DRAGON'S TIME

TITLE: DRAGON’S TIME

AUTHOR: ANNE & TODD McCAFFREY

Pages: 496

Date: 16/06/2012

Grade: 4+

Details: no. 4 New Adventures of Pern

            Received from Book Geeks

Own

Thousands of years after humans colonised Pern and genetically modified dragons to help them fight the dreaded Thread the world finds itself on the brink of disaster.

The dragon’s sickness has left Pern with perilously low numbers of Dragons to fight the deadly Thread with. Although Lorena found a cure to the sickness, the cure came too late to save the animals in sufficient numbers. And every Threadfall, the numbers of available dragons dwindle further. The people of Pern will have to find a way to quickly increase the number of dragons if they want to have a chance to survive.

In a desperate bid to find a solution, Lorena decides to fly forward in time knowing that this action will cost her the baby she is carrying.

While Lorena is travelling into between and through time, looking for a place to safely raise more dragons, back on Pern Fiona, Kindan and T’mar are trying to fight the Thread without dwindling the numbers of dragons and riders too fast and struggling to keep despair at bay.

Most people are convinced that Lorena must be lost to them and put Fiona’s reports of contact with the traveller down to pregnancy induced hallucinations.

When Lorena returns though, she has found a possible location and solution and soon the group find themselves on a newly discovered continent in a different time raising the dragons they will need to have a chance at survival. An enterprise that will turn out not to be without difficulties of its own and filled with danger and potential loss of loved ones.

Reading and reviewing a book that is the fourth title in a series which itself is part of an even larger series when you haven’t read a single one of the earlier titles is probably not a great idea.

Of course every good book is able to stand on its own merits; a reader shouldn’t need to have read the previous titles in order to enjoy the story they are reading. And I didn’t. I thoroughly enjoyed this story, fell for its characters, both human and dragon, and found myself completely rapped up in the struggle to save Pern from the deadly Thread despite being new to this world. Having said that, I have absolutely no doubt that I would have enjoyed this book more if I had read the previous books in the series, had known more about the background of the characters and the situation they find themselves in. I was constantly aware of the fact that I was probably missing links, references to prior events and other connections. But, that didn’t stop me from picking up the book on a wet Saturday morning and finishing it the same evening, compulsively turning the pages in order to find out what exactly was going on and how it all would end.

This is a well written book and an easy read. It is easy to lose yourself in the surroundings, the characters and the interactions between them, to marvel at the dragons and their links with their humans and as a result it is only natural that you start to care about the fate of all these characters as well.

I’m not sure if I’ll ever find the courage or the time to go back and read all the Pern books I have missed. I will however read the next book in the New Adventures of Pern series because I really want to find out what is going to happen next.