This book, another installment in Anne McCaffrey's "The Dragonriders of Pern" series, focuses on a new aspect of Pern: the dolphins that original settlers brought with them to the new world. Few people are interested in them, but their importance grows as their forgotten abilities are discovered.

Anne McCaffrey/Pern fans.

How she portrayed the dolphins--with different personalities and physical attributes. I especially liek their speech, as well.

How the book was written. Honestly, I found it terrible. Nothing like grammar or spelling was bad... But, the whole thing was so corny. Also, many incidents seemed just too coincidental. You know? "Oh, and it just so happened that..." Throughout reading this book I got the impression that it was written just to add on to the series, to squeeze out more dollars from fans' pockets.

Throw it away; but I didn't because then my series collection wouldn't be complete. It also made me want to go back and read the older parts of the series (ie the parts that are written well).

Disappointed, because I know the she can write much better than this.

From my observances regarding her dragonriders series, Anne McCaffrey is a short story writer, mainly. I've noticed that the longer her books are, the more they lack excitement and rapture. This book, at almost 400 pages, had nothing. However, many of her shorter novels are brilliant--and her short stories in the series are marvelous.

I can't recommend this book, but I wish I could. If you are an avid Pern fan, I'd recommend it because you learn some things about Pern that you don't in other books. If you are an avid Pern fan, I would not recommend it because it might shake your faith in Anne McCaffrey.

If you are not a Pern fan, I don't recommend that you read it at all, because it'll give you the wrong picture of the series, and make you think that it's total crap. I've read the whole series save for two books, and this one, so far, is the worst by a large margine.

(I hate to submit this review, since I want to be able to say that I love every single book in the series...)