“Dragonflight” by Anne McCaffrey

I buddy-read this with Sarah from Dragons & Zombies because we both like dragons (and zombies) and Elizabeth Moon’s Sheepfarmer’s Daughter, which we first tried to read, was too boring to continue with. Dragonflight was a slight improvement.

Genre:

Fantasy

Pubbed:

1968

Series:

Dragonriders of Pern (book 1)

Quick summary:

Dragonflight is the first novel in the Dragonriders of Pern classic fantasy series. It’s about a planet called Pern that uses dragons to overcome the Threads, offshoots from a planet that sprouts destructive formations when it orbits close to Pern.

Dragonflight begins with a girl called Lessa planning revenge on the man who brought about the end of her family and stole her birthright. However, Lessa does not yet know that her life is about to change for the unexpected because the dragonmen are on a search for a female to bond with the new dragon queen and help prepare for the return of the Threads. (Goodreads)

My thoughts:

Dragonflight has been on my TBR ever since I heard that it is a classic of the fantasy genre. Because it’s about dragons, I expected to like it, which I did at first, but it didn’t keep my interest. I was immediately curious about the planetary aspect of the story, which I did not expect because I’d never heard of Pern referred to as a planet or that it was threatened by one, and was drawn in by Lessa, who was pretending at something she’s not to succeed in her revenge.

So I was interested in the first 100 or so pages of the story, right up to where Lessa makes connection with the dragon queen. However, after that the plot began to drag in some places and I began to dislike some of the characters. Also, there is time travel and I do not like time travel.

Though I liked how independent and headstrong Lessa is, I didn’t like how she regarded the women around her. She has nothing positive to say about any of them and they are almost all perceived as weak. It’s the same with F’lar, a leader among the dragonriders whose perspective we also read from. The only woman he grudgingly respects is Lessa, who he mistreats. I did not like him. I did not like that he raped Lessa (which was not discussed other than to have F’lar reflect on it briefly), I did not like that he shakes her every time that he gets frustrated with her, and I did not like that he’s an asshole in general. Actually, all the dragonmen are assholes. I’ve yet to see one unassholey man in the book.

I also expected there to be more focus on the dragons, but the story was instead about the humans and their problems. I think the quips from the dragons that show their personality was the best thing about the story, but that didn’t happen often enough.

As Sarah said when we discussed the story, “it felt like a long introduction and then it was over.” I think that’s a good summation of my reading experience with this. There’s a lot of buildup, but the climax and resolution does not equal to the amount of buildup we had to read through. So I was unsatisfied by the end. I guess book 2 is when all the exciting things will happen, but I don’t plan to read it.

Overall: ★★☆☆☆ ½

Ugh.

Buy | Borrow | Bypass

There are many, better, fantasy books out there that have dragons in them.

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