I loved - loved - the Pern books when I was a kid. I haven’t cracked one in 15 years or so, but I still own all of them. Lately, out of nowhere, I’ve been struck with a desire to re-read all of them.
Should I? How do they hold up over time? I remember the writing and especially the dialogue as being particularly clunky, and that was when I was 12. How will it fare after reading Nabokov and Pynchon? 
The stories are quite enjoyable, if you can get over the stupidity of the supposed astronomy she creates with the red star. I thought the first two books, along with all three of the shorter Menolly/Piemur books were quite acceptable. I think she started going a bit silly with White Dragon, and I positively stopped reading anything after her book on the original colonization. It all got a bit stupid, really.
I also was disappointed with the story about Moreta’s ride. The whole focus should be the build up to the famous ride, but when that comes in the book, it’s almost anti-climactic. 
In case you didn’t know, the first part of the first book was originally a short story, for which she was awarded either the Hugo or the Nebula, I can’t recall which. That part had nothing to do with thread, etc. I wish she had simply stayed with a total fantasy setting.
I reread about the first dozen Pern books recently (I run roleplaying at my school and thought there might be inspiration / ideas I’d forgotten).
As an adult, I noticed that the plots were quite simple, the characters well drawn and that McCaffrey sometimes used people in her life as characters.
The discovery of the spaceship and computer jarred a little with the medieval setting, but it was far more original when she wrote it. (Star Trek changed our lives!)
Nevertheless it brought back pleasant memories.
I enjoyed rereading the Wizard of Earthsea even more (though the last book was disappointing).
I think if you read such books without preconceived expectations, you’ll be fine. 
I’ve reread the series often – anyway, up to All the Weyrs of Pern. The series went south after that, IMO. I enjoy them, although I confess that I am not a hard science fiction person. The Pern book are really the only science fiction books I read. A person with more of an interest in the genre might not enjoy them as much as I do.
I have read all of the Pern books.I think it was probably my first foray int fantasy as a branch off from scifi. I have not approached them very eagerly of late as I began to find them a bit repetitive. She would explain things/events from previous books that she had already explained within the same book . I know this is so the present book can stand on its own but I kept getting the feeling she forgot she already filled us in. A better editor might smooth this all out. She is still a darn good read anyway.
I’m not a fan, mostly because many of her books seem much too, “my heroes are the absolute bestest and they always win and they’re so heroic!” thing going on. Dragonriders of Pern makes my teeth ache, and want to hire Dirty Harry to waste the main characters.
I too loved them as an early teen, but now I find that only the Menolly books (really only the first two) hold up at all. Re-reading the dragon stories as an adult is pretty disappointing.
The Pern books are books I re-read when I want something light and am too tired or brain-dead to tackle a new book. I still enjoy them.
I don’t think its out of nowhere. Thats the first thing I thought of when I saw that awful Eregon preview. I wasn’t the biggest fan when I read them as a youngster, but I think they could make good movies or at least a television series.
Earthsea was Anne McCaffry(sp?). Cool.
I’m so glad I wasn’t the only one! My second thought was “rip-off”.
No, it was by Ursula K. Le Guin .
Her need of an editor, or at least some decent notes, has been getting worse and worse. I noticed this sort of thing starting with The Dolphins of Pern. She had a minor character, Lord Oterel, standing around on the boat during the happy ending scene. He kept pretty quiet, probably because his death was central to a story arc in All the Weyrs of Pern, which took place years before the events of Dolphins of Pern.
The Zombies of Pern is just waiting to be written.
McCaffrey’s earlier Pern writings (along with some of her Rowan books) are one of my guilty pleasures (tho slightly more respectable than my occasional re-reading of Mercedes Lackey).
So I say go for it, and if you enjoy it, more power to you.
Just don’t expect to gain tremendous insight into the human condition. Just keep thinking “Magical talking dragon will be my friend!”
And make sure to wash your hands when you’re done.
It’s also okay to not tell anyone what you’re reading, even if they ask you, if you don’t want to.
I think you’re safe re-reading the first several Pern books. I recently tried to read one of Todd’s Pern books and gave up, which is really rare for me. The writing was just terrible.
The first few books should be fine. As long as you’re not too picky, you can even read Dragonsdawn and The Renegades of Pern, and maybe even Dragon’s Eye. Don’t, I repeat don’t, read All The Weyrs of Pern or Dolphins of Pern. The Masterharper of Pern can be read if you’re a big Robinton fan.
Of course, Eragon fans can ignore all that and read all of them. Well, except Dolphins.
And I used to RESPECT you so much! Lackey? You read LACKEY?
I think that McCaffrey’s first two trilogies are readable, but not very challenging. I’ve tried a couple of Lackey’s stories and they make me puke. McCaffrey ran out of ideas long ago, and now she’s just milking that cash cow she’s got. I don’t really blame her, if people will buy a piece of crap from her, hey, she thinks it must be good.
There was a time she could write a very readable story. Decision at Doona was a favorite of mine for a long time. And Restoree still can give me the willies. But she has one habit that drives me up a wall. She writes using certain scientific or artistic fields as the central component of her stories, then fails to comprehend what she is writing about. The Red Star of the Pern novels was so impossible she never could rehabilitate her astronomy for that series, yet she didn’t stop trying. And her Crystal Singer novels were so full of misused musical terminology it made them almost unreadable.
I won’t even bother discussing Mercedes Lackey, or any of the other fanboi wannabes that get their start in Science Fiction by playing up to established writers, which gets them co-authorings, which they parlay into full novels of their own. VERY few of them worth reading on their own merits.
I’ve always been curious as to why so many authors go through a “it’s magic but it’s really science” phase. The audience doesn’t care: we’re interested in what’s going on, and only a handful of authors can actually make the setting itself a character we care about. It’s often so pointless, and adds little. So I’m always curious as to how and why they do that.