Product Description

The inhabitants of Pern face a titanic struggle for survival as violent storms and erupting volcanoes herald the coming of "Thread", a deadly power which could destroy them all.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #108699 in Books
• Published on: 1997-07-03
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 415 pages

From the Publisher
A spellbinding new chronicle of Pern.

From the Back Cover
For two hundred years there had been peace on Pern - but now the signs were ominous. Violent winter storms and erupting volcanoes heralded the coming of the second Pass of Thread, when the red planet would rain down its horrifying harvest and destroy every living organism on the face of Pern. No human or dragon or animal or plant was safe from the hideous death inflicted by Thread.

Weyrs and Holds tried to prepare, but they had serious problems. Over the generations much of the old technology had been lost. AIVAS, the giant information bank, was buried under tons of volcanic ash, and valuable and skilled men and women had succumbed to disease and old age, taking with them the knowledge of a great civilization.

They had to prepare as best they could, training the great flights of dragons and ensuring that the Lord Holders did their part by protecting their people in every possible way. Only Lord Chalkin, Holder of Bitra, refused to co-operate. He did not believe in Threadfall. It was a plot of the Weyrs to gain ascendancy over the Holds. He would do nothing to protect Bitra or its people. The Lord Holders and Weyrleaders were of one accord. Chalkin must he impeached and removed from his lands if the planet was to be made safe.

About the Author
Anne McCaffrey was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She graduated cum laude from Radcliffe College, majoring in Slavonic Languages and Literatures. A prolific bestselling author, she is best known for her handling of broad themes and the worlds of her imagination, particularly in her tales of the Talents and the novels about the Dragonriders of Pern. Anne McCaffrey lives in a house of her own design, Dragonhold-Underhill, in County Wicklow, Ireland.

Customer Reviews

Addictive, compelling, beautifully written.
How many times do you have to re-read a book before it can be termed your favourite? I have read this book at least six times, and will continue to re-read it for many years to come. Of all of the Dragon books, this is at the top of my 'best' list- taking a look at early Pernese history in the run-up to the second Pass.

Throughout the book, there is a high level of tension: preparations must me made for the Thread dominated years ahead; something must be done about a cruel, self-serving Lord Holder; a young Weyrleader has to cope with self-doubt; and a recently qualified artist must learn many new meanings of the word "satisfactory."

The book is a visual treat- viewing much of the story through the eyes of the artist Iantine gives us a new and enthralling view of life within the weyr and without. Every time I read it, I am transported into a colossally beautiful, exquisitely painted world which, sadly, exists only in the imagination.

With the usual McCaffrey brilliance, the story is deeply human- taking in the gamut of emotional experience: greed, generosity, hate, love, anger, revenge, fear and courage name but the tip of the iceberg. It is a story about a human people, living with human failings in an extraordinary society.

In spite of its smattering of unsavoury characters, I often view Pern as my personal utopia.

Buy it. Read it. Then read it again.

Pleasing return to form
I grew up reading Anne McCaffrey's novels and have enjoyed the vast majority and re-read an enormous number of them. As such all her books will get a look from me. Having said which the Pern prequels have been marginally disappointing and read more like a TV mini-series script than a good book. Thankfully Red Star Rising is a return to her form of old. New characters (from the same mold) in a new setting are an enormous help. The new setting is the half-technological and half-agricultural world that the characters now live in. This makes the Pern world fresh again and allows us to rediscover the menace of thread all over again.
Is it her best work? No. But it is substantially above some of her other recent works which have been stale and staid.

The Dragons Fly Again
Two hundred turns after Man had first come to the planet of Pern, the years of respite from Threadfall were drawing to a halt as Pern was once more wracked by its approaching step brother and a further inundation of Thread. Despite the loss of technology and knowledge over those turns the people of Pern rallied round the dragon filled Weyrs of Pern in order to defend against an enemy that would devour all its path. All of Pern, that is, except for Lord Chalkin who believed that Thread was simply a way for the Weyrs to gain power over the Lord Holders. Chalkin must go!
Anne McCaffrey was busily building up the back story of the Pern colony with a number of stories. This was the second in that series and a damned better one than _Dragonsdawn_.
The people of Pern were fast loosing all knowledge of their history and while the teachers still taught the tales of Earth and the Federated Sentient Planets both were irrelevant to the lives the people had to live and it was time to massively prune the curriculum.