Gigi McCaffrey

Gigi McCaffrey is a working name of Georgeanne Johnson, daughter of Dragonriders of Pern creator Anne McCaffrey and sister of fellow Pern novelist Todd McCaffrey. She grew up close to her mother's writing life and, after returning to live near her in Ireland, took an increasingly active role in it — helping manage her mother's affairs and, as Anne McCaffrey's health declined in her later years, providing personal care alongside the collaboration. Under the byline Georgeanne Kennedy, she co-wrote several Pern short stories directly with her mother for anthologies, and she also contributed a personal essay to Dragonwriter: A Tribute to Anne McCaffrey and Pern, the tribute volume edited by her brother Todd. Her major solo contribution to the series is Dragon's Code (2018), published to mark the fiftieth anniversary of Dragonriders of Pern and written seven years after Anne McCaffrey's 2011 death. Unlike some of her brother Todd's Pern novels, which are billed as co-written with their mother from her notes, Dragon's Code is credited to Gigi McCaffrey alone. Readers coming to the Pern universe through her book are, in effect, meeting the series through the McCaffrey family member who spent the most time at its creator's side; the natural next step is either backward into Anne McCaffrey's original Dragonflight or sideways into Todd McCaffrey's continuation novels.