Dragon Harper by Anne & Todd McCaffrey

Dragon Harper feels like it probably hit harder thanks to COVID. The primary story, after getting through the teenage drama part, is about a Flu Epidemic (Pandemic?) and how that's dealt with... which is, ya know, not super great given the current level of technology the Pernese are dealing with. I kind of knew what was coming, given that part of Dragonsblood takes place after Dragon Harper, but it still hit rather harder than I was expecting once I'd made the connection.

Okay, so backing up a little bit, the teenage drama parts of Dragon Harper had me rolling my eyes some. I'm just well over the teens and their melodramatic love stories at this point in my life, I think. Also, the duel thing. Kindan gets a sevenday of training to actually do the duel and I was wondering the whole time whether the Harpers also gave Vaxoram training for it. I don't think so and that whole situation just made me kinda mad. Stinks of favoritism toward Kindan. I know everyone knows Vaxoram is a bully and the agressor, but... yeah... didn't like that whole situation. Kindan also felt very Gary-Stu-ish during that whole incident.

I also wasn't a fan of Koriana's. She just seemed rather flat as a character to me. It was very clear she was going to be Kindan's love interest from the moment she Impressed the gold fire lizard and he Impressed the bronze. Other than that... much "meh" in her direction.

Anyway, back to the "Plague," as they dubbed it. Definitely felt true to life in a time period similar to what the Pernese are dealing with. Gotta love the complete loss of technology leading to things being much worse than they could have been. I do like that masks were thought of, although too late for a lot of people, obviously. My brain still can't quite comprehend the actual death toll. The numbers are just too high.

I feel like the time-travel aspect of the dragons abilities gets used alot for something that's not really supposed to be bandied about as one of their abilities. It's not exactly a bad thing, just seems to get used in just about every book so far. I did like the way it was used here and the way the dragonriders were able to help without exposing themselves to infection.

There were a few moments that had me in tears. Like, ugly crying, had to put the book down kind of tears. I won't spoil which moments, but they were there. Definitely a pleasant step up from how I felt next to nothing for any of the characters in Dragon's Fire.

So yeah, Dragon Harper was really good. I would have finished it in a day if I hadn't had life happening. The story's good, the pacing's good, the characters are alright... I find these characters don't exactly stand out vividly to me as ones from other books (Pern or otherwise), but they're at least recognizable. Dragon Harper is my favorite of the Pern books so far (chronologically, anyway).

Dragon's Fire by Anne & Todd McCaffrey

Dragon's Fire is honestly the worst Pern book I've read so far. The antagonists are one-note, most of the characters aren't even likeable, and the story is honestly just boring. The main point, it seems, is to explain the differences in Firestone and how the safe stuff came to be mined as opposed to the more unstable version... and how they figured out the Shunned problem.

I kind of liked getting some "behind the scenes" stuff at Camp Natalon that synchs up with the events of Dragon's Kin. Knowing that Zist had some more going on than just Nuella's lessons. Honestly, Pellar's story toward the beginning of "Book One" was the most engaging part of the book.

I found the rest of the book very disjointed. Too many POVs and too many absolutely horrible characters. Horrible in their personalities, although they also didn't feel very rounded, either. I'm really not sure how D'gan ever became a dragonrider. I would have thought the dragons would be better judges of character, but I guess not. Tenim is one note as all get-out. He's just greedy and that's it. And Tarik... still a horrible human-being. Makes sense that he was Shunned. Oh, and Moran... he's really just super flawed and not fleshed out nearly at all. Like, kind of good for him, taking in strays, but he largely throws their care onto Hala so... eh. Just too much absolute nonsense, in my opinion.

I honestly feel like I could have skipped Dragon's Fire in my chronological reread and not missed anything.