Gregg Nicholas

Toward the end of this story, several crises are resolved. Unfortunately, the ‘science' that resolves these problems is completely unbelievable and unscientific. It's almost as if the author painted himself into a corner - and decided to fix technological problems by allowing a genie in a lamp to pop up. Quite disappointing.

An interesting idea of how humanity might fit in with alien civilizations. In my opinion, the enjoyment of the book was hindered by a couple of the author's techniques. Some parts of the book seem to be written for video, with each paragraph, the scene may shift from a group of people on earth or to a different group of people in space. This is difficult for the reader to follow by the author's words alone. The author also has a tendency to refer to characters in a confusing number of ways. A single character may at times be referred to by their name, at other times by their military rank or an abbreviation, or a nickname, or a slang term, or a general description ... in some areas of the book, it's hard to guess how many people are in the room because their names keep changing.

Is this a work of fiction - or does it expose the truth of our Surveillance Society?

But seriously, while this novel is entertaining, some of the details presented are all too real - and scary. How is society changed as we transition to an era where every action is logged, recorded, tracked, and correlated? Is there a chilling effect, stifling dissent and discussion, just because nothing is truly private and the inmates/citizens never know if the Vast Machine is watching?

By reading this book, did i just get put on a list of subversives that need to be watched?

This book is fiction, but I find that the depiction of the lawyer matches many observations that I've made in my dealings with lawyers. While the ‘hero' of this book views his actions as working within the ‘system' - my viewpoint is that he has no moral compass. He will charge whatever fees he can get away with, stringing them along for as long as their bank account holds money. He will manipulate people, deceive them, and outright lie to them. He will bend the rules and even break them - so long as he doesn't get caught, it must be okay - all part of the game. His priorities are first - to his own income, and second - to win his case, regardless of the facts.

What's the difference between a catfish and a lawyer?
One's a slimy, bottom dwelling, scum sucker. The other is a fish.

When I started reading this book, I was prepared to simply tolerate it - as one piece of the series that so many people have enjoyed. I've read many of the books in the series, and haven't appreciated them very much, but this book contains the type of speculation that I consider fundamental to good science fiction. What If we encounter other types of life that are not only alien in psychology, and biology, but basic understandings of life? What If the very existence of one biosphere has the possibility for contaminating and destroying every biosphere it comes in contact with? What If . . . well, I may have already said too much. Enjoy the book. I hope it makes you think.

An interesting book for any major fan of this world - but unsatisfying for anyone who is looking for a real story. This book is a collection of 4 short stories that might fill in a few details, but are only pieces of the overall Ender's universe. The stories are from widely different time periods, and will probably lack context for anyone who hasn't already read many of the other books.

This series seems to cross several genre categories. You'll probably like it more than I do, if you like Romance, Mystery, Steampunk, and time travel paradox. Your enjoyment of the book will also be enhanced if you can tolerate multiple concurrent confusing dialogues. It will help if you aren't bothered by a lot of archaic words, some of which aren't even in the dictionary. Perhaps I would have understood more of the references if I was a fanatic anglophile with an interest in England's history from a hundred years ago.

I don't want my review to be entirely negative, so while I don't think that the rules for time travel are consistent in this series, it was still a readable story - even if it was a bit sappy.

There's very little ‘science fiction' in this series. It's mostly ‘historical fiction' with a generous amount of ‘romance'. In my opinion, this series is an example of how the industry has changed since it has become so easy to publish books. The whole four book series should have been edited down to one, or possibly two books. The whole trope regarding World War II and Nazi's is overused - especially in time travel stories.

This story occurs in an entirely unfamiliar world, with alien plants, creatures, weather, and magic. Each chapter is a fragment of the story. Each fragment may jump to a different set of characters or a different time. Key elements of the story and the nature of the world are hinted at by the characters, but never explained to the reader - or finally explained much later. For example, ‘weepings' is a word which occurs frequently, but we're more than half way through the book before it is explained. One of the main characters keeps referring to some traumatic experience with his brother, but the details of that experience are trickled out little by little. It's as if the author is purposely trying to keep the reader in the dark.

I do not find this world interesting enough to put up with his writing style and continue with the series.

This is an entertaining story of survival in a future that is heavily impacted by climate change. There are a couple of minor story aspects that are nearly impossible to conceive as happening in the real world. They aren't important to the story, however. The most unbelievable sentence in the story:

"On the other hand, I was a democratic socialist who could check any tool, table, appliance, or vehicle out of the public library, a citizen of the twenty-first century who could access every book ever published and every song ever recorded with a few taps on a screen, . . ."

While technology could enable libraries to share every book, song, movie, and other 'intellectual property' - the lawyers will never let it happen.

Set in World War II, this book of the series shows the characters reacting to the uncertainty of life in wartime England. I'm not fond of war stories, but even if that weren't the case, I'd get a little tired of the repetitious nature of their struggles with food, travel, bomb shelters, and sleep deprivation.

This isn't written as a story. As the title states, it's written more like a diary. As such, it includes a lot of introspective fluff. It is science fiction, but it also belongs in the romance category - and perhaps a bit of the poetry category. No offense is intended toward the author, but it's just not my preferred type of reading.

This series was something of a disappointment. I had expected better from Octavia Butler. The first book starts out with only remnants of humanity, kept captive by aliens. While this sounds like a great place to start a story about the strengths of humanity recovering from a terrible setback, that's not the story we're told. Instead, the aliens completely dominate the remaining humans, strip them of their humanity, and turn them into sterile, drug dependent, genetic experiment monsters. Mankind is dead - we're just waiting for the creatures that used to be human beings, to die off - because no new human beings can be born after the aliens sterilize the survivors. She tries to end the trilogy with hope, by restoring fertility to a few humans on Mars. However, none of them are truly human anymore since all of them have been genetically altered, and injected with alien cells.

In my opinion, the story relied too heavily on the unbelievable alien powers of control by pheromones. How are we supposed to believe that simply breathing in the presence of these aliens, removes free will and logical thinking? She tries to tell us that the biological urges and bonding of mates overpowers all logical thought and physically injures them on separation, including death when their mates die.

Clearly, Octavia had an agenda to writing this story. Masculine characteristics are constantly denigrated - there are no strong male role models. Independent thought is depicted as a horrible thing. Everyone must obey the consensus decision.