I Read What?!

So did Dragondrums pass the test of time?

Yes, I think it did. I'm a little surprised by this, given how dreadful the last two Pern books were, but I really enjoyed it.

I still have a lot to talk about though!

A Question of Timing:

So as I mentioned before, Ms. McCaffrey published this book after White Dragon, but apparently recommended that it be read before. I approached the series in pure publication order, and I wondered as I went, whether it would have been better to read Dragondrums first.

There are a few advantages to that idea. I think Dragondrums does a much better job of incorporating the threat of the Oldtimers and Meron than White Dragon does, while White Dragon wraps it up. On its own, the death of T'kul doesn't feel terribly satisfying. The Oldtimers have so little presence in White Dragon that the snipping of that plot thread seems very abrupt. I mean, sure, they steal the egg and almost cause a dragon-on-dragon war, but even that really didn't have the impact that it should have. Jaxom returned it so quickly, after all. And there never seemed to be a real danger of the war, since Robinton was busy calling Lessa an idiot. Maybe it would have helped if we'd gotten to see the Oldtimers steal the egg, or if Jaxom had to confront T'ron or T'kul about it. But we didn't see anyone but faceless mooks that Jaxom easily outflew. So it felt empty.

If we read Dragondrums before White Dragon, then we get the best of both worlds: we get to see T'ron's face as he terrorizes a mine, or hear Mardra's voice as Piemur hides. We get a sense of the Oldtimers as a long time plague on the Northern Holds, and the sense of conspiracy. THEN when they steal the dragon egg in White Dragon, it would feel like a culmination of their schemes. And thus their defeat is more satisfying.

That said, personally, I think it would have pissed me off to read Dragondrums and THEN White Dragon, for the simple reason that White Dragon really suffers in the comparison. These are the reasons why:

1. Dragondrums shows us that McCaffrey CAN write a bullying plot. She gives us Piemur in a genuine position of vulnerability. He's the lowest man in the hierarchy and his direct superior distrusts him. His reputation is such that even his friends and supporters first ask if he'd done anything to provoke his bullies. He's got a (misguided) reason to stay silent. And there's a palpable sense of frustration and danger.

Compare that to Jaxom. Jaxom is a crown prince, in essence. He has an attentive father figure in Lysol and a seemingly supportive foster mother in Deelin. He seems to be respected by the staff of the Hold. He has no reason to not be believed. Jaxom also is a prince. Jaxom will be Lord Holder of Ruatha one day. He HAS A FUCKING DRAGON. And yet, we're supposed to believe this peasant boy is stupid enough to antagonize him.

It'd be one thing if, like Piemur, Jaxom had a reason to stay silent, to think that he wouldn't be believed, or the fear of disappointing someone. But that's not established in White Dragon.

2. Reading Dragondrums first would have made me SO ANGRY at certain romantic beats. Sharra has so much more presence and characterization in Dragondrums. She gets none of that in White Dragon. Jaxom doesn't care at all about her interests, her goals or ambitions. And he clearly doesn't care about her love of the Southern Continent, considering he'll be dragging her off to Ruatha.

And then there's the Menolly-Robinton thing. That was hard enough to read, when we knew Menolly and Sebell were in a relationship. If I'd read Dragondrums first, and had gotten invested in the growth of the relationship, and THEN gotten to that scene, I would have been incandescent with rage. Sebell deserves so much better.

(Maybe Sebell and Brekke can ditch their terrible spouses and shack up?)

Also Menolly's personality in general really irked me in White Dragon, and I think I'd be angrier if I'd seen her in Dragondrums first.

3. Dragondrums doesn't have that much of an overarching plot, but it has a quiet sense of momentum and movement. Every part of the story has clear stakes and a clear challenge. White Dragon has higher stakes...SOMETIMES. But only sometimes. Between Jaxom stealing the egg and Toric stealing Sharra, nothing of import actually happened. Well, okay, the mating flight, but Jaxom wasn't even there for that. For most of the book, there were no stakes and no challenges, and I think reading Dragondrums first would have really drove that home.

4. Piemur is just a better lead, and Jaxom really suffers in comparison.

So yeah, ultimately, I think I read them in the right order.

--

So how was the book?

As I said before, it passes! It was a lot of fun! Piemur's a great lead character. He's likable but not flawless. He gets to be selfish and petty and all those things that Menolly and Jaxom were never allowed to be. But that just makes his bravery and cleverness shine more.

Sebell and Menolly were our secondary leads and they were great too. Sebell, in particular, got some much needed focus and development. He'd been likable enough in Dragonsinger, but here, we really get to see him in action. He and Piemur have a great dynamic, and an easy mentorship. And honestly, this makes me even happier about Robinton's retirement, because I think Sebell might actually do his fucking job.

