Rating: 
Summary: Great Book
Review: Clan of the cave bear is about a Cro-Magnon girl named Ayla. She is orphaned during an earthquake as a child. When she is attacked by a lion she is found nearly dead by a clan of Neanderthals. She is nursed back to health and is adopted by the clans medicine woman. Clan of the Cave Bear ( as well as the future books in the series )is thoroughly researched). The story is based on actual archealogical findings. The character Creb is a medicine man who has severe physical deformities. An actual neanderthal skeleton was discovered that apears to have the same deformaties that Creb has. The story is fictionalized but it is amazing how they cancreate a culture based on a few artifacts. Since there is no written record, "Clan of the Cave Bear " is as close to an actual ethnography of early modern humans as you can get.
Rating:
Summary: History, Imagination, Fascinating Characters!
Review: Ayla is a young girl in prehistoric times whose parents are killed, but she is adopted by a new group of people. They are of a different species and she is strange to them. What follows is a fascinating story about the girl's life within their small but complex society. Jean Auel draws heavily on archaelogy and makes many imaginative guesses to determine what their lives must have been like. The characters are developed in many layers all the way down to their subconscious. The reader almost knows some members of the Clan better than they could possibly know themselves. While some of the Clan's ways and rituals might be laughed at by modern humans, they also have extensive knowledge of the world around them. For them, survival is honed to an art after thousands of years of experience. The Clan is close-knit group with many admirable traits but there are also many shortcomings. Their species has reached the height of its development and they have grown impermeable to change. Ayla is new and confusing to the Clan. Even after raising her as one of their own, things that are instinctive to the rest of them have to be taught to her. When she smiles it seems to them as though she's snarling and when she cries they wonder why her eyes are watering. From the time they first adopt her, Ayla tries her best to be one of them and becomes accepted by most of the Clan. However, her biological differences are everpresent. She inherently brings change that conflicts with ancient traditions.
Rating:
Summary: Loved it the First, Second and Third time around.
Review: I've re-read this book yet once again. And it was just as good this time around as it was the first. Great interaction between characters and moving story. Thanks for the great read.
Rating:
Summary: Taught me how to be a woman
Review: I was 14 years old when I read this book, and quickly followed with the next two. The other reviews focused on the plot, so I will omit that. I am going to instead concentrate on how it made me feel. As a teenager, reading about this young woman's struggle to fit in when she was so different really struck home. The story also concentrates on freedom issues that face women. How many times I identified with Ayla(main character) when she was yet again having her uniqueness stifled, or having her love rejected I cannot say. I found myself learning to stand up, and become strong physically and emotionally from her example. In short, I wanted to be her- an intelligent, strong, independant, loving healer who had to guts to defy the patriarcal system she grew up in. This book also has some wonderful information about herbal medicine and food preparation. I would especially highly recommend this to young women, because of the wonderful example it sets. I have to say I love the second book as well for it's theme of being tested by solitude, and facing predjudice. In truth, I love them all but the first two are by far the best. And I too waited over ten years for the fifth book!
Rating: 
Summary: Very Disappointing
Review: I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw this large "book" on the kitchen table the other day. Wow! First off, Bessie rarely reads anything except diet books. Secondly, a book about Beer!!! Well, as is often the case with my angry fifth spouse, I was once again overloaded with misplaced optimism. This is not a book about some Cave Beer Clan. Instead, "The Clan of the Cave BeAr" is an overwrought, overwritten, overblown feminist ode to some silly notion about evolution filled with research and adjectives. I'll be honest, once I realized it wasn't about beer, I didn't so much read as skim. Really skim. I enjoyed the fact that the heroine was blonde with blue eyes, but I didn't like how much the author seemed to be in love with her. I also grew rapidly annoyed by this author's overuse of adjectives. It did make skimming a lot easier, but I was still annoyed. Additionally, while I can relate to the brutish sex-starved male as Cro-magnon stereotype, I didn't particularly find it made for good reading. I'm still not sure why my brooding spouse is reading it unless it's to reinforce her already firm opinion of me as an apeman. Or maybe there's a diet somewhere buried within the books 9,142 pages. Not for me. HHD.
Rating:
Summary: Completely Aweome.
Review: This book... wow. How do I even begin? My only wish is that the rest of the books in the series had been even half the book that this one is... I almost wish she had never gone on... I was so disappointed and bored by the rest of them. But this book... what an incredible tale of a woman's self-exploration and identity!!! I think all young women should read this book at leats once... actually, all women, no matter your age... it is exhilerating and painful and heartfelt and so realistic... and completely and utterly empowering. I am usually into thrillers, so this was different for me, and I was afraid I would be bored but... I wasn't at all... In fact, I couldn't put it down... I was completely enraptured in this woman's life. This book is a work of art, not simply a book to be read and discarded... and should receive much more acclaim... much more notoriety... than it does. Every woman should read it... seriously. You'll never forget it! :) (Oh, and unfortunately I feel my duty to tell you... if & when you do read it, please spare yourself the disappointment of the rest of the series, and end it with this book which does stand on it's own.)
Rating:
Summary: Absolutely Excellent
Review: A friend told me I should read this book, but I never got around to it. Then, last week my mom found the book in a thrift store and asked if I wanted to borrow it. Finals were over, I had a week before school started, so I figured..What the hell..I can always quit if I don't like it.
This is absolutely the best book I have ever read. I would recommend it to anyone who has a little time on their hands and wants to go into Ayla's world. The characthers felt so real to me, that I hated to see the book end. I have ordered the second book, and ran across the third in the series in that same thrift shop today. I can't wait to read the others! Absolutely Excellent! As a side note: If you see the movie starring Darryl Hannah as Ayla, for clan of the cave bear..It is a horrible adaptation of the book. I was bored with the movie, but the book held my attention and was excellent..(Did I say that already?) Buy the books, rent the movie.
Rating:
Summary: very interesting
Review: This was a fascinating book. I learned a lot about the early days of the human race through this book, and the story was great too. Ayla comes from the race of The Others, the more highly developed humans who are mistrusted by the clan who adopts the young orphan girl when she is five. The clan is deeply rooted in tradition and customs and doesn't like change or deviation from the norm. So taking Ayla in takes some getting used to. But through the years, they adjust to her presence, and she grows up as part of their culture. She's different from them, though - she knows it and they know it and it's always hanging over them. But she pushes on, overcoming obstacles and standing up for herself every step of the way. I won't spoil the ending, but I was sorry it ended at the point in the story where it did. It would have been far more satisfying to see what happens after the events at the end of the book. There would have been a certain sense of satisfaction in seeing the inevitable decline and destruction that would most certainly occur under the new leadership. Alas, I guess we'll just have to imagine it in our minds.
Rating:
Summary: Absolutely the Best Fiction on Early Man
Review: The first in the Earth's Children series will make you a continuing reader of the rest of the more recent books. Excellent character development and realistic setting. The reader is immediately drawn into the story and remains a follower of Ayla and her adventures in the continuing series of books.A must read! Interesting and informative!
Evelyn Horan - teacher/counselor/author
Jeannie, A Texas Froniter Girl, Books One - Three
Rating:
Summary: clan of the cave bear
Review: this book is great!! i love this book and have become addicted to it. im obsesed (sorry i dont no how to spell it) anyway. that is all i go on about, it really bugs my friends. i admit, this book can get abit borin coz it does describe it alot but its still great. i bet anyone with a heart who reads this book will cry at least once
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