Rating: 
Summary: Great book-well worth the wait!
Review: Beautifuly written! I was quite suprised when i heard that one of my favorite authors had picked up her pen again after such a long wait. But it was worth it! I was once more transported to the iceage where Ayla and her soon to be mate Jondelar conclude their long journey and arrive at Jondelars home at the Zelandoni Caves. The amount of detail and accuracy she puts into her work is astounding. I expecially liked Aylas experiences in the beautiful holy caves where she goes on a spirituel journey. It was an extremely pleasurable experience to read this wonderfully crafted novel, and it is one that i plan to repeat often. I cannot wait until Auel comes out with the conclusion to this spectacular series. Hopefully this one will not take her nearly as long to write and publish.
Rating: 
Summary: A bit tedious, but not hideous
Review: The whole book reminded me of Valley of the Horses. It is building up to an encounter/clash with the Clan, just like VoH was for most of the book a buildup to Ayla and Jondalar's introduction to each other. However, unlike VoH, SoS leaves us hanging... in spite of a book that left me with sore muscles from holding it up!Now to be totally fair, the tediousness comes from getting to know yet another people - the Zelandoni. Their society is not terribly different from the Mamutoi, Sharamadoi, and all the other peoples we get to know in previous books. But they are different, and the timing of the introduction of them should have been done in VoH, or even an earlier book of Jondalar's childhood. Auel chose this way and it obviously was a difficult choice. So I guess I rate it this high because as a stabd alone book, it is not that bad. It is just kind of clunky if you are reading the series concurrently. This book is like eating your Brussell Sprouts so you can have dessert. The next one could be the best of the series based on all the buildup.
Rating: 
Summary: Ayla No Longer Has a Soul
Review: There are many comprehensive, articulate reader reviews here, so I hestitate to even write another. I am doing so, mostly, to vent my negative feelings about the author, who I feel cheated her many faithful fans. She made us love Ayla (and Jondalar) as we shared her life from toddler to womanhood through four books. Now, she has presented us with an unbelievable character who you soon realize will "live happily everafter", for this book is going nowhere with the little hints of impending danger and drama. Jondalar's cave community is as organized and civilized as any middle class 20th century American village. There is nothing believable here. Ms. Auel used our longing for another book as an excuse to do years of research and then she used Ayla's life to piece the facts into a book. There is no story, no credibility, no soul. I am sad for Ayla. I am mad at Jean Auel for taking her beautiful story and striping it of what was so special. She should be ashamed for taking our money.
Rating: 
Summary: Throbbing manhoods and geology lessons
Review: After a long wait, Shelters of Stone is a disappointment. I wait and wait for a plot to develop, but most of the words involve Jondalar's throbbing manhood (O spare me), Ayla's oral fixation on the said manhood, lengthy geological lectures, rambling landscape narratives, the same-old-same-old surprises that surprise everyone who meets this surprising woman, the repetition of facts (as if either the author forgot she mentioned things two pages earlier, or she believes the reader has forgotten), those rotten spear throwers appearing fifteen times (with people always being surprised), Ayla developing society and modern technology single-handedly (in the next volume does she invent Glad Wrap and the TCP-IP protocol?), and the poor Wolf and horses who (of course) surprise people and fill them with wonder every time they appear. Really, Jean: is there anything in this fat tome that has not already appeared a dozen times in the previous volumes?
Rating:
Summary: Where was the editor???????
Review: I kept doggedly reading, hoping to return to the storyteller I had found in the first 4 books. Never happened. Was there an editor? Ayla's story deserves to be told without endless repetition of descriptions of scenery, introductions to characters that are never developed, and story lines that are started and then dropped without any explanation. I couldn't recommend this book to anyone.
Rating:
Summary: Utter disappointment
Review: After twelve years of waiting for this book, I could barely wait to start reading it, especially since Plains of Passage had been so boring and I was eager for the story to actually move along. I saved it for a 12 hour flight, thinking the 765 pages would keep me busy and interested until I got home. So wrong! By the time I was a few pages into Shelters of Stone, I couldn't imagine getting through the whole book simply because the writing was so painfully bad. But I did, and in abour four hours because it has to be the most repetitive book ever. I cannot believe Auel or her editors actually put that many excerpts (and I think one of them was even put in multiple times) from previous books. I cannot understand why Auel or her editors would think readers would need a recap of how Ayla invented or tamed everything for the Nth time. The last two chapters have all the plot movement there is. Read those last two chapters in the bookstore, or if you're flying British Air, look out for my copy-- I didn't even want to bring it home.
