Rating: 
Summary: fabululously awful, and then just plain awful
Review: So bad it's a blast to read. Jam packed with the author's political views, especially hilarious when they have nothing to do with the plot! There's nothing like giving book contracts to the mentally disturbed. Look out Vegans and environmentalists! You'll be target number one when Skynet rules, aparently. Also hilarous are the dropped characters and storylines, like the group of college students who have their own chapter to almost never be mentioned again. Also: There's a gas shortage! Don't waste gas! We have to get somewhere quickly for this plot twist, let's drive! And remember, if you disagree with Sterling's political views you are an "idiot activist in an idiot cause," so there!
Rating:
Summary: A Book Written on Spec, and it Shows
Review: T2: The Future War is the third book in a series that follows the characters of
The Terminator movies from where the movies leave off to future world that was
described so chillingly in the first movie. Stirling is faithful to the movies, and keep
his characters consistent with those on the big screen. He expands on the story
told in the movies and provides a good deal of background information and detail
on how the Terminator future can to happen. The problem with T2: The Future War
is that most of the plot and themes in the book are so simplistic that I found myself
skimming chapters to get to the paragraphs where SkyNet unleashes a new round of nasty machines upon humanity. The characters were so shallow that I simply did not care what happened to them. To make things worse, the ending is pre-ordained so there was no real suspense in the story. A more serious problem, however, was that the book was full of cliches. For example, environmentalists and ecologists are portrayed as cold-blooded, fascist who are incapable of thinking for themselves. Stirling seems to be using this book
to editorialize on groups that he does not like, and he assums that his readers share his views. I lost interest after a few chapters. Stirling has written some very good stories, but this is not one of them. Read The Children's Hour to see Stirling at his best.
Rating: 
Summary: Waited 19 years for this?!
Review: The book is the complement of the first Terminator movie, T2 and T3 (due in a few weeks). Remember in T1 the glimpses of the future, showing Reese and others fighting in the rubble, amidst skeletons? It has been nineteen years since the T1 movie, but finally we can see extra details alluded to. Stylistically, this differs from most of Stirling's works. In part because he must fit it into the boundary conditions set by the movies. The narrative is sparser. Details are considerably less, especially of the scenery, which is his trademark in many other stories. There is simply not the dense weave of descriptions and subplots seen in the Nantucket trilogy or the Peshawar Lancers. Plus, the combat scenes don't have the same intensity as those in Marching Through Georgia. (One scene in Future War alludes to another in the latter; see if you can find it.) My impression is that Stirling wrote this book simply to tie up the loose ends in the movies and close out his two other Terminator novels. Just work-for-hire. Fans of the movies should check this book out for more flesh on the movies. Fans of Stirling should probably look to his other wholly-owned works.
Rating:
Summary: Good, but very rushed.
Review: This final entry into Stirling's great T2 series is overall a good read, telling the tale of John Connor's rise to leadership over the remnants of mankind in the war against the machines and their human followers. My major complaint is that the book feels rushed, as it covers about twenty years of war in one volume. Characters vital to the other two books, namely Snog's college buddies, are dropped here, with no explanation of what happened to them. Other characters come in for the first part of the book, but are killed off or disappear before the second half.
This gets insane near the end, as Kyle Reese's entire 20+ year life is covered in about 80 pages of what are basically vignettes interspersed with the main story of John's fight. This main story is also rushed, with two years or more flying by at a time. This is seriously what's crammed in the last ten pages:
-Skynet's defense grid is smashed.
-The time machine facility is captured in a huge battle.
-The Terminators go back in time.
-Kyle Reese and the good T-800 go back.
-The book ends.
And no, there weren't spoilers there, if you've seen the movies, which you should have if you're reading this series.
In conclusion, while the book is well-written, it feels like Stirling tried to cram what should have been two, or even more, books into a single novel. By all means, buy this if you've read the other two books and want to see the end of the series, because it's a good book. But this novel won't make anyone a new fan of the series, and even veterans of the Terminator saga like myself might get confused at the insane pace of the last hundred or so pages.
Rating:
Summary: T2: The Future War
Review: While I liked the first two entries in this series, this one is weak. Stirling seems in a hurry to finish off the series and the great story line he began in "Infiltrator" and "Rising Storm" falls flat here. I assume the pressure of deadlines and a restricted amount of page space are to blame?...or perhaps the author had other projects that were more important? Its too bad that a strong series had to fininsh on this note.
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