Nialla has been on the run since she found her horse-trainer father murdered. The police didn't seem to be interested in finding her father's killer and everyone else took advantage of her naivete, including her father's ex-employer, who brutally raped her. Terrified that someone will find her, she dyes her red hair a mousy brown and keeps on the move, traveling from horse show to horse show. Her greatest loves are her horses, Orfeo & Phi Bete, and her coon cat, Dice, until she meets Rafe Cleary. Rafe is unlike any other man she has ever met and she finds herself falling in love with him before she can stop herself. Without Nialla knowing it, Rafe does some digging into her background and realizes that she is in desperate need of his protection, whether she wants it or not. He quickly marries her and sweeps her off to his beautiful country estate. Nialla is happier than she has ever been, but will her all too-perfect storybook ending last?

This is a quick, fun read written in an old-fashioned romantic style. All of McCaffrey's characters were great: Nialla is a strong woman, but not afraid to lean on someone else for help, Rafe is a fascinating, mysterious man whom readers will want to learn a lot more about, Mr. Marchmount is the villain who the reader actually begins to feel sorry for because he is so pathetic, but the animals are the best characters and have so much personality, especially Dice, that it is worth reading the book simply to read about them. This book is a far cry from McCaffrey's popular Pern series, but is very well written and enjoyable all the same!

This was not at all what I expected from a McCaffrey book, but it was an excellent read! There are no SF elements at all--this is a romantic suspense novel. Also, this is most definitely an adult book--a bit racier than her SF books. However, the characters were as captivating as any of her SF books.
This is the story of a woman on the run with only her horses and cat. She travels from horse show to horse show barely getting by, living in fear. Finally her past catches up with her, and she is nearly killed trying to rescue her beloved horses from a suspicious barn fire. Rich and mysterious Rafe, a fellow horseman, rescues her and helps her to face her enemies and uncover her past, even as he finds himself falling for her.

Jennifer Crusie and Janet Evanovich fans--you should like this one!

This was a fun read, different because it's not fantasy/science fiction, but a romantic fiction book about people in the horse show world.

This version of legends is divided into three parts, if you search for Robert Silverberg you can find it in one volume for about the same price, so that you get all three parts together for about a third of the price
As to the book,I can only review the second part (I made the mistake of ordering legends 2 thinking that it was all 11 stories, but it was really just three.) The three stories that were in it were:Debt of Bones by Terry Goodkind
The Hedge Knight by George R.R. Martin
and Runner of Pern, by Anne McCaffrey
Of the three I read, The Hedge Knight was definitely the best, it has alot of action and the grimly real, but exciting story that only Martin can provide. It is set in the Seven Kingdoms of Martin's excellent series, A Song of Ice and Fire.
Debt of Bones was good, and it showed me what type of a writer Goodkind is,(I haven't read anything by him but that, but it got me interested and I bought the first book in his series, The Sword Of Truth.
Runner of Pern was probably the one I least liked, I knew nothing about Anne McCaffrey, and it was okay, but not nearly as good as The Hedge Knight.
Be sure to buy the edition with all 11 stories, I have just ordered the full edition, Most all of the writers in the 11 stories, I have read before and it is interesting to have a short work to read by them, about a different part of their world. This will also help you get aquainted with writers you havn't read before, see their writing style, and decide if you want to read more of them.

I read Legends in one piece, so please bear with me reviewing here. Legends (and Far Horizons) as well, were a brilliant move. Short stories about the worlds you know and love, in one book with yet unexplored worlds... it's awesome, both from the fan's and the publisher's point of view.

The quality of the stories was high. King's story was beautiful and enchanting, I am not a great fan of Pratchett, though, Feist and Goodkind's stories were entertaining enough, if not a little predictable.

I felt myself also highly attracted to Williams' story for some reason. And I havent even read the series. Still gotta find the first book somewhere. :)
Jordan's story, as a WOT fan, was nice enough. It was nice to be back in the WOT world again (this was during the wait for book 9). For me, it grabbed hold and didnt let go. Although I agree that it might be a little vague and incomprehensible for the people who are not familiar with the Wheel of Time.
The big thing about Legends though, has got to be the Hedge Knight. It got me to reading Martin's work, and it had got me to favoring Martin above Jordan as soon as I was done with the series.

Legends did what it was made for - introduce fans into worlds they havent explored yet, and show them a little bit more of the worlds they know and love. So yes, Legends was brilliant.

Wow.

