Sassinak

This actually the third book in the series, not the first. If you read this without reading at least the previous book, the last third of the book will be confusing. The book takes us from Sassinak's early days on a frontier planet, to her capture by planet pirates, through her mid-adulthood. I thought the characters were interesting, the plot was good and it is an interesting galaxy, based on Anne McCaffrey's worlds. You can see the influence of Elizabeth Moon too.

I wanted to rate this higher than I did... Sassinak starts out well, with a clear writing style, a strong story, and a sympathetic and capable heroine. She is competent, smart, and fair. I like that she befriends people that others have a prejudice against. I also like that she is relatively relaxed in her relationships. They start, and they end, and no fuss is needed on that account.
The reason I'm not rating this higher, is that I started missing more and more about the story, until I really couldn't quite follow in the last part of the book. Perhaps I was not reading carefully enough. On the other hand, I read this the same I read everything else. If I was less attentive at certain parts, it was because they were not interesting show more enough. In any case, I went back to certain parts when I got lost, and I still couldn't quite make heads or tails of it. What I did get is that the way the traitor on board was finally found came pretty much falling out of the sky. So I'd rate this 3.5 because of its good parts, but I'm rounding it off downwards. show less

The last section was a confusing mess, probably because the storyline merges with other books by Anne McCaffrey, but it wasn't laid out well enough to stand on its own and for me to fully understand. Before that, though, I loved following Sassinak through her life, struggles, and ultimate triumphs against the backdrop of an interesting worldbuilding in space.

My favourite of the three in this series. Main character Sassinak is determined, tough, resourceful, fair, and fun as well. You could perhaps argue she's a bit too good, especially in her friendships with the other alien races that McCaffrey and Moon populate the environment with. It's a lot better than the clumsy way that McCaffrey et al treat inter-species relationships in the next two books.

I wanted to rate this higher than I did... Sassinak starts out well, with a clear writing style, a strong story, and a sympathetic and capable heroine. She is competent, smart, and fair. I like that she befriends people that others have a prejudice against. I also like that she is relatively relaxed in her relationships. They start, and they end, and no fuss is needed on that account.
The reason I'm not rating this higher, is that I started missing more and more about the story, until I really couldn't quite follow in the last part of the book. Perhaps I was not reading carefully enough. On the other hand, I read this the same I read everything else. If I was less attentive at certain parts, it was because they were not interesting show more enough. In any case, I went back to certain parts when I got lost, and I still couldn't quite make heads or tails of it. What I did get is that the way the traitor on board was finally found came pretty much falling out of the sky. So 3.5 because I liked the good parts, but not higher than that... show less

McCaffrey, Anne, and Elizabeth Moon. Sassinak. Planet Pirates No. 1. Baen, 1990.
By 1990, Anne McCaffrey was a writer whose name on the cover would increase sales. She was best known for her fantasy novels, especially the Dragonriders of Pern, and for her science fantasy series that began with The Ship Who Sang. She was used to collaborative writing and had already franchised out some stories in the Pern series. In collaborating with Elizabeth Moon in the first and third volumes of the Planet Pirates series, she was working with a young writer who had only been publishing for two years. I don’t know how they divided up the work, but if I had to guess I would say that most of the novel belongs to Moon, except perhaps the shape-changing show more aliens, and some of the last section. McCaffrey may have had in mind something like Andre Norton’s young adult planetary romances, but what emerges in Sassinak is military science fiction more like David Weber and later novels by Moon. The novel opens with a hard-edged story of young Sassinak’s enslavement by planet pirates. There follows the story of her rescue, her time at the Fleet Academy, and her career as a Fleet officer. The novel ends with an adventure in which Sassinak rescues one of her ancestors who has been in cryosleep for years. I hope someone interviews Moon about her experience working with McCaffrey. 3.5 stars. show less

Sassinak was 12 when the pirates came and enslaved her. But she could not be broken by their treatment of her and eventually she escaped. She joins the Fleet and becomes a Fleet Captain and then she can chase pirates. I wasn't enthralled enough by this debut to read any more in this series.