I Read What?!

Back to Pern. Moreta was actually readable, and probably objectively the best book in the series so far, so that doesn't dismay me.

I'm maybe a little disappointed, because I'd misremembered the production order and thought Dragondawn was next. I'd never read it as a kid, but I've always liked secret sci-fi origins for fantasy settings, so I'm intrigued. Also, I seem to recall reading that the main villainess in this book is named Bitra, and that's so unsubtle that it loops around to genius.

But actually, the next book is Nerilka's Story. Which I also have never read, so I'm technically violating the purpose of the community. Oh well. But as mentioned, Moreta was good and I liked Alessan and what we saw of Nerilka/Rill, so this probably won't suck. Even if I still hold a bit of a grudge about the guy taking his sudden new wife to his lover's funeral.

I'm sure there will be context. And I tend to enjoy the stories centered around normal people, because of the significantly lower amount of non-consensual sex hijinx. And that may be the biggest point of criticism I have for the series: Ms. McCaffrey, you've made the thought of having a dragon companion so terrible that I'd rather be reading about boring normal people instead.

My copy of Nerilka's Story actually starts with a list of characters divided by Hold and Craft Halls. I feel like that'll be useful. There are quite a few familiar names on the list, like Capiam, Tirone and Desdra. But there are a lot of strangers too.

There's no prologue, but I'm way too lazy to actually start chapter 1 tonight, so I'm going to try to cover for that by sharing some observations about the list:

I'm a little weirded out that Nerilka apparently has her own "personal drudge". Have we ever worked out whether or not drudge-dom is actually slavery? Lessa's experiences certainly looked pretty awful, but I will grant the caveat that Fax was a horrible person and may well have had an unduly harsh system.

I remember seeing drudges beaten, or implicitly about to be beaten at least, in White Dragon. While Piemur argues that even drudges get to go to the Gather in Dragondrums. Camo is, I think, supposed to be a drudge, and they certainly treat him poorly, but more in a non-malicious, yet insulting and patronizing way.

Maybe we'll find out more in this book. Nerilka didn't SEEM like the sort of character that would condone outright slavery, from the glimpse we got of her in Moreta, so I'm hoping that holds true.

We also get a list of Nerilka's brothers and sisters in order of birth. There are EIGHTEEN counting Nerilka. McCaffrey helpfully labels one, Pendora, as married. There are no indicators that any of them are the ones who died in Ruatha, so Tolocamp possibly had EVEN MORE kids. No wonder he's callous about it. Nerilka is in the middle.

We're reminded that Holding is not based on primogeniture, because Tolokamp has an older brother Munchaun. His second wife, the one Nerilka didn't like, is named Anella.

One part that I find intriguing is that High Hill's healer is "believed dead". This probably has to do with the plague, but I kind of love the idea of an undead healer roaming the planet.

Ruatha's listed. The names are all familiar, but we do get the surprise that Suriana, Alessan's dead wife, had been Nerilka's foster sister. (This adds to my interpretation of Alessan being considerably younger than Moreta.) Also the dude lost his wife, most of his family, and now Moreta herself in a really short amount of time. AND now he's getting married? That seems like a bad idea.

Oh, and hey, there's a list of Dragonriders too. McCaffrey, thank the Gods, left out some of the worst names that she's come up with. Though we do have G'drel and M'barak listed. And Sh'gall. I wonder if he'll actually have some dignity this time. I'm not holding out hope.

Okay, I've stalled enough. I'm going to bed. See you with an ACTUAL review next week!