Discovering McCaffrey from the start

[neopeius]

Having gotten to March 1959 in my day-by-day science fact/fiction blog, I'm delighted to find McCaffrey's first story:

galacticjourney | A study in contrasts (April 1959 Fantasy & Science Fiction, Part 2; 2-22-1959)

Did anyone here discover her in her early period, or did you find her with the later Dragonriders/Pegasus stuff?

 

[3cats5]

The first McCaffrey I read was "The Ship Who Sang" and I loved her as an author. Here was a book that I could understand, knew what was going on, and felt the empathy of the author for the character. I have read most, if not all, of the Pern books and I love this author. I have also read the Cristal series and a few others. Easy to read and pleasurable.

 

[chrispenycate]

Restoree. But Helga came soon after.

 

[Lady of Winterfell]

Dragonsdawn was the first book of hers I read. I have since read all the Dragonriders of Pern books (written solely by her), and the Petaybee books.

 

[Pyan]

Dragonsdawn for me as well - followed by all the Pern books, the Tower and Hive series, the Brains and Brawn books and the Crystal Singers books. Stopped reading the Perns after Masterharper of Pern, when she started retconning earlier stories to fit her favourite characters into them, and haven't read any Todd McC books.

 

[kythe]

I started with the Harper Hall trilogy, which really resonated with me due to years of music lessons. By now I believe I've read most of the Pern books, except the ones by Todd McCaffrey.

I haven't read any of McCaffrey's non-Pern books. I think I associate her so strongly with the dragon stories I forget she has other works.

"The Ship Who Sang" looks good. I need to put it on my reading list.

 

[kdf_333]

My first book was Dragonsdawn.

This was not only my first McCaffrey book but my first Scifi/fantasy book that i read that was not assigned by school.
My Godmother had given it to me as a birthday present. it sat for a couple years. it was big and had dragons on the cover. i was not into that.
i thought all dragon books were magical and had spells and witches and names you couldn't pronounce and wizards and lots of made up rules for this or that particular world. it had an index and i was like any book that needs an index for the characters is way to long and epic for me. i was about 11 years old.

It was summertime and I could not walk to the library. i had read every book in the house that looked interesting. some 2 or 3 times. SO i started it. As you know it is very scifi and technical in the beginning. iwas so bored i stopped. I was like ugh, this is worse than old 70's Star trek/Dr. Who shows. i liked the Next Generation but not the original and the beginning reminded me of those.

so middle of summer really bored and really desperate for a book. I start it back up and plow through and i don't remember when it finally caught my interest but it did and i fell in love with Pern.

But i did not just fall in love with Pern if ell in love with Dragon partnerships.I fell in love with military Scifi. I fell fell in love with space opera (did not know the name of the genre then ). I fell in love with strong female protagonist who kick butt but are still all woman.

then i was a on a quest to find books similar to Pern. there are none really. i have found some that have some of the qualities i liked but no one really mixes scifi and fantasy the way Anne did.

I really liked her new Cat series with Scarborough. sigh. i miss ya Anne.

 

[Kerrybuchanan]

Reading this is making me miss Anne too. Read pretty much everything she has written I think, from her early semi-erotic scifi to the Pern books and on. There was just something special about her.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Restoree and Crystal Singer (with it's bizarre South of Dublin / Wicklow naming) were among the earliest SF I read, first 10 years of it. I must have been reading SF since about 1965, and read Restoree maybe sometime in 1969 to 1972, can't remember exactly. Read "The Ship Who Sang" and others before the Pern books. I bought the early Pern books new in College I think roughly as they came out. I don't think the later ones are as good. I only got "The Ship Who Searched" though last year!

 

[BAYLOR]

I read Dragonflight with no expectations . I was pleasantly surprised at how good it was.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Dragonflight was the first one for me, too. It was one of my favorite books for a long time, but after a few rereadings I returned to it after a period of many years, it felt ... I guess slight is the right word. I had already grown tired of the way the rest of the Pern stories did little to advance the story.

Some of her books outside that series have a lot more depth. I found The Ship Who Sang extremely moving the first time I read it.

 

[mosaix]

I remember reading my first McCaffrey story in my flat that I'd just moved into in 1965. The only place I could have read it in those days was Analog. Can't remember the name of the story or anything about it though.

 

[BAYLOR]

It kind of reminded me of Burroughs Barsoom novels .

 

[Nechtan]

Dragonflight was my first too. Then the next six Pern books; Dragonquest, Dragonsong, Dragonsinger, Dragondrums, the White Dragon and Moretaragonlady of Pern. I loved these books as a teenager.

I returned to it after a period of many years, it felt ... I guess slight is the right word.

I'm too frightened to reread them now. They were such an important part of my reading experiences back then and I have very fond memories of them. I wouldn't want to destroy that memory as I have done with others.

I also enjoyed Decision at Doona and the Ship Who Sang. The short story collection Get Off the Unicorn was also enjoyable. I couldn't get into To Ride Pegasus. I was too disappointed that the cover, showing Pegasus, didn't match the story. (I was quite young.) I didn't find her Dinosaur Planet books that good.