My dad got me this as a gift a few years ago, and i have been consistently re-reading it since. All of the stories are masterpieces, even more so in that they are all less than a few hundred pages, yet still present a rich, textured world, unique to each story. This book has led me to 5 different series, 3of which i have completed again and again (I just can't seem to find the rest of the other 2). All of the stories are exquisite.

New Spring, by Robert Jordan, last story in the book, has affected me the most. It was one of the last stories I read, not just for being last, but I have read the 7000+ page series again and again in the last few years.

I have not read the Memory, Sorrow and Thorn series, but the story by Tad Williams is very complex; it took me a few readings to get the full plot. A great older read.

The Earthsea story isn't really connected to the other books, but they are good. And Ms. Le Guin has also written a few kids books.

The Hedge Knight, by George R.R. Martin, is most likely my favorite story. I haven't gotten around to reading the series yet, but it's on my list. Wonderful storytelling and action.

King, as always, is absolutely stunning. Leaving no violence or sex out, this serves as a wonderful intro or stand-alone. The Little Sisters of Eluria is a #1 first story choice.

The Feist story was a bit wierd, and kind of unfufilled. The Seventh Shrine was the last story I read. I think i was a bit put off by its length. It was worth the time, and i still have yet to pick up a book of the series.

And I won't settle for subliminal messages: BUY AND READ THE BOOK! NOW!!

Oops, I seem to have left out the Card story. It is funny, and linked to a wonderful series whose depth so far is rarely equaled in my reprtoire. The Ender series, also by the same author, is much more famous, and about par, on a totally different subject. a very funny yarn, when the rest of the series is slightly more somber.

What makes this book worth reading is the that we are able to follow the lives of Damia's children as well as the rest of the extended family. For me that is always what made this series worth reading was the family's dedication to each other in-spite of their egos and talents. This 4th book in a series of 5 Lyon's Pride by Anne McCaffrey is set in the universe we have come to expect of her Talents series. The story continues on with Humanity and it's Allies continued fight against the hivers. There are several subplots that are set up or carried along for conclusion in the 5th book. But it is worth the read if you like this series, and McCaffrey in general.

"The formidable Lyon's Pride," as a character in the next (and final) book of the Talent series calls them, are the children of T-1 Damia Gwynn-Raven and T-2 Afra Lyon; and that "T" rating is a measure of the Talented one's power. Telepathy and telekinesis keep Human and Mrdini commerce operating by moving travelers and cargoes instantaneously across vast reaches of space. Those same Talents enable the two allied species to battle successfully against a third: the implacable Hivers, who covet the same kind of real estate as do Humans and Mrdini.

All eight of Damia and Afra's children have Talent ratings of T-1. All are destined, as adults, to be known as Primes. Some, like eldest daughter Laria, will operate commercial transfer towers - a prestigious and powerful position, but one that can take a young Prime far away from home. Some, like sons Thian and Rojer, will carve out new roles for Talents in service aboard naval vessels. Second daughter Zara's strongly empathic Talent fits her for the career of healer - after it enables her to do what no one else can manage, by communicating (on however rudimentary a level) with a captured Hiver queen. The Lyon's Pride is, indeed, formidable. Its four eldest are reaching adulthood just in time to play key roles, as the Human-Mrdini alliance begins to solve the Hiver threat that first loomed when their grandparents were young.

An exciting, character-driven tale, which only occasionally bogs itself down with shipboard protocols and politics. If you can get past those pacing problems, you'll be glad you did; because "The Tower and the Hive," the next volume in the Talent series, provides a worthy conclusion to the long-running Gwynn-Raven saga.

Yes Asia was Rojer's cousin but 2nd or 3rd she was Rohid's sister out of ten kids. M-5 planet is the kind of planet it is I am not sure but I think the M-5 can support life. This was a good book I read all 5 books in 2 days. Of course it was not as good as the pern books but what is?

This slim volume is nowhere near as fascinating as Anne McCaffrey's full length Pern novels. Its worth is that the 4 stories it contains serve to fill in gaps in the overall picture. The stories are short and somewhat simplistic but present a view of Pern not otherwise dwelt on - children hoping to impress dragons for example. Not quite a book to add to one's library but for all Pern fans, a nice set of glimpses. I only wish Anne had focused on some other Pernese professions - maybe the Healer Hall (2 of the 4 stories are dragon-rider oriented)?

