Pern

From Anne McCaffrey comes a collection of captivating short stories that focuses on everything from spaceship adventure and shifting time-storms to ghosts and romance. The title story, set in the world of the Dragonriders of Pern series, tells of Aramina, a teenage girl who hears dragons and is relentlessly pursued for her ability. Aramina's mother fears losing her daughter completely to the life of a dragonrider, but McCaffrey has another fate in mind for her young heroine. Other novellas included are Duty Calls-an exciting tale in the Ship Who Sang series-and A Quiet One, where large animals have had to make way for an expanding human population.

The beautiful planet Pern seemed a paradise to its new colonists, a return to an agrarian way of life, until unimaginable terror turned it into hell. Lethal spores began to fall like silvery thread-like rain from the sky, vaporizing everything, and everyone, in their path. The colony, cut off from Earth and lacking the resources to combat the menace, was doomed. The colonists noticed that small, dragon-like lizards in their new world were joining the fight against Thread, breathing fire on it and teleporting to safety. If only the dragonets were big enough for a human to ride and intelligent enough to work as a team with a rider. With time running out and the colony's destruction imminent, they set their most talented geneticist to work to create the creatures Pern so desperately needed dragons!

These are the first five episodes of Anne McCaffrey's fascinating saga of Pern - in which listeners learn about the earliest days of Pernese history. Beginning with the very first ever Dragonriders of Pern adventure, join the original survey team as they explore Pern and recommend it for colonization. Share the terror of the evacuation from the Southern Continent as a flotilla of ships - aided by intelligent, talking dolphins - braves the currents of the Pernese ocean. Learn how the famous Ruatha Hold was founded. Thrill with the dragonriders as they expand into a second, then a third Weyr. And discover a secret lost in time - the rescue of some of the original colonists before the planet was cut off forever.