Dragonseye

Dragonseye Anne McCaffrey Date: 28 January, 1997   —   Book product page Rating:

Fiction, Science Fiction

This book falls into a weird sort of rating for me, because it was a book I enjoyed quite a bit— while I was reading it. The characterization was good, the writing was solid... it was shaping up to be a good book. And then it ended. It ended before anything of real consequence had taken place. If you were to draw the plot arc, instead of a mountain it would be a series of speed bumps. Yes, there was that horrible Holder who cheated everybody and caused his people to starve and all... and you saw it all from a distance. If McCaffrey had chosen a family or two suffering under his rule, it would have had far greater impact. Instead she had all of the good Holders talking about him, essentially making dinner conversation about what a horrible man he was.

Even the struggles of a colony still attemping to keep a form of civilization despite the return of the dreaded Thread were muted. It just didn't seem as though McCaffrey had any real goal in mind when she created this book. It's more of a slice of life, good enough for a short story but nowhere near enough to sustain a whole book. Reread Dragonsdawn or Renegades of Pern, and don't bother picking this up.