Personally, I've never been that into short stories. Mainly because they're not long enough. It seems like in a lot of cases just when I'm getting really interested in the story, it ends. I'm the type of person who likes to read full sized or even larger than normal novels. And if the novel is part of a series then even better. That being said the short stories from this book are much more my style, since they are from a series (the Pern series to be exect). This book includes two short stories that have been published before in other books. One short story that is part of a larger story. And one new short story. If you are a fan of the Pern series this book is definately worth having.

I call the first story a classic because, well, in the McCaffrey Universe in my head it is. In fact, the Littlest Dragonboy was _the_ story that got me reading Pern in the first place. I adore this story for that reason and others. To me, it encompasses all that Pern represents, justice, kindness and simplicity. It is that simplicity that draws me back to this long lived series time and time again.

The second and third stories are beauties as well. The Girl Who Heard Dragons is one of my Mother's favorites. A sweet story with a predicitable, but still sweet ending. The Runner of Pern is wonderful because it explores a totally new aspect of our beloved Pern, with Ms. McCaffrey's characteristic, opposites- attract romance thrown in. A story that left me smiling like I had just seen an old friend.

Finally, the last story in the book did not sit well with me at all. It was just too cozy and sweet. This may sound hypocritical of me, after all, K'van's story is awfully sweet too, I just couldn't really believe this one. (I won't spoil it for you, but it's extremely predictable) Maybe the horrible event that I have been dreading has happened. Perhaps like so many fantasy readers before me I have become disillusioned with the Dragonlady. Everyone told be the day would come, but I swore it would not happen to me. Ah, who knows? All I can do is cling to my fondness of The White Dragon and hope that I can hold out a little longer.

Anyway, I say buy it, or at least check it out from the library and read the first three if you haven't already. As for the new one, which I am assuming most of you veterens of Pern are looking for in this book, I'd skip it and read any wannabe's story from one of the hundreds of fan weyrs on the web, it'll be the same thing.

It's interesting to read about Damia's children;their personalities,relationships,the challenges they faced,and the lives they lead.The characters of the previous books("The Rowan" and "Damia") are not forgotten,and we still hear about them and see their involvement.This book has more technical details,especially about the Hivers.A good read!

Although I have read many of Anne's novels, Damia's Children truly captured my imagination and interest. The book opens leasurely, some years after its predecessor, the book Damia. The beautifully written openings describe in great detail the individual characters of Damia's Talented children, but it foreshadows the menace the reader expects. And true to its promises, the book plunges into an exciting expedition where the combined fleets of both the Human and Mrdini species track down the home world of their decades-old enemies, the Hive. But this book is not just about space-battles and "star wars". The reader witnesses the growing-up and maturing of Damia's four eldest children, and we even see glimpses of characters that one would expect to be obsolete: the Rowan, Isthia Raven, and the rest of Damia's children's predecessors who played such a large part in previous books. The book is definitely, without a doubt, a must-read, especially if you have read the previous two books, The Rowan and Damia..

Damia's Children is a wonderful follow up to The Rowan and Damia. This is a wonderful series. Anne McCaffrey is a gifted writer and I love reading about telekentics and the things they do. The hive creatures are very strange and the way Zara reacts to the captured queen is awesome. I thought for sure the queen was going to eat Zara, but instead she seemed to not even really know she was there. The Rowan and all the others in this series are definately page turners from page 1 to the end. One just can't wait to get to the next page or the next book in the series. I am starting Lyon's Pride now and can't wait to see how that turns out. THanks to Anne for wonderful reading. Joy Jenkins

I enjoyed reading this book. I read it in two days. I really liked Acorna and her special abilities of healing and purifying air and water. The children in the story touched me. It was sad how they had to "grow up" in the mines and factories and how most never grew up at all. I wish more could have been written about Acorna and Pal's relationship. Maybe the sequel will continue the romance. I'm a big fan of McCaffrey's works, especially the Dragonrider's of Pern series and Rowan series. It was a great book to read. I'm looking forward to the sequel.

This was a very cahrming book and I really enjoyed. I read it over an extenmded period of time because I was on a vacation. I suggest that if you read very quickly(finish a book in a week or less) you will enjoy this book a lot more. When I readm it over a long periosd of time, I was very hard to get into because it starts off slow. Don't get me wrong now, this is an excellent book. If you like Sci-fi, or books on Personal/Social struggles, I recommend it to you--strongly. Since I am thirteen, tall, and have a shock of red hair, I stand out a lot and thus can relate to Acorna's troubles. Acorna is an alien that was found by some gruff miners. She later goes on to expose a child labor scheme on a planet called Kezdet. She meets a lot of intersting characters in her travels, and some parts of the book are really funny. This book was charming, intersting, but some parts became slow. If you enjoyed any of Anne McCaffrey's books, especially the brain/brawn series, I strongly recommend this book to you.

