Dragonheart by Todd McCaffrey

When Fiona, the youngest, and now only daughter of Lord Bemin of Fort Hold, happens to impress a dragon, it occurs on the cusp of a horrible tragedy that affects Weyrs all over Pern: though Dragons were thought never to get sick, somehow, a plague that affects them is transmitted from sick fire-lizards.

Shortly after Fiona impresses Talenth, everyone, dragon-rider, Weyrpeople and Holders, must send their fire-lizards away to the southern continent to ensure the health and safety of the Dragons. Unfortunately, it doesn't help, and Fiona, grieving over the loss of Fire, her gold fire-lizard, is called upon to help the Weyrwoman and headwoman of Fort Weyr in their many duties, and tend to the sick dragons of others with the help of a Weyr drudge named Xhinna, who she refuses to treat as a drudge and instead treats as a friend.

As the two girls take care of the dragons and their riders, Thread begins to fall, in a pass that will last 50 years. But with every fall, more and more dragons sicken, and many who are sick choose to die by going between, and many of their riders go with them. Soon, fewer and fewer older dragons and riders are around in the Weyrs, leaving the younglings to take care of more business, and Fiona is one of their number.

With less Dragons to fly every fall, more of them are getting hurt, and because there are so few dragons, they cannot get the rest and recovery they need. But there might be a solution- timing it! By going back years before the plague and keeping to an area of Pern where there are no dragons, they might set up a place for the wounded to recover and allow the younglings and strong, vigorous dragons a chance to grow older without being exposed to the disease and helping them take over flying threadfalls.

When Fiona is tapped to lead just such a group to Igen Weyr ten years in the past, she must call upon all her training as both the Lord Holder's daughter and as the Weyrwoman of Fort Weyr to lead her friends and Weyrmates through the setting up of Igen hold, now abandoned, as a place for the wounded to recover and the young to grow into the new duties they will assume on their return. But Fiona will have a special place in history, and it is up to her to discover and live it, ten turns in the past!

I find Todd McCaffrey's writing to be not very much like his mother's. And I can't exactly say what sets it apart, just that there is a difference and I can sense it, but he also tells wonderful stories, perhaps in a bit more pedestrian manner than his mother Anne did, but still fascinating and wonderful to read.

Here, we are introduced to Fiona shortly before she impresses Talenth, and the impression takes her completely by surprise, for she isn't even one of the candidates to impress... she's sitting in the stands. One of the girls trying to impress Talenth reappears later in the book as Xhianna, and we find out that she wasn't one of the candidates, either! She had stolen one of the white robes and sneaked onto the hatching grounds because she needed a friend, and everyone else picked on and ignored her. But she may get a chance to impress one of Talenth's eggs later on, as the gold dragon offers it to Xhianna when she and Fiona become friends.

Of course, in addition to the dragon illness that is so worrying everyone, the new weyrlings seem to be confused and logy most of the time. This may be explained by the fact that they will later spend years reliving the same time in another place on the planet, but no one can say for sure, and it may be a factor in the next book to come. Of course, some of the Weyrlings recover from their symptoms in the past, and some do not, and Fiona may be triple-timing, as the gold rider who led her into the past may actually be herself at some point in the future, but since neither we nor Fiona ever see the woman's face, it remains a mystery.

Fiona is the main character, and she has an awful lot to do here, especially when she and the others go to the past, but it just makes her a stronger character as she deals with traders, helps establish a Gold-mining hold that also raises WatchWhers and has a hand in a lot of the past. It's almost Mary-Sueish, how much history she sets in place and makes, but she's never annoying or know-it-all and never makes you hate her, no matter how much the author seems to love her.

It might not have had the magic of Anne McCaffrey's writing, but Dragonheart was a solid book that I enjoyed reading. Even though it has an ominously large page count, the book is a fairly fast read, and the story will slip by before you know it. Even so, it feels like there should have been more to the book. The story feels like it needed a more solid and concrete ending, even if it ended up being a Harry Potter-sized book. But I will be interested in reading the next volume.