OK, so A Game of Thrones was an excellent book. The Seven Kingdoms falls apart and we get a ringside seat for all of the action. With A Clash of Kings George R R Martin extends his great writing skill and style to another 800 page monster novel, and it's just as good as the first in the series, if not better. Everything in the Seven Kingdoms falls apart in this book, and one of the main characters is dead, but which one, and is s/he really dead? These events take place and many, many more in the space of this book that stands by itself as a must for any serious fantasy fan. If you want the real stuff, the blood and the sex and the intrigue and the back-stabbing, A Song of Ice and Fire is definitely the series for you. It isn't any lightweight fantasy, it's George R R Martin at his best.

Clarke is indisputably a master of science fiction, but Childhood's End is a stretch of such a description. While he has written a great many very good and noteworthy novels, this one is just one of the pack that no one really needs to pick up, except perhaps the most avid fan. Some may pass it off as a 'classic', but this book does not belong in such a group, in my own opinion. It gave me some chills with it's vivid descriptions of what could happen in the 'next stage' of human evolution, but those weren't enough to cover up the fact that this book wasn't too fascinating. I had never heard of it before picking it up, so had no expectations, which is a good thing in this case. The story of the aliens was mildly interesting. One big problem with this one for me was the characterization. Clarke just kind of throws them at the reader without enough development, and then he jumps around between them constantly, leaving one confused at times. The only redeeming factor I found in this novel was the end of mankind. Any such situation gives me chills, especially Clarke's presentation of our evolution. It is all quite unlikely, as much science fiction can be, stretching our ultimate end to a fantastic demise, but it is all too much to accept without the ever popular 'suspension of belief'.

This was an extremely good one-day read. It's short, entertaining, and completely worth devoting a few aimless hours to. This was my first exposure to Bradbury, and it did not disappoint in the least. Though probably classified as sci-fi due to the overall themes and the author's writing history, this book belongs, in my opinion, in the horror genre. Not all of the stories are particularly frightening, but many of them convey such a sense of dread and terror, much appealing to the psychological aspect, that it left me a bit less prepared to sleep in a dark room that night. One in particular that stands out is 'the Veldt', in which future-modern home technology turns devastatingly bad on some of its owners' intended victims. This book is worth a look, for certain, but can be picked up in most decent used book stores for much less than the new list price.

This is a great book for what could very well happen with all of the wrong factions controlling Mars after it is colonized. The whole explanation of how things would work and what would happen are exceptionally well done. I could give this book 5 stars, but something when I was reading it kept nagging that it wasn't as good as it could have been. I mean, killing the best character in the book in the prologue is a bad way to start.

I started this book and was not very impressed with the first 50 pages, but then I got into the rest of it and WOW was I impressed! Crichton takes us back to the excitement of 'Jurassic Park' and 'Sphere' and makes it all even better. I was getting impatient waiting for a followup to Crichton's last novel, but it was all worth the wait. The action is great, the story is even better, and the end pulls it all together and makes for a great book.

Of the yet-to-be-complete series, 'Shadow Rising' stands out, to me, as the unequaled best of the sequence. It picks up from where the dead boring 'Dragon Reborn' left off (which is hardly worth reading except for a few important and intelligent side stories). It could be said that this book is the first half of a much larger whole, with 'The Fires of Heaven' as the completing half. Jordan wrote these two books with extremely similar story lines, except that Perrin Aybara doesn't appear at all in book 5. Not to say that one could skip either of the two to understand the series, since so much of importance happens in 'Fires', but 'Shadow' and 'Fire' are told like one book, if you could take out the annoying back-tracking the characters do to help the readers remember every single little plot line from the last books. Both books have Rand's conquest of the Aiel and their following actions as the main plot. These books are the longest in the series, but the most satisfying to anyone who has read it a couple of times.

I don't care about how other people complain how this one is worse for being slower to develop. A good story can't keep plowing ahead at the rate the first two books did, and this novel allows for a good time of character development and plot evolution. And the setup at the end promises a great conclusion. As for you who complain about this novel not being able to stand on it's own, well go figure! Williams said himself that he is writing a single book that is just way too big to be published in one novel. It just isn't meant to be read by those looking to read one short novel; it's part of a much, much larger whole. And Williams is not the author to look to for an abrupt or short-winded story.

Before reading A Game of Thrones and its sequel, I plodded my way through the Wheel of Time and the Sword of Truth. A Song of Ice and Fire is so much better than either of those series. Martin is perhaps longer winded than Jordan (hard to do) and slower with the action sequences than Goodkind, but the novel is just better, the best! The sequel, A Clash of Kings, is even better! Both of the other guys lost their magic after the first book or two, but Martin shows none of that nonsense about 'getting tired' of his story. I have no doubt A Song of Ice and Fire will easily be much better than the Wheel and the Sword of Truth when it is finished.

Also, read 'The Hedge Knight' in the Legends collection, by Martin, taking place a generation before the novels. It makes it worth the cost of buying the collection.

While Donaldson almost seemed to just be dragging the series out in multiple volumes just to have more than one or two books,'This Day All Gods Die' (along with the 4th novel, 'Chaos and Order') is an extremely absorbing book. By the end of this one I know the characters almost as well as I know myself. It seems like I will be able to predict what Angus Thermopyle will do next, because I know the man so well (my favorite character in the series despite his actions in the first three books). Donaldson, though, seems to realize this and turns him in another direction everytime, providing a very satisfying conclusion to the Gap Cycle. Some say that the 2 Covenant series are Donaldson's best work, and I read both of them, and I must disagree. I got sick of Covenant's self-pity by the 'Illearth War', much because he is the only character that Donaldson delves into with any detail. There is a lot of psychological description in the Gap, but it is divided between four or more main characters, and not all of it is the self-pity Covenant never stops with. I love how Morn never gives up despite her hopeless circumstances in every book, in almost every chapter that she is in. And not only could Angus take on Covenant any time, but Lord Foul would certainly balk at taking on a laser equiped cyborg that shows no mercy.

I read the Lord of the Rings for the first time when I was 12. The second time around was three years ago, and I'm planning another time through very soon. These are simply the best fantasy novels around. Robert Jordan is good, and George R R Martin is extremely good, but Tolkien is simply beyond compare. Each book grabs the you and pulls you into the story. I cannot recommend these books enough to everyone. They are simply great. The end makes it all worth the whole read, but the story keeps you going the whole time, never wanting to put it down. READ IT!