The fact that I found this book to be of quality that is to be expected from Anne Mccaffrey is at the moment irrelevant to my comments. I am a long time fan of Anne Mccafrey. The Restoree is one of my all time favoroute books. I enjoyed Acorna from an aspect that is not enjoyed by your avarage english speaking readers.I happen to come from from Hungary. My native language is hungarian. Most of the book takes place on a planet called Kezdet. Kezdet is the hungarian word for beginning. In the beggining when I started to read this book I thought it was just a coincidence. I wasn't.I really enjoyed how the writers used the hungarian language and expressions in writing this book. I am about to provide a little dictionary for anybody who reads this review. anyag-material czerebogar- a particularly loathsome kind of beetle. farkas-wolf maganos-lonely And of course these are only a few examples. My favourite happens to be the name of one of the minor characters. The girl called Irodalmi Javak. The literary transaletion happens to be: Irodalmi- Litarery Javak-patents Essentiall her name means literary patents. The fascinating part of it is when reading this name the feeling of it not unnatural. All I could see in my minds eye is a fragile but strong girl with a name that suits her admirably. Incidentally most of the names of the characters from that planet actually probably came from hindi not from hungarian. I could recognize the origin because I lived in India also for a little while. I was at that time busy learning english so I could not understand those names that came from that source. I would love to learn their meanings also. My review does not have very much to do with the undoubted quality of this book but it added a lot to my enjoyment of it that I wanted to share with other readers. I do not know how long I can wait for the second part of it to come out in paperback so I can afford to buy it. I hope that by an incredible chance Anne Mccaffrey would be able to read a very personal message from me to her. All my life I wanted to write books. I never tried to publish anything that I wrote because I did not feel that they were up to a standar that I would expect from myself but you are definitely one of my stars to steer by.

Some of the stories are quite similar to others. Of course, they all have to do with dragons, but several fall in the Hero goes to slay Dragon formula. The Orson Scott Card does not seem to fit in the traditional dragon formula and is the outstanding story. The Anne MaCaffrey is good but overwritten at points. I expected more from the Zelazny. It was very good, but Zelazny has done such mind-blowing work that this seems to be a bit trite. The Friesner is hillarious and the best of the funny stories in this book. The Martin and Tilton are quite good, but not estradordinary. The rest were merely okay, except for The Ever-After which had horrid prose.

This was a fairly good book. It gave a lot of information that someone might use while reading any of Anne McCaffrey's books. I liked this book because of that. Anyone who likes dragons could use this book.

I LOVED this book! I've never in my life read stories of this calliber!I couldn't put this book down.It was delightful from cover to cover.I highly recommend this book to anyone who has fallen in love with the world of dragons.

This was when it was issued an excellent reference for Pern, but it has since been very dated by the publication of books such as Masterharper of Pern and Skies of Pern. And the information in it is extremely shallow compared to some of the excellent wesites that are available online. I would be delighted if Jody Lynn Nye and Annne McCaffrey would sit down and incorporate some of the work Pern fans have been doing in the interim years and make this a truly authoritative Pern reference book.

I found this book good reading, for the most part. Like any "instructional" type companion book for a series, it can be dry at times...but it's still a good read! I found out some things that the series books had left out, or didn't explain too thouroughly. The illustrations were really great, too! My perception of just how big Ramoth was definitely changed after I read this book! All in all...not bad, if you're a McCaffrey/Pern fan. Worth buying!

Do you love Anne McCaffrey's Pern books? Did you ever wonder exactly what a bubbly pie was or how klah really tastes? Want the recipe? It's all in this book. I took this home and kicked my family out of the kitchen for hours. Klah is fabulous if you like coffee, cinnamon, and chocolate. Do you want to know what the Rukbat system looks like? There's a map of Rukbat here. And what are those bloody threads made of anyway? And how do the dragonriders predict where they'll fall next? It's all right here in this cover-to-cover learning experience

Looking and reading like a romance novel, I found Crisis at Doona a dissapointment. Being a long time fan of Ms. McCaffrey's I was dismayed at what I read. Instead of the usual well developed characters and stories, cardboard cutouts moved around on a wooden stage. Ms. McCraffrey wrote several romance novels and now apparently has become enamored of the style, sadly enough. Like late period Heinlein, go back and read the earlier works, leave the rest to the rabid fans.

