Many years ago in high school I found a book that was a collection of short stories/novellas. I think it was an 80's edition of Best of Sci-Fi and Fantasy, and basically where I developed a love of the genre. I read it from cover to cover several times, and I've purchased many collections since then. One of the best aspects of these stories (in my mind) is that the authors don't explain how things in the fictional worlds came to be, or how the tech works. It is left of to the imagination, and I believe that too much detail ruins stories.
Once of the stories, and I believe it was a novella because of its length, was about a lost and forgotten colony of humans who had domesticated dragons for use in combat. Now before I go on, I realize this is much like Dragonriders of Pern. I have actually never read any of the McCaffrey books (I guess I like 'hard' science tales more)so it could in actuality be a short story in her world. But it is different in that the dragons were descended from an alien race, and that in reality they aren't dragons at all, only that that is about the best word to describe them.
At the end of the story the aliens return to the planet and were revealed to be related to the dragons but more frail, and were defeated by the humans and dragons. No explanation of how the humans were forgotten, how they tamed the dragons or much backstory at all.
Again, please forgive me if this is just a simple Anne McCaffrey tale. Thank you in advance, and if someone could even point out the book that it was included in that would be the icing on the cake. Damn if I didn't lose the book many years ago. There were many fabulous stories in it.
Wes
Once of the stories, and I believe it was a novella because of its length, was about a lost and forgotten colony of humans who had domesticated dragons for use in combat. Now before I go on, I realize this is much like Dragonriders of Pern. I have actually never read any of the McCaffrey books (I guess I like 'hard' science tales more)so it could in actuality be a short story in her world. But it is different in that the dragons were descended from an alien race, and that in reality they aren't dragons at all, only that that is about the best word to describe them.
At the end of the story the aliens return to the planet and were revealed to be related to the dragons but more frail, and were defeated by the humans and dragons. No explanation of how the humans were forgotten, how they tamed the dragons or much backstory at all.
Again, please forgive me if this is just a simple Anne McCaffrey tale. Thank you in advance, and if someone could even point out the book that it was included in that would be the icing on the cake. Damn if I didn't lose the book many years ago. There were many fabulous stories in it.
Wes
