[Azurehero]

I have to admit, I don't like Ann. I'm a boy, and I read The Ship Who Sang, and it was okay. A cool idea, but the book had a lot of slow spots for me. I started the White Dragon or whatever the first book of that serries is and it didn't grab me.

Oh well, huh?

[Thoughtcriminal84]

I have several theories about those pesky Pern books...I heartily agree that you should never judge a book by it's cover (gasp, cliche within a cliche) but having said that, I do believe that Pern is designed for young women. Not a damn thing wrong with that, we need more women in the game, and I need more women who like sci-fi to talk to. But I have to say much of the Pern material I have read (and, honestly, that includes all of three books) seems juvenile in it's approach and execution.

[Cadfael]

42/fat/male/balding

But I think the early Pern books a utterly brilliant. I have not read much of the later books because I found it was the same stories told from another perspective.

No... Anne MaCaffrey is for any gender. Mary Stewart is considered a 'woman's writer' but her books based on the Authurian Legend are good as well, in fact they are some of my favorites. If you like a book, it don't really matter what audience it was writen for

[PENTIAK]

This may be an uninformed opinion (a master of that am I)
I've only read "Runner of Pern" on Legends and that was some time back.
I must say I enjoyed it. I'm more a SF freak than Fantasy (i.e. I'm grossly outnumbered here) and tend to read on recommendations of people who's opinions and tastes I value.
in her defence, being not quite so enamoured to the fantasy genre as so many here, I found that I could visualise and get a feel for what was going on. something I often have trouble with with many fantasy authors, for example (POP! The sound of a can of worms opening! http://www.sffworld.com/ubb/redface.gif)Jordan, who I've been asked (given ultimatums really) to read and on any occasion I have he just didn't do it for me. however I could grasp, in her story, a feeling of the enviroment, and get a sense of depth. Which, is after all the reason for reading anything no?
My critique however, as a big hairy lout, is that seing as there are people flying around on dragons and nasty spores and such why does she spend so long explaining the finer details of the dress she wore to the dance and how her shoes matched it? And what a great dancer he was...
Perhaps, and I've seen evidence of people complaining of it here, it's good to see, as a lot of fantasy, and SF even more so, are simply dripping with testosterone- which of course is the way I like it but then we need a little variety do we not?

[CondorSkrill]

I'm 28, male and I have all the Pern series and frequently reread them, all books IMHO are for whoever wants to read them and shouldn't be limited to a specific audience.

[tamlyn]

PENTIAK: a story is almost only dialogue and description,even 'He walked into the room..' is description. Which is why dresses are described with such detail.
Any way i like the pern series and the Talents series best out of McCaffery but then i'd be classified as a young woman so you might as well ignore me.

[riotpoof]

Hi!
I'm 21 and I find the Pern stories quite amusing.
But I think that Marion Zimmer Bradley is better... her stories appeal to both sexes and to most of the age groups :-)
All the best

[niiina]

Just a thought....

Would anyone ever have asked if a book written by a man with a male lead character was only for men?

We women are so used to reading books from a male point of view, that I don't even think we speculate about it.