It's just that this sci-fi/mystery book has very poor elements of mystery in it. Many facts in the book are contradictory (not on face). I shouldn't tell any element of the book so I won't reveal the errors.

However, I did manage to get through this sacharrine and very typical book of the style of Anne and Mercades and Andre. It's O.K. despite my disappointment with it. To the point, this book is the lightest of light reading for people who want to pass time. There is no way it deserves five stars in my opinion.

Here we find that Todd and Hrriss, two characters who became best friends as children in "Decision at Doona", are still best friends 25 years later and have become role model citizens. But suddenly they are accused of some serious crimes just as the agreement between the Humans and the Hrrubans is up for renewal, and as a result the continued existence of their shared colony world is in jeopardy. No one who knows the two very well believes for a minute that they've committed the acts they're accused of, but the body of evidence against them that will be used to hold them in judgement seems to be mounting up. A riveting tale of mystery and suspense.

Like many others, I was excited to see a new addition to the Dragonriders series and, unfortunately, like many of the readers here, I was horribly disappointed in the Skies of Pern. There were too many discrepencies to go into (other reviewers have done that) but what it means when you are reading is that instead of getting engaged with the plot(s), your mind says, 'hang on a minute...isn't Mirrim a GREEN rider?' then you re-read the passage about her gold dragon. Then you put the book down and hunt through several rooms to find one of the other books with the dragon/rider relationship handily printed in the back and confirm you are not crazy but rather, Ms McCaffrey and her crack team of editors completely screwed up. Repeatedly.

There are a multitude of plot lines that are not resolved, somewhat unusually for the Pern series. The writing is not crisp nor witty. And smart characters end up in the stupidest situations. The ending is totally fabricated (it didn't make me want to cry. Vomit, maybe, but not cry). It is painfully obvious there will be another book taking us to the end of Thread in the Ninth Pass, but the bigger question is how many of us faithful Pern fans will care enough to buy it!

I've been disappointed with most of the recent installments in the Pern series, largely because of the lack of depth to human-dragon interaction. The Skies of Pern, however, is a very welcome return to a relationship-centered Pern. F'lessan and Tai, the two central characters, are remarkably well-developed, and their dragons are even better! This novel explores the depth of the relationship between dragon and rider, and between Weyrmates, in a way that none of the previous Pern books really have. The buildup is gradual, the climax at once heartbreaking and triumphant. I sincerely hope that McCaffrey gives us more of F'lessan, Golanth, Tai, and Zaranth in the future, as I loved and cared immensely for all four of them... and definitely feel that the ending warranted a follow-up!

Mercifully, the accounts of Council meetings and politics among Lord Holders are limited to vital decisions which affect the main storyline. The side plot about the Abominators, however, didn't really feed into everything else. Maybe that will be wrapped up in a future installment.... But at least in this volume of the Pern saga, I found myself skimming those sections to get back to F'lessan and Tai.

Golanth and Zaranth are some of the best-written draconic characters that Pern has ever seen, and the only way that I will find their story disappointing is if there is no more of it!

It has been many years since Anne MacCaffrey came out with a forward-moving story for her Pern novels .... I really enjoyed this book, and had trouble putting it down.

The story focuses around F'lessan, bronze rider of Gollanth, and only son of the Benden Weyrleaders Lessa and F'lar. It also has the requsite unsure, talented, young girl (this time dragonrider of green Zaranth), who must learn to stand up for herself. And of course, all the political intrigue (new Lords Holder and Weyrleaders to replace retired/deceased older leaders, and as a new threat, The Abominators -- those who oppose AIVAS innovation as polluting Pern's "purity" of tradition) and powerplays (Southern's power-hungry Lord Holder, Toric). Yes, it's a familiar formula, but it at least moves the timeline forward a and answers the question of what Dragonriders will do when thread will no longer fall on Pern.

...the story moved back and forth in time didn't bother me... the dragons were, after all, "timing it" during that section of the story. And yes, the solution to Dragonriders' occupation after the Present Pass seems degrading by comparison to their present duties, but it does make sense. BTW, the book did have there is one scene that drew tears to my eyes... something I haven't done with the Pern series since Robinton and his fire lizard died in _All the Weyrs of Pern_.

My main complaint is that I expected this to be the last of the Pern novels. Instead, it has the ending leaves the door open for *many* new sequels. ....