Pern Appreciation Month: The Chronicles Of Pern: First Fall While I’m not the hugest fan of these remaining two stories, I’m really glad they exist. So let’s take a look at the pair of them before we start discussing the whys and wherefores of them… “The Fo…

In which we look at the last two stories in this collection.

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Pern Appreciation Month: “The P. E. R. N. Survey” The remaining four members of an Exploration and Evaluation team have arrived at the third planet of the Rukbat system. Tired, worn out and shattered after a gruelling mission which has cost four m…

In today’s instalment of Pern Appreciation Month, we head back to the very beginning of the series… published 26 years into the life of the books, naturally: The P. E. R. N. Survey.

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Pern Appreciation Month: “The Dolphins’ Bell” During the second half of Dragonsdawn, a rather epic event took place: the colonists, in their bid to reestablish the colony on the Northern Continent, create a huge convoy of boats and ships to co…

A sidestep back into the history of Pern in today’s Pern Appreciation Month post.

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Pern Appreciation Month: All The Weyrs Of Pern I’d have been perfectly content if this had been the last novel in the series. It’s a great place to finish: during the course of this book the threat of Thread is eliminated, there’s a tearful end…

Pern Appreciation Month: it’s time for DRAGONS IN SPA-A-A-ACE!

Also known as All The Weyrs Of Pern

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Pern Appreciation Month: “Rescue Run” During the events of Dragonsdawn, a group of terrified colonists launched an emergency beacon. This was after the horrendous toll was taken from the first Threadfall and  before the first gene…

Another day, another badly clipped photo for Pern Appreciation Month.

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Pern Appreciation Month: “The Impression” Felessan is facing an Impression. As the only child of Benden Weyrleaders F’lar and Lessa, there is a certain expectation that he will “do well” and possibly impress a dragon, despite it being his …

Pern Appreciation Month reaches another short story: The Impression.

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Pern Appreciation Month: The Renegades Of Pern The 1980s had been very good to Anne McCaffrey. She had had successes not only with the Dragonriders novels, but with so many of her other books as well: by the end of that decade she had sold near…

Today’s entry in Pern Appreciation Month: The Rengades Of Pern
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Pern Appreciation Month: Dragonsdawn I don’t normally enjoy prequels. Too often you have authors trying to shoehorn a future onto a situation that feels forced. Sometimes a story just needs to have happened without it being explained …

Pern Aprreciation Month reaches the first book in the series: Dragonsdawn

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Pern Appreciation Month teacher Nerilka’s Story.

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More news from Pern Appreciation Month as we reach the heartbreaking tale of Moreta: Dragonlady Of Pern

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Pern Appreciation Month: Dragondrums This was published in 1979 and is set roughly three years after the events of Dragonsinger: Harper Of Pern and about four years before The White Dragon. Piemur wakes up one morning in the Harperhal…

One day I will master the art of getting titles to line up with the picture clipping that posting links does on social media sites… but today is not that day.

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Pern Appreciation Month: The White Dragon (The first part of this book was published as a chapbook entitled “A Time When” in 1975. I’ve managed to procure some copies of early versions of the novels and stories in this series for when it w…

This is the novel that made Anne McCaffrey into the success she became for the rest of her life. It also changed the bestseller lists forever.

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Pern Appreciation Month: Dragonsinger, Harper Of Pern When we left Menolly at the end of Dragonsong, she was overjoyed to discover that she was going to live at the Harperhall. After a lifetime of abuse because of her musical talent, she was finally g…

Pern Appreciation Month continues with Dragonsinger.

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Pern Appreciation Month: Dragonsong I mentioned previously that “The Smallest Dragonboy” was picked up as a short story idea because Anne McCaffrey was working through a story about a girl called Menolly. After K’van’s adventure was …

We had proper book covers in the olden days. I don’t talk about this cover in this blog post but I do go on about the book a fair bit.
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It was earlier than 1958…

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Pern Appreciation Month: “The Smallest Dragonboy” In 1973, Anne McCaffrey should have had the world at her feet: she had released several short stories and novels into the world, won some awards that no other woman had won before her, and had the …

Anne McCaffrey’s 100th Birthday continues with Pern Appreciation Month: The Smallest Dragonboy

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Pern Appreciation Month: Dragonquest It’s not often that you read a sequel that feels as though it was written by a different author. I first experienced this with Terry Brooks’s The Elfstones Of Shannara, the sequel to The Sword Of S…

Pern Appreciation Month continues with Dragonquest, the rare sequel that improves upon the original.

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The cover for Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey, first published in 1968. It’s the e first novel in the Dragonriders of Pern series.

I’m celebrating Anne McCaffrey’s 100th birthday with a trip back to Pern that’s going to last all of April. It starts with a look at Dragonflight, the first novel in the Dragonriders of Pern series.

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Clanker tanker

“There should have been another yippie-kai-way, Myrka-f@cker.”

Not about the themes or ideas but the actual content. Events that are important to the stories being told. It’s really frustrating because I’m trying to make sure things are reported accurately on my blog that hardly gets read.
</rant>

Doing some research for a big blog project coming up next month and listened to some podcasts where people are talking about these books. Look, some people are calling themselves lifelong fans of this work and are just so blatantly wrong about things that happened in them.

Sorry, Daniel: meant to reply to @whoc2c.bsky.social’s original post.

An Author Ian Likes: in memorium, Sir Terry Pratchett (This post was originally written on the original stuffianlikes blog the day after Sir Terry passed. I’ve tidied up some grammatical errors and added a couple of pictures but this is otherwis…

#speakhisname

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Ark In Space, Remembrance Of The Daleks, Silence In The Library/Forest Of The Dead
Absolute bags of atmosphere with top-notch scripts, superb actors and brilliant stories.

Other Doctors are just as competent and brave but I rarely felt that he would let things be as bad as they could get, as though he personally stood before chaos and tyranny and stopped it in its tracks.

After a really hard think about it my Doctor might be Jon Pertwee. He resolutely stands up for what is right, speaks his mind but is also in touch with his emotions and understands how others are feeling. He’s also one of the few incarnations that made me feel safe.

A Comic Collection Ian Likes: Voyager and The World Shapers featuring The Sixth Doctor Colin Baker was announced as the sixth actor to play Doctor Who in 1983. He took over from the incumbent Time Lord in the TARDIS, Peter Davison, during the 21st season of the Classic run of the ser…

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Nice is being polite and making people feel as though they have been treated well.
Kind is actually helping people.

Frontman Joe Camilleri and birthday boy Ian

Signed copy of The Quintessential Black Sorrows.

Joe Camilleri wrote Happy Birthday Ian on the back of the album for me.

Went out to the Astor Theatre last night to see The Black Sorrows. Frontman Joe Camilleri was in the foyer afterwards and I got a picture and an autograph for my birthday.