she "first set dragons free on Pern and then was herself freed by her dragons". Like Crystal Singer, Dragonsong features a young woman with great musical talent. Beside fishing, its focus in Pernese society is the arts and education, in contrast to the military and political focus of the original trilogy. In this the action at Harper Hall rather than the Weyrs is akin to McCaffrey's own experience. At Radcliffe College, Harvard, she majored in Slavonic Languages and literature. From her teens through her thirties, before she turned to writing full-time, she pursued musical avocations: piano lessons, voice training and performance, and assisting in amateur production of musicals and operettas. Plot summary Taking place seven years after the events of Dragonflight, the book opens with Menolly, youngest daughter of Masterfisher Yanus, Sea Holder of Half-Circle Seahold, in the fictional world of Pern. Menolly, a gifted young musician, has been assisting the Hold's ailing Harper Petiron in his duties to educate the Hold's children. After Petiron's death, however, a new Harper arrives as his replacement. Menolly's parents forbid her to reveal that she has been teaching the children in the interim, believing that music and particularly teaching are not a woman's place. To conceal her former role from the new Harper, Menolly is not allowed to play, sing, or compose, and her parents severely punish her for doing so. Unbeknownst to Menolly or her parents, prior to his death Petiron sent several of Menolly's original compositions to Masterharper Robinton at Harper Hall, where Robinton is now frantic to locate this mysterious new composer, though unaware that the composer is female. Frustrated and heartbroken, Menolly chooses to leave her Hold and live Holdless, a dangerous enterprise as flesh-eating Thread fall regularly on the area. She is entirely unaware that Masterharper Robinton has directed the new harper at Half-Circle Seahold to find the composer in order to train them as a Harper. Menolly finds a safe cave near the sea and makes it her new home. She also discovers a nest of the legendary fire-lizards, smaller versions of the giant dragons that defend Pern from Thread. She assists the fire-lizard queen in relocating her clutch to safety, thereby winning the creature's trust. Menolly is present when the clutch hatches and inadvertently Impresses nine hatchlings, forming a symbiotic, psychic bond with them and making herself responsible for their care. Feeding both her fire-lizards and