Rating: 
Summary: Innovative and suspenful
Review: Good science fiction should be innovative in the future it describes and suspensful in the story telling. Eon is a great example of both of these characteristics.
Rating:
Summary: Alternate Universe - a different opinion
Review: I can't understand why so many people seem to dislike this book.
I think I read it in '91 when it came out, and a couple times since. One of my favorite books of all time, Eon never stops offering new surprises, new technologies, and big ideas.
Read the book. Make your own opinion.
Rating: 
Summary: Fantastic ideas spoiled by awful writing
Review: EON, a 1985 novel by Greg Bear, is one of the science fiction writer's most fantastic displays of imaginative thinking and worldbuilding. However, I found the work rather disappointing due to Bear's poor writing skills.
The plot of EON is complicated, both in its science and in the political relationships between characters. Everything starts as a mysterious asteroid enters Earth orbit, and an expedition sent by the west discovers that it was built by humans of the future and somehow sent back in time unintentionally. Museums on the asteroid chronicle a future war between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. The most awe-inspiring facet of the book, however, is where the inhabitants of the asteroid disappeared to, leaving the cities there abandoned.
Bear's writing is atrocious. Dialogue is clunky and unrealistic, there are some really absurdly penned sex scenes, and his description of the characters is formulaic. The portrayal of the Russians is incredibly stereotypical, and Bear never misses a chance to beat the reader over the head with the message that communism was wrong and the U.S. right during the Cold War. With the non-English characters he makes numerous mistakes. Kiev (i.e. Kyiv) is called a Russian city (it's Ukrainian). The author writes a traditional ideogram to describe a Chinese character's shirt when the PRC has used simplified forms for fifty years. The Hellenic rulers of Egypt are confused with the indigenous Egyptians. Apparently, the author did little research outside of the hard sciences.
It is really a shame that the writing is so poor, because the concepts introduced here are fantastic. Alternate geometries, new forms of human society in the far-future, aliens some familiar and others inherently unknowable. The author's portrayal of a nuclear holocaust is harrowing but thought-provoking.
In short, I would not recommend Eon unless you are a heavy reader of science fiction and can look past the poor writing--unfortunately quite common in this genre--and enjoy Bear's imaginative ideas.
Rating: 
Summary: Some good ideas poorly presented
Review: Never having read Greg Bear before I wasn't sure what I had in store for me when I picked up Eon. A few chapters into the book I was about ready to give up on Mr. Bear. I could forgive his frequent forays into the technical discussions of hard science fiction. I could forgive his tendency to introduce subjects/objects/phrases and not properly explain them until several chapters later. But I could not forgive the hollow characters who behaved more and more eratically as the story progressed. And I disliked the teasing of what seemed to be potentially important subjects (i.e. the Frants or the increasingly promiscious nature of characters) that went no where.Despite all this, he managed to weave an intriguing enough story that I struggled through these faults and finished the book. I certainly wouldn't put this on any Top X book list, but neither would I toss it in the trash if I received it as a gift.
Rating:
Summary: Thou Dart Bullseye
Review: Wow! Great story and characters. Really sucked me in an wouldn't let go. Bear's imagination is seldom rivaled. I loved this book, but I felt at times that I needed a refresher course in physics. Not too badly however. I never felt lost among his wild concepts, I just wished I remembered more about some of the more complex physical thoeries that most hard sci-fi writers are more familiar with. If nothing else, this book will reaffirm your desires to refamiliarize yourself with some of the more intersting ideas from your favorite physicists. Give it a read. I guarantee you'll at least learn something.
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