Rating: 
Summary: wonderful ayla housed in a mediocre book
Review: i fell in love with ayla back when i was a teenager. ayla is at some deep level my ideal woman...perfect, tall, beautiful, intelligent, compassionate, wise, forceful, courageous, and yet through it all humble and vulnerable. so even though this book stinks in so many areas, it feeds me a little more about ayla, and for emotionally hungry me, the lonely teenager within that was sparked so many years ago, i guess i have to admit that i'll take what i can get. yeah, i'll read lousy book six too, wade through all the endless descriptions of skies and plants and firestones and the inevitable repetitions of previous books for alzheimer's readers and the annoyingly unedited comma splices and the shallow one-sided underdeveloped characters and the thinly disguised pseudo-liberal social messages and the subtly perverse incest themes and the idealized versions of child porn with all the "first rites" nonsense. aaaah! but then again, who knows, maybe i won't feel compelled to read book six in ten years...maybe by then i'll have a real wife to love and won't have to suck up the fantasy droppings about ayla.
Rating:
Summary: Glad I'm not alone--by Sandy, a Prehistoric Fiction lover
Review: Reading these reviews has been a comfort to me, since I waited almost 12 years for this book, and found it so disapointing. I'm glad I'm not the only one! That having been said, I have to jump to Ms. Auel's defence. First of all, no book could have lived up to the fanfare and expectations of those of us who have read and adored the first four books. (Especially those of us who spent all those years dreaming up our own versions of what happens next!) Just because she didn't include all of the action I hoped to see, doesn't mean Ms. Auel has lost interest or failed to write the book she wanted. Secondly, I spent all day re-reading SOS and realized that several parts were excellent. (And anyone who thinks this book was ghost-written clearly didn't pay enough attention to those parts!) Chapters 2 through 10 are great. So are some of the scenes at the Summer Meeting. There are at least 300 pages of terrific reading. The only problem is, the book is 741 pages. There are only two serious problems with the book: 1. The endless descriptions of the landscape and repetitions previous material. 2. The really great characters and storylines Ms. Auel introduced--then didn't take anywhere. I could easily skip the pages of boring description, but what I can't forgive is the way she set up Brukaval as a stalker, Marona as a dangerous villainess and Laramar's whole abused, disfunctional family that Ayla was supossed to save--and then left us all the lurch. I could write reams of fan fiction about all that stuff, but I'd have preferred Ms. Auel do it for me. That's why I was in the bookstore on April 30 as soon as I got off work. I will probably do the same when book 6 comes out, partly out of hope that it will be back to the level of the first 4, and partly out of repect for the author who has written some of my favorite books of all time...
Rating:
Summary: A Year in the Life
Review: As a fan of Jean Auel's earlier books, I have to add my vote of disappointment over this long-anticipated continuation of Ayla's story. The earlier books were enjoyable, even with, and partly because of, the detailed descriptions of prehistoric life. And, of course, Ayla as the primitive version of Thomas Edison has to be taken with a grain of salt. Unfortunately, in this book, that grain has been bulked up to a granite rock and has been shackled to her leg. Auel drags Ayla through a year in the life of Ayla and Jondalar as they return to his old neighborhood. To plagiarize an old concert review, the book ran through the entire gamut of human emotions, from A to B. Although the description of the mountains, rivers, grasses, deerhide, weaving, etc... was mildly interesting, (up to a point), it slowed the story line down from a pleasant walk to a zombie stagger. The repeated introductions, the endless reliance on the comings and goings of Wolf, Whinny and Racer as plot development, the numerous descriptions of every rock, cliff and riverbank, as if this was a traveler's guide instead of a novel, simply added to the lethargy. When dramatic tension is defined by a gashed leg to a young hunter, or the horrible dismay Ayla suffers at being shouted at, it's hard to force the hand to continue to turn the pages. I did finish the book - it was generally easy reading - but I did it more out of a sense of commitment rather than engagement. And I don't see how a reader who had not read any of the earlier books would get even that far.
Rating:
Summary: A Decade for Disappointment
Review: I started reading the Earth's Children Series when I was in sixth grade. I am now twenty-five years old and I had given up on completely reading the series. In this span of time I have read and reread through the series. I love her books previous to Shelters Of Stone. She has always provided excellent plot, character development, excitement, and the tantalizing "just wait for the next book" endings. This, mixed with her amazing ability to convey the setting in a factual well-researched manner, has made me a devoted Auel fan. Over a decade I had spent reliving Ayla and Jondalar, in a limbo that I had thought would never end. Now it seems that I will continue to exist in this limbo. Jean Auel has forgotten her characters in exchange for more intimate detail of scenery, climate, and anthropology. I feel like I know these characters better than Auel does. This is not conceit, just plain commonsense. Ayla is a shadow of who she used to be. The animals are no longer character. Jondalar is just an ordinary man. I would like to ask Ms. Auel, "Where is Ayla? Does she exist in your mind anymore, or is there only rock?" Perhaps this seems harsh. Perhaps this could be a problem with the Publisher and Editors hounding Ms. Auel for her new book. It is easier to write a book about things than about people, especial the fictional. However, the book is not up to Auel's par. Regardless of the reason, or the quality of the settings, which are in full detail, the heart of The Earth's Children is not there.
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