Anne McCaffrey

About Anne McCaffrey Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders of Pern series firmly established her legacy in the science fiction and fantasy genres. She notably achieved a milestone as the first woman to receive both the Hugo and Nebula awards. Her work ‘The White Dragon’ distinguished itself by featuring on the New York Times Best Seller list, a significant accomplishment for a science-fiction novel at the time.

The best place to start is the Dragonriders of Pern series, the earliest of Anne McCaffrey's multi-book series: it opens with Dragonflight (1968) and runs to 30 books across 1968–2018, ending with Dragon's Code (2018). Anne McCaffrey's other series stand alone, so they can be read in any order.

Anne McCaffrey has 205 books catalogued in this guide, published between 1967 and 2026. 142 of them belong to 21 named series — the largest being the Dragonriders of Pern series with 30 books — and 63 are standalone titles, collections or anthologies.

Read each series in publication order — the numbered entries in each series follow the year each book first appeared. Anne McCaffrey's series do not depend on one another, so they can be started in any order; by start date they are Dragonriders of Pern (1968–2018, 30 books), Brainship (1969–2026, 8 books) and Doona (1969–1994, 3 books), plus 16 more.

This guide splits Anne McCaffrey's 205 books into 21 named series and 63 titles that stand alone or appear only in collections: Dragonriders of Pern (30 books, 1968–2018); Acorna (10 books, 1997–2007); Brainship (8 books, 1969–2026); New Adventures of Pern (5 books, 2003–2011); The Tower and Hive (5 books, 1990–1999), plus 16 further series.