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Anne McCaffrey: A Life with Dragons Hardcover – Illustrated, August 15, 2007

by Robin Roberts (Author)
4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 50 ratings
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Anne McCaffrey: A Life with Dragons is the biography of a writer who vividly depicted alien creatures and new worlds. As the author of the Dragonriders of Pern series, McCaffrey (1926–2011) was one of the most significant writers of science fiction and fantasy. She was the first woman to win the Hugo and Nebula awards, and her 1978 novel The White Dragon was the first science-fiction novel to appear on the New York Times hardcover bestseller list.

This biography reveals a fascinating and complex figure, one who created and re-created her fiction by drawing on life experiences. At various stages, McCaffrey was a beautiful young girl who refused to fit into traditional gender roles in high school, a restless young mother who wanted to write, an American expatriate who became an Irish citizen, an animal lover who dreamed of fantasy worlds with perfect relationships between humans and beasts, and a wife trapped in an unhappy marriage just as the women's movement took hold.

Author Robin Roberts conducted interviews with McCaffrey, her children, friends, and colleagues, and used archival correspondence and contemporary reviews and criticism. The biography examines how McCaffrey's early interests in theater, Slavonic languages and literature, and British history, mythology, and culture all shaped her science fiction. The book is a nuanced portrait of a writer whose appeal extends well beyond readers of her chosen genre.

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  1. Print length
    240 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    University Press of Mississippi
  4. Publication date
    August 15, 2007
  5. Dimensions
    6.37 x 0.95 x 9.24 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    157806998X
  7. ISBN-13
    978-1578069989
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Robert's intriguing biography of the legendary Dragon Lady of Pern provides a fascinating overview of Anne McCaffrey's life along with some keen insights into how her career developed. A trail blazer, McCaffrey, now 81, says she "put romance in science fiction." Roberts counts her among authors such as Ursula K. LeGuin and Joanna Russ who helped change the face of a once male-dominated genre. In a chatty, chronological format, Roberts sketches McCaffrey's life as a perky student, frustrated young mother and wife, SF insider (including her brief affair with Isaac Asimov) and expatriate. Her post-divorce move to Ireland came as a surprise to many but soon led to tremendous success, despite her longing for the company of friends such as her mentor and agent, Virginia Kidd. McCaffrey was the first woman to win each and both of the prestigious Hugo and Nebula awards, and in 1978, she became the first author to have a science fiction book (The White Dragon) on the New York Times bestseller list. This is not an "authorized" biography, and though McCaffrey gave Roberts her blessing and access to crucial papers, she appears to be an elusive interview subject. The result is an authentic but sometimes enigmatic portrait. 30 b&w illus.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

"Highly recommended for librarians, English instructors and professors of young adult literature. It responds to a crying need for quality literary criticism in the field. A vital purchase for public, academic, and secondary school libraries."-Catholic Library World

"This recent addition to Greenwood's Critical Companions to Contemporary Writers series is a truly useful guide to Anne McCaffrey's fiction. Although written for readers who are probably unfamiliar with science fiction, this book would be a useful tool for scholars and McCaffrey's fans."-SFRA Review

"Science Fiction enthusiasts with a solid grounding in McCaffrey's works receive a fine critical examination which probes her noves to date. While young adults producing reports will find this quite useful, many an adult enthusiast can easily use this as a key to understanding mcCaffrey's many contributions to her field."-Booklist/Reference Books Bulletin

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ University Press of Mississippi; Illustrated edition (August 15, 2007)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 240 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 157806998X
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1578069989
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.34 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.37 x 0.95 x 9.24 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 50 ratings

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Robin Roberts

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Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
4.4 out of 5
50 global ratings
An intimate look at Anne's life
5 Stars
An intimate look at Anne's life
This is an outstanding biography: well-written, interesting, and in depth. Unlike the previous two biographies (Dragonholder and Anne McCaffrey: Science Fiction Storyteller (People to Know), both out of print), this one is a thorough examination of Anne's life, from childhood and schooling, to marriage and divorce, to her move to Ireland and struggles to make writing a successful career, to her eventual bestseller status and enjoyment of being a "real" fairy godmother to friends and family, and her continued writing to this day. It gives a good portrait of Anne's personality and what shaped it, how her life has shaped her writing and conversely how her writing shaped her life. It doesn't shy from covering her love affairs, details which are not to be found in any previous biography (which isn't surprising: the Trachtenberg bio was aimed at pre-teen readers and her own son wrote the other biography). Altogether it gives a detailed, intimate look at Anne McCaffrey's life. Any fan of Anne's books should enjoy learning about the forces that shaped her fition.
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Top reviews from the United States

