As these kind of stories go, I found it intelligent and original. Our young hero falls in love with a beautiful woman sometime before W.W.I. They marry and everything seems to go fine. But this woman actually comes from another world, one in which magic is common and wars are fought with bows and swords (a medieval land) connected to our own Earth through dimensional gates.
It all turns sour when his wife is kidnapped, while he's away, and taken to such world. He must follow and try to save her...
Curtis Macurdy will have to overcome many problems in his quest, while learning the ways of a different world.
The plot was good and thoughtful. I found most interesting the progression and growth of the characters. Though ultimately sad I'm very anxious to read the sequels.

My only complaint is that the sisterhood shared some similarities to Herbert's Bene Gesserit, and no book can survive any comparison (even a minor one) to Dune.

This book falls in that genre that mixes SF with fantasy. It's a good enough book for those rainy days. Not one you'll be thinking about later, though.
Fleeing an interstellar war that would possibly mean the destruction of Earth, a human colony is launched to a distant planet. However the Morkth catch up with them on the new planet. Betrayals and fights end in a standoff. Both races are now on the planet and unable to leave.
300 years later, the new human society resembles Earth in the 16th century.
A thief ,a warrior, a princess and a member from the original human crew set out to find the 'magic' stones that will provide the struggling colony with a way to beat the aliens.

This book is awful! Bear in mind that I'm a Dune fan and as such I was disgusted. The way in which the authors destroy the characters is unsettling. In a vain effort to present every character that plays a role in Dune, they only succeed in showing one-dimensional bad copies of the originals.
The Baron is a joke, compared to Frank Herbert's foe. How could they change the essence of characters. Shadam, Gurney, Duncan they are all poorly characterized.
It's as if the authors set themselves a task: write a very uninteresting trilogy to fill their pockets. This book was a string of uneventful episodes. One insignificant incident after the other one.
The worse, of course, is the way the authors have molded and modified the original Dune to fit their own mediocre creation!
Mohiam being Jessica's mother is laughable! Please! How could that be so? The interactions between Mohiam, the baron and even Jessica and Paul would have been very different if so!
The origin of the Baron's grotesque physique is inconsistent! In Dune, we are told explicitly that his fatness is due to overindulgence! Even Margot comments That Feyd won't let himself grow fat like the Baron (and she was Bene G, so would have known otherwise), and when Alia is possessed she starts gaining weight!
The episode when Liet meets Gurney in Salussa! What the Hell was that??? Wouldn't Gurney have recognized him when Leto arrives in Arrakis???
Even the way in which Jessica comes to Caladan collides with what Frank wrote.
The fact that Pardot starts the change in Dune is wrong! It was Liet's vision, not his father's!!
And Ramallo being really a Bene G? Excuse me?? It was clear she was a wild reverend mother, not a true one!
And what's striking is that every one knows about the Bene G's secret breeding programs when it was a carefully guarded secret in Dune! And people know about Fremen practices??? That they drown a worm to get the Water of Life??? How would anyone know it?? It's sad...very sad what they've done here. Hopefully these books will fade away and only the original saga will remain.
It's as if they hadn't even read Dune!! They took the essence of the Dune universe to construct an awful Space Opera. The result is a disaster. The only similarity is the sadness. The whole Dune saga was based on intelligence and thought. I'd rename this trilogy as 'Dune for dummies'.

I really don't understand why the authors felt inclined to destroy Frank Herbert's legacy. It would have been much better to write a single interesting book, instead of three boring ones. They could have avoided much nonsense and stayed true to the story!
I'm still waiting for an Atreides victory, for in Dune we are told that the Atreides had the winning score.

But who's the poorest sod? I am! Because I continue buying these awful books, hoping for better. At least I know that Dune 7 won't be a total failure since they'll be following Franks guidelines.

Lois McMaster Bujold has long ago become my favorite author. This is certainly one of my favorite Miles Vorkosigan adventures also. In this book you won't find dendarii mercenaries nor even a huge lord auditor investigation...just good old Miles screwing his love life. In the romantic scene of the Imperial wedding Miles is set on conquering the heart of Ekaterin, whom he met on Komarr. Unfortunately, conquering is too precise a word and Miles will hit quite a few walls in his lame attempts. LMB again unfolds her magic in showing us yet another side of Miles. As in Memory he will face situations that will require he takes a close look at himself and either grow and learn or... But Miles is not alone! Mark rejoins House Vorkosigan with quite a love problem of his own and Ivan can't seem to settle down. And along these problems of the heart the Barrayaran political scene is in turmoil and the council of counts is in full activity. This book is a true adventure of the heart, mind and soul. Nobody does it better than LMB. She conceives wonderful and entertaining plots but the stars are her characters: they live and breathe.

Though this is actually the third novel in the first uplift trilogy it stands neatly on it's own. It may be wiser to start with Startide Rising, though. Anyway, in this book an alien bird-like race (Gubru) lays siege to a human colony world(Garth). With a Galaxy-wide war set around humans this lonely and poor colony must face it's would-be conquerors alone. It's one battle in the whole war whose causes are better described in Startide (though they are also explained here). Brin does an exceptional work in describing the chimpanzee culture who must strive to help their human patrons in saving Garth. All characters are wonderfully explored and complex, even the aliens! For those of you who are looking for the characters presented in Startide Rising, tough luck! This isn't it! For that read Brightness Reef(the first book of the second trilogy). We also get a close look at Earth's Tymbrimi allies and Thenanin enemies. Though you could skip this book in the overall streaker series I found it extremely entertaining and absolutely engrossing. Besides the ultimate conclusion of this book shall play an essential role in the outcome of the greater war.

