When Killashandra arrives on Optheria to replace and tune the crystals of a famous organ she is kidnapped and left to fend for herself on a deserted island. McCaffrey re-invents this universe over the course of her subsequent novelizations. Killa is determined to join them, whatever the cost. She encounters a member of the Heptite Guild, whose membership, like herself, have perfect pitch. Killashandra Ree will never be a top flight singer, so she decides to leave the profession. The original series spanned Killa's dramatic exit from operatic training until her death. In The Crystal Singer, McCaffrey revisits the series. The original series consists of four short stories each published in an issue of Continuum, edited by Roger Elwood.

The first singer we meet in the Crystal Singer series is Killashandra, a typical McCaffrey heroine, small, fast and quick-tempered. Helva, the ship sings, also, and Anne McCaffrey participated in a collection entitled, Space Opera, a pun, a subject also beloved of McCaffrey (in true science fiction tradition). The influence of McCaffrey's love of music is also seen in her Pern series, especially in the Dragonsinger trilogy ( Dragonsong, Dragonsinger, Dragondrums), and in the character Master Robinton the Masterharper of Pern, who was inspired by a friend of hers. The singers are well paid, but the cost to them is even higher. The Crystal Singer series takes the 'voice that can shatter glass' idea and uses singers with perfect pitch and technical facilitation to cut special crystals from the Milkey mountains. So it isn't very surprising that her work includes this influence. I do, too, but before the minute is up, I fade, chock, and halt, while that final note of Annie's keeps right on going.'Īustralian author Dave Luckett tells a story about trying to keep up with her at 2 a.m. At the final note, she takes a deep breath and holds.

We sing at each other very loudly, and finally we work ourselves up to a climax, which is always, 'When Irish Eyes Are Smiling'.While everyone in the audience gets far out to non-winding distance we get louder and higher.

We had another of our perennial songfest competitions. He writes in The Hugo Winners 1968-1970: 'In August 1970 Annie and I were co-guests of honor at a science fiction conference in Toronto. Isaac Asimov writes of trying to outlast her in singing show-downs. Anne McCaffrey Crystal Singer Series Singer's FortuneĪnne McCaffrey is a trained singer.

Crystal line anne mccaffrey