trolldoll-1
5.0 out of 5 stars Bio on Anne McCaffrey.....
Reviewed in the United States on May 27, 2014
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I was just checking on the Dragon Lady's books and accidently found this book. The author must have spent quite a bit of time with Anne, her son Todd, her editors, her friends, people that live and work for and with Anne.... It is a very detailed bio that also relates Anne's life experiences and how she added those experiences, emotions, angst, issues, etc., into her different books. It was interesting that the author, book editors, friends, etc., related that her character Menolly from "Dragonsong" is best described as being Anne herself - all her childhood issues and loneliness communicated through this character. I love all the Dragon Riders of Pern books but especially the Harper Hall trilogy! I guess I related deeply with Anne through her character Menolly also... I highly recommend this book to any Anne McCaffrey fan --- you really get to know the author much better. Well worth the read!
6 people found this helpful
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BkWyrm
5.0 out of 5 stars Accurate, scholarly, extremely interesting biography!
Reviewed in the United States on August 6, 2010
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Robin Roberts was allowed full access to Anne McCaffrey, her family, and Anne's papers. She has written a very scholarly, very entertaining, informative, fascinating biography of Anne. Ms. Roberts obviously has sincere admiration for her subject, but she diligently recounts all of the factors - warts and all - that helped shape Anne into the beloved author that she is today. Her detailed knowledge of all of Anne's books (she has also written a non-fiction book about Anne's books)adds interesting insights. If you really want to know Anne McCaffrey and what shaped her body of work, read this book! It is excellent!
7 people found this helpful
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Steve F
4.0 out of 5 stars A Thorough and Deeply Personal Look at Anne McCaffrey that Avid Fans will Greatly Appreciate
Reviewed in the United States on August 7, 2012
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I just finished reading "Anne McCaffrey: A Life with Dragons" by Robin Roberts, so I thought I would offer my review. Anne McCaffrey is my favorite author and I have been an avid fan of hers for many years. I found this biography to be a deeply insightful look at who Anne McCaffrey was as a person, as a writer and why Anne wrote what she did and why she wrote the way she did. This biography also gives thorough coverage to Anne McCaffrey's life experiences from a young age to her twilight years which Anne draws upon for her writing and where those experiences show up in Anne's books. The author of this biography also gives attention to the real life people in Anne's life on which Anne bases some of the charcters in her books. While this biography offers an academic perspective, it also offers a fan perspective as is evident in Robin Roberts's reverent treatment of the details of Anne McCaffrey's life.

I gave this biography 4 stars out of 5 instead of a full five due to a couple of technical shortcomings in Robin Roberts's writing. The first shortcoming was in Roberts initially too often repeating information from two previous biographies from other authors (Anne's son, Todd McCaffrey's biography and a fan's biography by Martha P. Trachtenberg). The second technical shortcoming in the writing was in Roberts being too redundant in repeating things she just told the reader, as if the reader would forget so quickly. However, compared to the overall immense value that this biography is to avid fans of Anne McCaffrey, these two technical distractions, in my opinion, are somewhat minor. I think this biography is an essential addition to the library of an avid Anne McCaffrey fan.

Additionally, this biography provides a great reference list in its "Source Notes" and "Works Cited" sections for avid fans of Anne McCaffrey who would like to dig even deeper into favorite aspects of Anne's life or examine some of the primary sources of information used in this biography such as original television shows, interviews and magazine and newspaper articles about Anne McCaffrey. There are 5 other biographical works about Anne McCaffrey from different perspectives (fan, family anecdotal and academic) that I have recently discovered (two from this book and two others which I have read previously). If anyone would like a list of these, please feel free to reply to or comment on this review and I can send the list. Sometime in the future, I hope to put up my own Anne McCaffrey fan website and I will also post it there. I also hope to post the website link to one of the threads of this review on Amazon.com.

I highly recommend this biography, "Anne McCaffrey: A Life with Dragons" by Robin Roberts to avid Anne McCaffrey fans everywhere. Enjoy!

Steve F.
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Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars Best Writers and Books
Reviewed in the United States on August 30, 2020
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Loved the book. Wish there was more books still in the files to be published. Ms McCaffrey was a great writer and her children are taking after her.
Praying for PERN to be made into movies. I need to find that planet. Not a simpler life but better then what we are living through.
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Hans van der Boom
5.0 out of 5 stars A terrific and above all readable biography
Reviewed in the United States on August 8, 2008
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It is not easy to write a readable and entertaining biography while at the same time keeping the scientific value and the historical level high. Well, Robin Roberts is a master at it and this product the best she has written until now. This biography is a must for every Anne McCaffrey fan. And my warmest compliments to the dragonlady herself for opening up personally and file-wise and thus accomodating a cracking good book on her life and accomplishments. And if you start talking about this science fiction author's accomplishments you need every page you get!
3 people found this helpful
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Regular Prime customer
3.0 out of 5 stars Hard to get through
Reviewed in the United States on January 17, 2012
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This book wasn't as good as I expected it to be but I am still glad I read it. I learned a lot about Anne McCaffrey, which is the purpose of a biography but the writing itself was repetitive and there were many places that I really had to push myself to continue reading. Also, the editing was not very good; many words were broken by hyphens where they shouldn't have been. I would recommend this book to a die-hard McCaffrey fan like myself but a casual reader would probably not enjoy it.
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donhale1@prodigy.net
5.0 out of 5 stars Great read
Reviewed in the United States on July 18, 2011
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This is a well written and insightful view into the life of one of our great authors. Those of us who have read Anne McCaffrey's work over the decades already have some knowledge of the Great Lady - who she is, how she thinks, and what she's accomplished - but Robin Roberts opens that door to her life even wider. For all those lovers of Pern, the Tower, Brainships and Coelera this is a wonderful addition to our libraries.
3 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

Sonya Bell
5.0 out of 5 stars good read
Reviewed in Canada on December 18, 2020
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illuminating
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