Very entertaining and highly recommended. Brin's very best!

If you've never read Asimov this is a good book to introduce you his robot series. This collection of robot stories that appeared in several magazines in the 50's are entertaining and clever. Asimov's style as usual is flowing and engaging. The stories deal basically with diverse situations that provoke peculiar behavior in robots. They are almost little mysteries that the characters need to understand and resolve. Drunk robots, crazy robots, religious robots...take your pick. It all makes sense in the end and Asimov is extremely careful in always working along the rules he sets in the beginning. In short, very entertaining and undoubtedly a classic. These are the stories that created the way in which we see robots today.

In this book, the authors take us back to the events that will ultimately lead to Frank Herbert's Dune. Indeed the novel seems focused on introducing and explaining all characters that will play an important role in the future. Without Paul Atreides and Arrakis, most of the original book's underlying mixture of religion, politics and sociology are lost, though the authors make a valiant attempt at preserving the original wheels-within-wheels plots that seem to involve all characters. Unfortunately it all seems straightforward. Thus, the book carries an enormous scope in characters and complexity. It's pace never quickens enough for the addictive reaction and it's ultimate conclusion is anti-climatic. Opposing Frank Herbert's genius at dropping subtle hints about the characters' machinations and goals that always left us hanging on his every word and more often than not re-reading passages to appreciate his mastery, here the characters reveal their thoughts and plots every step of the way. But it's unfair to compare it to Dune. I found the book interesting, shedding light to the politics in the Empire before Muad'Dib. It's entirely devoted towards the original Dune, though. A worthy addition to the saga but I'm afraid only fans of the original series may find it enjoyable. As I said, if you haven't read the original saga it might get slow an unappealing. After you get hooked on spice, though, you'll come around to this books searching for gems of insight.

In this book, the authors take us back to the events that will ultimately lead to Frank Herbert's Dune. Indeed the novel seems focused on introducing and explaining all characters that will play an important role in the future. Without Paul Atreides and Arrakis, most of the original book's underlying mixture of religion, politics and sociology are lost, though the authors make a valiant attempt at preserving the original wheels-within-wheels plots that seem to involve all characters. Thus, the book carries an enormous scope in characters and complexity. It's pace never quickens enough for the addictive reaction and it's ultimate conclusion is anti-climatic. Opposing Frank Herbert's genius at dropping subtle hints about the characters' machinations and goals that always left us hanging on his every word and more often than not re-reading passages to appreciate his mastery, here the characters reveal their thoughts and plots each step of the way. But it's unfair to compare it to Dune. I found the book interesting, shedding light to the politics in the Empire before Muad'Dib. It's entirely devoted towards the original Dune, though. A worthy addition to the saga but I'm afraid only fans of the original series may find it enjoyable. As I said, if you haven't read the original saga it might get slow and unappealing. After you get hooked on spice, though, you'll come around to this books searching for gems of insight into the characters' background.

The book is worth reading. I'd read all ender books so decided to take my chances with this one. It wasn't disappointing. This time the central character id Beam, whom you may remember as one of ender's companions from battle school. We learn about his origins as street urchin from Rotterdam until his genius is discovered and sent to training. The book is well presented and gives much wanted detail on battle school itself and it's teachers. However and without giving away the book, it pained me to see how OSC had to manage to convince us that Bean was way, way smarter than Ender even though none of his interactions with Ender in Ender's game showed it. All the conversations obviously replayed in this book though from a different perspective seemed strained. But the obvious flaw of the series is the improbability of it all. I mean I could accept that Ender (and perhaps Bean) is so unique and exceptional that his training must be rushed to command the battle. He is one of a kind, the best. But how come none of the graduates of battle school are there in the final showdown? All those generations of graduates that had a normal training through tactical and command school (opposed to a few months) never produced any good commander??? That's hard to swallow. You could argue that they were chosen because they'd obey Ender but if the ship captains put their lives on the line surely an adult can take a few command orders from ender. However this is a critique both for Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow. Apart from those annoying (though really unimportant) gaffes it's a good parallel novel and certainly worth reading.

In this book, Haldeman returns to the characters he introduced in Forever War about 18 years later in their lives. Now living in a cold world, they go about their lives with little enthusiasm while the civilization of Man runs everything that matters. Bored and unable to accept their role, they decide to take a relativistic cruise through space just to return home thousands of years later and see if they like it better then. The book starts fine with a steady rhythm and pace and an engaging premise. It all kind of falls apart half-way through the characters' journey. Why? Well I would spoil the book if I told you. Let's just say that the author resorts to the fantastic and we end up with a kind of Deus Ex Machina ending that satisfies no one. Ultimately the endeavor doesn't amount to anything. What can I say? If you change the rules half-way through the book without really explaining how, it's very unfulfilling. As I said, a bit disappointing in terms of plot. As Haldeman is an accomplished and good author you don't actually dislike it, but this isn't one to remember.