Nerilka’s Story

A deadly epidemic was sweeping across Pern

Everyone, holder and dragonrider alike, pitched in to help--except Nerilka's father, who refused to share Fort Hold's bounty with the other Holds. So, ashamed of her family and determined to do her part, Nerilka packed up medicines and supplies and sneaked off to aid her people.

Her quest to help wherever she was most needed led her finally to Ruatha Hold, where Lord Alessan was frantically preparing the precious serum needed for mass inoculations against the dread plague.

Nerilka had long ago abandoned her hope of marriage and a home of her own. Now she found happiness in being useful and appreciated--first the Healers and then Alessan made very clear that they were grateful for her help.

She had no idea that her new path would change the course of her life forever

Anne McCaffrey, one of the world’s most popular authors, is best known for her Dragonriders of Pern(R) series. She was the first woman to win the two top prizes for science fiction writing, the Hugo and Nebula awards. She was also given the American Library Association’s Margaret A. Edwards Award for Lifetime Literary Achievement in Young Adult Fiction, was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame, and was named a Science Fiction Writers of America Grand Master. Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1926, McCaffrey relocated to Ireland in the 1970s, where she lived in a house of her own design, named Dragonhold-Underhill. She died in 2011.