Rating: 
Summary: Brotherly Love?
Review: The setting: Venus-- The Plan: Van Humphries will travel to Venus with a crew to recover the remains of Van's brother.-- The reason: To gain financial freedom and distance from his father.-- The problem: (1) There is another adventurer seeking to gain the reward offered. (2)The temperature of Venus is such that it is near impossible to land on it and survive.I enjoyed this novel. It does have the element of science fiction in it, but it is also a great adventure story.
Rating:
Summary: Gripping characters challenge a formidable planet
Review: There are many different sci-fi novels out there, but very few actually focus on our sister planet. The harsh environs of near Venus offer a strong antagonist in Bova's novel. Ban Bova is well known for his visualization and grand scheme and this book is no exception. The characters are well developed an fit together to give the story edge. While it is a little slow at times, the action sequences can take the breath away and prevent you from putting the book down. Definitely a good read if you are a Bova fan. If not, try reading his earlier books first because he is known to subtly weave his plot lines between books.
Rating: 
Summary: Worth a read.
Review: This book is intruiging and imaginative. It is a seemingly tasteful blend of science and the human condition. I must say that I have not yet read a book quite like this one. The book focuses strongly on character development and dynamics. I truly grew attached to the characters in this novel and I was rather disappointed that the book had to end. I want more!!! I want the story to go on indefinitely!!!! A great read, this book is well worth your time. I conjecture that this book will be a unique speculative fiction adventure for anyone who reads it (regardless of whether or not your are an astronomy fan).
Rating: 
Summary: Ouch!
Review: This is a painful experiance to read. Overal I found it boring and cliche riddled. The characters are purely 'off the shelf' and are about as uninteresting as you can get. The science will grab you attention for a few seconds, but there is far too little of it for my liking. After finishing 'Venus' I quite literally threw it out my window into the rubbish bin outside. Maybe you'll like it, but this sci-fi fan found it poor beyond words.
Rating:
Summary: Great Read!
Review: This is one of the best scifi novels I have ever read. I do not often come across a book that I cannot put down, but this was certainly one I could not bear to part with. Bova is a great storyteller, and aside from a somewhat sappy ending, the book is well-written and exciting. I am no expert on Venus, so his science may not be accurate, but it matters little to me since the story was so strong. Definitely recommended for someone needing an escape from the ordinary.
Rating:
Summary: typical Bova's novel
Review: This is one of the very few novels written about Venus and Bova did pretty good job, once again in combining the good descriptions of Venus with the science fiction speculation. The son of a millioner goes on the quest to find his brother's remains on Venus.(His brother's first manned expedition to Venus ended in fiasco). Along the way he learns more about his family... For people, who look for literature-like writing and character development, look elsewhere. This book is for Bova's fans, who like myself read science fiction because of speculative ideas and plot. Fast paced, straight to the point novel.
Rating:
Summary: Exhilarating!
Review: This is the first of Ben Bova's books that I have read, and I found it to be exhilarating. It was a very exciting read that while leaving you on the edge of your seat, firmly planted on Earth, led you on an unbelievable journey to Venus. Ben Bova allows you to open your mind in science, as well as your heart, for his characters. His descriptions of Venus' blazing surface and throat-closing atmosphere were so detailed, that I don't think I'll be taking a sauna anytime soon!
Rating:
Summary: Quality Science Fiction, with a Strong Plot
Review: This is the first time I've ever sat down to read anything by Ben Bova, a name that I had heard attributed to "hard" science fiction. As far as my science fiction reading goes, I normally prefer my science plausible, but not hard: my own science background was physics and chemistry to the end of highschool, and then a mild spattering of brain-centric biology for my psych/english lit degree.
Imagine my surprise when I found "Venus" to be a science fiction novel with a strong plot as well as hard science. The science in this fiction does not overwhelm, with the typical use of a character or two that aren't as accomplished in the realms of science as the others, forcing the more educated to explain to the others - and the reader.
The plot itself starts as a basic 'run for money.' A truly hateful man sets up a prize: 10 billion for the first person to return from Venus with the remains of his son, who died there on the first manned mission to the hellish planet. The other son, a weakling, a runt, and a bit of a dandy, rises unexpectedly to the challenge, and the race is on.
That said, this 'protagonist' is the least enjoyable part of the book. The main voice of the novel, he begins as a whiny, spoiled, soft and clueless man, and though he almost immediately begins to grow, there are points at which you'd gladly see him tossed out an airlock.
Woven into the story is a rich tableau of family secrets and hatreds, a political -vs- corporate battle, and of course, the hostile attempts to survive in the hellish world that is Venus herself.
For a fast-pace action science fiction novel, 'Venus' delivers in spades. The characterizations are often a little slow to growth (especially our 'hero'), but suffer through his views for the first quarter of the book and I promise you you'll be involved and interested in his welfare from there out.
'Nathan
Rating:
Summary: Quality Science Fiction, with a Strong Plot
Review: This is the first time I've ever sat down to read anything by Ben Bova, a name that I had heard attributed to "hard" science fiction. As far as my science fiction reading goes, I normally prefer my science plausible, but not hard: my own science background was physics and chemistry to the end of highschool, and then a mild spattering of brain-centric biology for my psych/english lit degree.
Imagine my surprise when I found "Venus" to be a science fiction novel with a strong plot as well as hard science. The science in this fiction does not overwhelm, with the typical use of a character or two that aren't as accomplished in the realms of science as the others, forcing the more educated to explain to the others - and the reader.
The plot itself starts as a basic 'run for money.' A truly hateful man sets up a prize: 10 billion for the first person to return from Venus with the remains of his son, who died there on the first manned mission to the hellish planet. The other son, a weakling, a runt, and a bit of a dandy, rises unexpectedly to the challenge, and the race is on.
That said, this 'protagonist' is the least enjoyable part of the book. The main voice of the novel, he begins as a whiny, spoiled, soft and clueless man, and though he almost immediately begins to grow, there are points at which you'd gladly see him tossed out an airlock.
Woven into the story is a rich tableau of family secrets and hatreds, a political -vs- corporate battle, and of course, the hostile attempts to survive in the hellish world that is Venus herself.
For a fast-pace action science fiction novel, 'Venus' delivers in spades. The characterizations are often a little slow to growth (especially our 'hero'), but suffer through his views for the first quarter of the book and I promise you you'll be involved and interested in his welfare from there out.
'Nathan
Rating:
Summary: Go buy some of Heinlein's old young-adult novels instead.
Review: This is, perhaps, the worst book I've ever read by this author. The main character is a two-dimensional cardboard cutout, which gives him one more dimension than anyone else in the story. The book is filled with rusty, creaking old plot devices. The Evil Hedonistic Villian-Father gets a brief showing to set our hero off on his quest. The Man Driven By Hatred makes an appearance. There are Spaceship-Eating Aliens-- two kinds, yet! And, oh yes, let's not forget the hero, the Young Man of Uncertain Patrimony. Even the science is bad. The Cold of Space is used to quickly freeze a dead person at one point. Another guy is reduced to ash by three years' exposure to the surface of Venus-- but the tape recording he carries is perfectly intact. If the book were at least short, I could have given it two stars. As things stand, however, I just can't think of anything good to say.
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