Acorna's Triumph [Audio Cassette]

Acorna's Truimph is the seventh and final book in the Acorna series by Anne McCaffrey and Elizabeth Ann Scarborough. Acorna is a young linyaari (a humanoid-unicorn species) who was raised by humans. In previous books, she has had many adventures to be reunited with the other linyaari and free their home planet from the insect-like khleevi. In Acorna's Truimph, Acorna is reunited with her missing lifemate Aari who has been time-traveling with the feline shape-changer Grimalkin. Acorna bounces from one crisis to another across space and time, chasing thieves and rescuing people, all while trying to solve the mystery of Aari's strange behavior.

The plot reads like a series of television episodes -- each crisis is neatly wrapped up and then the characters move on to the next adventure. Several of the supporting characters aren't much more than clichés and even the main characters seem shallow at times. However, it is entertaining in a tongue-in-cheek kind of way and the action does bop along fairly swiftly.

This light-hearted jaunt through space and time with almost-magical unicorn people will mostly appeal to young adults. Older readers might want to try Scarborough's Nothing Sacred or books from McCaffrey's Pern series.

The one word I find that comes to mind to describe this book is, unsatisfying. I've loved the Acorna books since the very beginning, but I've found that the last few were disappointing, and Acorna's Triumph was no exception.
The story was light, and missing the detail and emotion that I'd grown to expect from the Acorna series. The storyline itself was so flighty, jumping around from one time to another with no purpose, but rather with the randomness of a bad dream. The ability to move from time to time so easily cheapened all of the struggles that the characters had gone through before.
And was it just me, or were there some strange gaps in the story?
Okay, here I'm going to mention a few things that may spoil the story for those who haven't read it yet. Sorry, but I feel I must.
The fact that characters such as Aari's brother, and Acorna's parents even! were brought back in with such casual disregard for how their deaths had shaped the story up to that point was shocking to me. That, and other events that had no point but bringing in a few seemingly random characters to be used for one transparent purpose or another, made it feel like the Authors were trying up loose ends, and neatening everything up for a fairy-tale happy ending. And the reason that was so disappointing to me was that the Acorna series had never been a run-of-the-mill fairy tale, where everything is always perfect.
And now, the thing that bothered me the most. Throughout the whole series, Acorna has always been in charge of her own destiny. But suddenly, there is an unseen manipulater behind the scenes, making everything just the way he wants it.
It just seems to me that maybe the series was simply running out of steam, to use so many obvious shortcuts to bring things to a happy conclusion.
But you'll notice at the top, I gave it three stars. And that's because, in spite of everything, I still love Acorna, her people, and her world.
Plus, I have to admit, sometimes I'm a sucker for a happy ending. Even if it's missing some of the trials and triumph that I'd enjoyed, and respected, in the books preceading it, there's still something about Acorna' Triumph that makes you smile.

The Ancestral Hosts are near immortal shapeshifters, who rescued the Ancestors (unicorns) from earth because they were hunted to near extinction by humans who wanted their magical healing horn. The hosts mixed their DNA with that of the Ancestors leading to the creation of the Linyaari race. They made their home on Vhiliinyar until the insectoid race known as the Khleevi destroyed their home world. Acorna, who as a baby was found and raised by three space miners, finally is reunited with her people and meets her lifemate Aari.

Together they help to rebuild and terraform Vhiliinyar but below the surface of the planet they find a room meant for time traveling. Aari becomes lost in time and space and when he returns he is different and Acorna keeps her distance from him. After rescuing a previously unknown sentient race, Acorna begins to believe that Aari is really an Ancestor host that he traveled with and the real Aari is trapped on Vhiliinyar in the past during a Khleevi attack. A rescue mission is mounted but will they be in time to rescue Aari before the Khleevi torture him once again.

The Acorna novels are great space opera filled with non-stop action and enough romance to appeal to fans of that genre. Fans of Star Trek, Star Wars and Lost in Space will find ACORNA'S TRIUMPH a wondrous delight and a fitting end to this breathtaking series. Readers who liked this book will want to read the previous six works in this series starting with the aptly named ACORNA.

Harriet Klausner