 Editor Campbell requested "to see dragons fighting thread [the menace from space]", and also suggested time travel; McCaffrey incorporated both suggestions.The third story, "Crack Dust, Black Dust", was not separately published, but the first Pern novel ("Dragonflight", published by Ballantine Books in 1968) was a fix-up of all three.Agent Virginia Kidd and editor Betty Ballantine provided advice and assistance for its sequel "Dragonquest".