Rating: 
Summary: Good hard SF, fast-paced and intelligent
Review: An enjoyable read, hard to put down. Not quite one of his best, but if you like Bear, well worth it...
Rating: 
Summary: Not as hot as I thought
Review: This book tells a good story, except for
loose threads that hopefully are resolved
in the sequel. I felt something changed
toward the end and my interest wavered.
I kept reading on to see how things would
turn out and at the very end something
really [made me mad]: the boy who had witnessed
an atrocity of incalculable proportions and
who in the face of a great injustice swore
to seek out the perpetrators to avenge his pet.
Greg Bear has done better than this...
Rating: 
Summary: A shocking, exhilarating read
Review: One to buy and read over again, together with the very different sequel, "Anvil of Stars". One of my favourite authors.
Rating:
Summary: Awesome Book
Review: I am so picky about the books I read, and even more picky about recommending one. This is a suspensful, scary book. Get it.
Rating:
Summary: simply the best
Review: It is very hard to call a book simply the best at what it is. To often the book is simply one reader's opinion (mine). This book is simply the best invasion book ever I have ever read. Yes, I am including Footfall. I originally read the book in 1987 when it first had been released. I still cannot get the haunting story out of my head to this day. This book is not for the light hearted. It is depressing and the reader knows what is going to happen early in the novel. Still, it is worth the work. Once again Bear writes a masterpiece blending hard science and well written characters. The political reactions and realities to the aliens are believable and probable. Once again heroes are born in the most distressing of times. By the end of the book, you actually care what is going to happen to the human race. Do yourself a favor, pick up this book and enjoy.
Rating:
Summary: Morbid Sci-Fi at its best.
Review: Being a big fan of Greg Bear, i went into this book with high expecations. Very quickly i was impressed with the story that began to unfold before me. Allthough the book doesnt really begin to pick up untill the latter half, the events leading up to the main parts lay a good foundation for this amazing story.
I was really able to feel the emotions that Bear was putting into his characters, especialy when the soldier gets traped with the nuke inside the alien craft, that has to be one of the most powerful literary sequences ive read in a long time. The book even took me along the roller coaster of emotions that the inhabitants of earth were feeling when they became aware of what was happening. Anger, denial, despare, acceptance. Nearing the end of the book, i understood the very hopelessness of the situation, and read on with grim acceptance of earth's fate.
The one thing that i would say keeps this book from being a 5, is the weak ending. I would rather have all of humanity been destroyed in one great, yet meaningless caticlysm, than a small portion saved by some late arriving alien race. I felt this really disracted from the main story of the people of earth, and shouldve been left out. Of course then there would have been no sequel. All in all, this book is a must read for those of you who enjoy Sci-Fi that really makes you think, and doesnt end with everything working out, just like in reality.
Rating:
Summary: The best alien invasion
Review: To put it simply, this is the hands down best alien invasion book I have ever read. I am the first to acknowledge that I am a huge Greg Bear fan. The reason that I am in so much awe of the man is because of this book. I have read the rest of his works since I first read The Forge of God. He skillfully mixes the best elements of hard sci-fi with social commentary. Writing about how the various world governments react to the invasion along with the mysterious aliens and the various factions involved among them gives this story a deeper feeling than the other giant in the field (Footfall).
Rating:
Summary: Slaughter of Innocents
Review: I read FOG many years ago and bought another copy recently to reread it. The story has stuck with me through the years. The encounter of the alien with the President just floored me when I read it the first time: "Do you [aliens] believe in a God?" "We believe in punishment." How Old Testament can you get? There are superior powers in the universe -- a chosen race? -- who have judged us wanting and are here to wipe the slate clean to further evolution of more promising worlds. Or are they? One wonders just whose side the Planet-eaters and the Benefactors are on. Perhaps they are on the same side and just want to step up the evolutionary pressure on our species. Perhaps they are waging a war between themselves by proxy. Or perhaps, like Saberhagens Bizerkers, the Planet-eaters just want to eliminate all biologic life in order to advance robot evolution. Or perhaps, there is an advanced civilization out there that wants to terminate all competing species and have the galaxy all to itself. The book gives us the counter argument to SETI that maybe the universe is a hostile place and like the a child in the woods, we better shut up or we will be eaten by wolves. Perhaps, as Arthur C. Clarke has said, the best proof that there are extraterrestrial intelligences in the universe is that everybody is silent. FOG is a paen to our mother Earth and a first contact scenario gone horribly wrong. We should not be so naive as to think evolution does not apply to extraterrestrials. Competition for dominance, territory, reproduction, and scarce resources will always come to play where we ever find life. Anyone who reads it will realise how precious our planet is and Bear lovingly depicts Earth's beauty through out the book. To watch the destruction of our planet some of the characters choose Yosemite valley (my choice too) and others are forced to watch from space as The Law (Old Testament again?) requires our species to witness the Crime. "Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you have lost til its gone." Read FOG and you will look homeward rather than spaceward to cultivate your garden.
Rating:
Summary: A different look at first contact
Review: This book gives readers a whole new out look on what first contact might be like. It strays away from the typical "Take me to your leader" and adds a twist of inconsistent stories and a suspenseful plot keeping the reader intrigued. Up to the end, it is uncertain what will occur. The use of dialogue adds realness to the book and traps the reader inside the story. This book was unpredictable and presented a view on what first contact might REALLY be like.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best SF novels I have read
Review: I have read quite a few Stephen King, or other, horror novels. I yawned my way through them. This novel, about the impending destruction of the Earth in an alien invasion, gave me NIGHTMARES. It seemed more real than any other novel I've read in years. This story seems so real, and is so fast paced, I read it in a matter of hours over only two days. It terrified me in a way no other book ever has. Greg Bear wrote perhaps the best alien-invasion novel ever. And I wouldn't say the ending is dues ex machina. Yes, the cavalry comes -- but to what effect? I don't want to spoil the end, but suffice to say, Bear doesn't wimp out at any point, and pulls few punches... if any. Get it. Get up early some morning and read it in one day. Then, know what a true horror story is.
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