And it was good to see a Menolly that I actually recognize and like. I can appreciate why she's not the lead character anymore. She's too good at what she does! There's no real challenge! But she makes a great big sister. It makes me happy. And I believe that she and Mirrim are friends here, in a way that I didn't in White Dragon.

Speaking of, Mirrim was treated better in this book too. It feels funny saying that, since both Piemur and Sebell made it pretty clear that they didn't like her. But well, Mirrim's abrasive. It makes sense that not everyone will appreciate that. Piemur does make a point of noting her positive qualities though, and Menolly defends her. And her Hatching was awesome.

So what didn't I like?

Robinton. Of course. I'm just so tired of Saint Robinton. He's a terrible mentor. He seems to care very little about his students. And oh yeah, he up and tortured someone!

And look, I don't necessarily need my heroes to be lily-white. A good writer can have their heroes do bad things sometimes and I'll be like "Okay, I see why you did that." But McCaffrey didn't give us enough reason here.

Meron is awful, supposedly. But is he awful enough to deserve being tortured?

Let's look at Meron's actions over the course of the series so far:

1. He was part of Larad's rebellion against the Weyr. Larad didn't like him because he doesn't have noble blood and had took over his Hold after Fax died. He was mouthy and disrespectful.

2. He remained antagonistic to the Weyr in general after that.

3. He and Kylara banged. He apparently has a big dick. He can't match clothes and mistreats his lizard.

4. Kylara was visiting him for the mating flight.

5. He sent things to the Oldtimers and spread supposedly deficient fire lizards (though again! Useless vanity pets with no visible difference in ability).

6. He didn't want to name an heir.

I'm sorry, but this isn't enough to make his dying in agony a satisfying prospect. He's an irritation, not a real threat. He hasn't hurt a main character. He hasn't raped or tortured anyone, that we know of. He hasn't murdered anyone that we know of. He's just a dick.

They could have lied and claimed he picked someone. They could have chose the oldest one, or the richest one, and been done with it. N'ton would back them up, and no one would argue with a dragon. Hell, I feel like I remember something about the other Lord Holders having to accept the new one anyway. So let THEM pick.

I'm also very annoyed that this supposed voyage where Robinton and Menolly got shipwrecked, and she kept them alive in that cove that Jaxom later recovers in isn't even in this book. Seriously?

Another nitpick is that we never actually SEE the drum master. I'm not sure why. It would have been easy enough to make the senior drummer, the one who constantly doubted Piemur, the drum master. If anything, it would have been higher stakes. Instead, we're left with a phantom who apparently has nothing to say about his students bullying each other. Or trying to kill each other. Hell, has Piemur ever even met the dude? I read the whole book and I don't know.

Finally, I still don't completely understand why we needed a dubious consent sex scene between Menolly and Sebell in the last chapter. But okay.

But those are minor complaints, over all, I really liked it.

--

So let's talk about the Harper Hall Trilogy on a whole.

I didn't do this for White Dragon, because I don't really see White Dragon as a conclusion of a trilogy. McCaffrey can say what she wants, but in my opinion, White Dragon was a standalone interlude that barely progressed the plot. If Dragonflight is the beginning of a trilogy, then I argue the third book should be All the Weyrs of Pern, where Thread is dealt with, once and for all.

Harper Hall though is a clear trilogy.

And...eh. I don't know if it passes. Dragonsong was great! Dragondrums was great! But Dragonsinger is so so utterly useless that it kind of drags the others down. It just doesn't fit. Yes, it's about Menolly, but both Dragonsong and Dragondrums are about young people in a transitory period of their life, trying to figure who they are and who they want to be, with a lovely little survival plot in the meantime.

Dragonsinger doesn't share in these themes. It doesn't have a plot. It's: Menolly starts classes, Menolly rocks classes, Menolly encounters some minor inconveniences that go away, the end.

It's a paragraph of backstory in a better book, and I'll prove that: read Dragonsong and then read Dragondrums and see if you need Dragonsinger at all. I say, no.

The sad thing is, there could have been a better second book that fit the theme: let's skip Dragonsinger, and instead, we can start the story with Menolly already making Journeyman and having to figure out exactly what that means. Maybe they want to send her back to her old Hold to take over for Elgion. Maybe she'll go to a different one. But she doesn't really want to. She doesn't remember her Hold life fondly. But then, she and Robinton get shipwrecked, and she gets to use the skills she learned as a Holder girl, and the tricks she'd learned surviving on her own to keep them alive. In doing so, she discovers confidence and realizes that she can be a great Harper no matter where she goes.

We could introduce Sebell and Piemur here just as easily as in Dragonsinger, and we'd have some nice consistent themes throughout the trilogy.

Alas, it isn't meant to be.