Rating: 
Summary: Eh. Interesting but derivative.
Review: I was interested in seeing how it would turn out. However, I wasn't riveted. The whole time I was reading it I was thinking it was so much like The Fountainhead- a determined and visionary modern architect with the world against him (who even works in construction in the beginning), an aloof and unattainable female character who loves the architect but can't let herself have him, an older architect mentor who was down on his luck because no one would hire him anymore, a wealthy patron who sponsors a building and who the architect likes despite being in love with the patron's wife...Raynor's characters end up a little flat and it becomes harder to understand why they are doing what they do. if the Fountainhead is too much for you, this book is for you. Otherwise, stick with the original.
Rating: 
Summary: The Cloud Sketcher
Review: I'm a big fan of Richard Rayner's work. I loved "The Blue Suit", "LA Without A Map", and "The Murder Book". "The Cloud Sketcher" is not only his most ambitious, but also his best book to date. This book is a passionate love story that begins in the back woods of Northern Finland in the early 1900's and continues through the Finnish Civil War. It ends in New York during the twenties. What intrigues me most about this book is that it captures a time and a place about which I knew very little. It's got everything: a wonderful love story, history, politics, architecture and murder and it's all interwoven in a very compelling way. I could not put this book down. To me, "The Cloud Sketcher" delivers what I expect from great literature. I highly recommend it to all who appreciate beautiful writing, a riveting story, and a unique journey into an incredibly vivid world.
Rating:
Summary: The Cloud Sketcher
Review: I'm a big fan of Richard Rayner's work. I loved "The Blue Suit", "LA Without A Map", and "The Murder Book". "The Cloud Sketcher" is not only his most ambitious, but also his best book to date. This book is a passionate love story that begins in the back woods of Northern Finland in the early 1900's and continues through the Finnish Civil War. It ends in New York during the twenties. What intrigues me most about this book is that it captures a time and a place about which I knew very little. It's got everything: a wonderful love story, history, politics, architecture and murder and it's all interwoven in a very compelling way. I could not put this book down. To me, "The Cloud Sketcher" delivers what I expect from great literature. I highly recommend it to all who appreciate beautiful writing, a riveting story, and a unique journey into an incredibly vivid world.
Rating: 
Summary: architecture and the mob
Review: interesting story of a man who befirends and saves the life of a mob kingpin who jumpstarts his architecture career. i recommned it
Rating:
Summary: An Instant Classic
Review: It's unfortunate to me that so far this book hasn't attracted the widespread audience it deserves. It begins in Finland with a boy named Esko Vaananen who becomes obsessed with the skyscraper, or pilvenpiirtaja as he knows it. Shortly after he meets a young girl who entrances him, and his destiny converges in his quest for love, and his desire to be a brilliant architect. Spanning nearly thirty years and crossing from the frozen Finland tundra to The jazz infused gang run clubs of New York City Rayner's intricately researched novel certainly brings to mind comparisons with Ayn Rands, "The Fountainhead". Yet for many this will be a much more accessible novel. The dramatic journey the character goes through makes this book an obvious choice for a feature adaptation. A satisfying and wonderfully woven book!
Rating: 
Summary: As High As They Can Be
Review: Obsession, passions, and buildings all rise to their maximum intensity and height in the roaring 20's as depicted by Richard Rayner in his work, "The Cloud Sketcher". This is the first of his books that I have read, and while not among the best, I enjoyed it enough that I would read his next and possibly backtrack to some of his earlier work. The story develops from two major events in the protagonist's young life. In the first he meets a young woman that becomes a life-long obsession, and the second is a vision of what he wants to accomplish with his life. The setting for the first part of the story is Finland as the Bolsheviks and their revolution damage it. By the time the fighting between the Whites and the Reds takes place, the protagonist has been horribly maimed in a childhood accident, he has lost his Mother, and then as a soldier he fights against the Reds which include his Father, and the Father knowingly like the son fights the other. The consequences of the war bring about a set of contrary beliefs in outcomes of the war that continue to influence future events even if the most unlikely of stretched imagination must bring them to pass. One of these brings the central character that is now a young man, as well as an Architect to America in search not only of building his Skyscraper, but also of pursuing his obsession of a childhood love. His severing of his life and the people who inhabit it in Finland stretched my credulity in the story. Once the story crosses the Atlantic the events continue to be implausibly convenient as well as improbable, and though he has left his Wife in Finland, events there continue to develop that will haunt him later in his life. When he saves the life of a man that will eventually preside over New York, virtually any obstacle can be overcome, and is routinely done so which detracts even further from the story's credibility. As much as I complain about the contrived nature of the book's events it was an enjoyable, light, even if a less than fascinating read. Some books are meant to entertain, and this work lacked enough originality to demand close attention, and like the Skyscraper race for the tallest in the world, a given building, like the book's events, is surpassed by an improbably higher building just as events more implausible than there predecessor unfold.
Rating:
Summary: Rayner's best book of several
Review: The book is a fascinating story with historical overtones covering the early 1920's in Finland and NYC. The theme of architecture is gloriously persued wrapped around a love quest. I was crazy about the writing style depicting the elements of creativity, personal drive and interesting character development of the hero architect. Rayner gives indepth visual depictions of people, places and scenes. Three of my family members have passed it around with high praise.
Rating:
Summary: Rayner's best book of several
Review: The book is a fascinating story with historical overtones covering the early 1920's in Finland and NYC. The theme of architecture is gloriously persued wrapped around a love quest. I was crazy about the writing style depicting the elements of creativity, personal drive and interesting character development of the hero architect. Rayner gives indepth visual depictions of people, places and scenes. Three of my family members have passed it around with high praise.
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