Preview of Dragonsdawn Summary:

Dragonsdawn shows McCaffrey's timely awareness of social issues. The colonists of Pern are doing what some of McCaffrey's readers would like to do: get away from Earth, forget the past, and start over. While the Earth and its colonies have grown to become the Federated Sentient Planets (FSP), Earth's principal problems are old and familiar: a pollution-plagued environment ruled by a technocratic bureaucracy. Since Pern is too far from Earth to be commercially exploited, the colonists establish an agriculturally-based economy, with a minimal, localized political structure.

Concern for the planet's ecology plays a large part in all decisions affecting the survival of the colony. The colonists bring many animals, plants and microorganisms from Earth, and biologists and genetic engineers help with integration and adaptation to Pern's ecology. Grazing animals are genetically altered to digest Pern's grasses. Metasynth dolphins, altered to communicate mentally with fishermen...