins with the original settlers and why they chose to immigrate to far off and isolated Pern. The settlers, weary of the seemingly endless conflict human civilization seemed plagued with and so had decided to establish an agarian society, sever ties with the rest of humanity, and begin again. They selected Pern as their new home based on a planetary survey (done over two centuries earlier) that indicated that Pern was a new Eden. The climate, especially in the Southern Continent, was balmy, there were no large predators and the native biology was either compatible with or adaptible to humans. The colony was established, the new society began to take shape all was going well and then Thread began to fall. The settlers had to act and act quickly. They had to determine just what this terrifying new threat was, how long it would last, and what they could do to stop it. And if this was not enough, the approaching rogue planet seemed to trigger volcanic activity, including the dormant volcanos near the main settlements.

This novel, while not the first book written, gives the 'backstory' of the series. It would be a good place to begin the series or would give anyone already familiar with the series answers to the many questions about how this fascinating society came to be.

This was the first book i ever read of Mccaffery and i couldn't stop fom there now i own all her books and am constantly on the lookout for more of her writing. this book is about the dawn of Pern and the creations of the dragons that become the center peice of all her pern series. it sets the moral integrity that permeates all of the pern books. to the new reader i would recoment either this book or Dragonflight as you first book.

Dragonsdawn is inspiring, heartfelt, and moving. It is the story of how it all happened on Pern: when Thread started, how the dragons were engineered, who the people were behind the original hold names, why they left the southern continent. But McCaffrey also manages to make some wonderful characters and draws the reader into her world by giving views of the bad guys and the good. Sallah Telgar's death was poignant and sad but the budding romance between Sean and Sorka as well as the first dragons give Dragonsdawn warmth and vitality. In short, this is the best Anne McCaffrey book I have ever read