not ship fish, Dolphins

I am definately a fan of Anne McCaffrey. this book didn't hurt my opinion of her writing abililty.

Some imformation in case you are not a regular visiter to Pern.

In the future(isn't that where most of the good books start) Mankind as been spreading through out space to get away from its polluted earth. One survey mission descovers P.E.R.N.(parallels earth resources negligible)and deems it exceptible for colonization. Unfortionately for the colonest the survey didn't descover perns dangeruos secret.
Every hundred years the planet is ravaged by Thread that falls from outerspace. When the colonest are just getting set up this menice comes and devoures anything organic that happens to be in its path.
So for the sake of safety the biologicaly inhance one of the planets natural species to fight the thread. These become the focal point of the pern series book until this one.
This book is about the dolphins that have been brought from earth to help explore the waters of pern and help in rescue missions if sailors should run into trouble. In return these dolphins get clean water to swim in and the people of pern to help them when they need medical attention. Through bilogical inhancement the dolphins have aguired speech and have developed a sense of history.
Well to escape the thread man moves to the Northern continent and from there moves inland. Then over time the pernese seem to lose tuch with the dolphins except for the occasional sighting of "shipfish".after 2500 turns(a pern year) Alemi and Readis are saved by shipfish and to there amazement the shipfish seem to be talking to them. They even correct them on the name calling themselves dol-fins.

Thats where this Book starts. The dolphins have passed down through generations the sense of dutey to the pernese and have been waiting for man to return to ring the Dolphin bell. Man does return in the form of Alemi the master fisherman and T'lion the rider of bronze Gadareth who with the help of AVIS(the Artificial Inteligence that the people of pern have discovered in the ruins of the colonest) reconnect with the dolphins and strart to make good on the deal to help the dolphins in return for the're service.
Readis grows up and all the while grows more and more fond of the dolphins till one day he is forced to leave home do to his mothers fear of the dolphins. He finds a cave on the water and continues his contact with the dolphins until one day.... now I can't give the inding away that easy.

The only real problem I had with this book is that I wish it was at least another fiftey pages so that there could have been a little more time spent in developing the ending and a little more time to spend haveing adventures with Readis.

If you haven't read any of the pern series, I would recomen starting with THE CHRONICLES OF PERN: FIRST FALL.
But you could start here and still realy enjoy this book. You will however find yourself searching for all the other pern books.