Rating: 
Summary: An enjoyable read
Review: The Baker's Boy is an enjoyable and easy read, and well worth the time for anyone interested in exploring the newer faces in the fantasy fiction world. I don't understand the need to complain about the book, as many of the reviewers have. It is not badly written, it is not written in bad taste, and it makes no pretenses of being anything but a fun, fairly standard, easy to read, fantasy novel.Having said that, there are interesting and thought provoking characters, and your standard and even nonstandard themes. I was particularly interested in the drug abuse depicted within the novel, something that I've not seen often. More than that, having an analytical (and perhaps over imaginative) mind, I saw many parallels between themes and character portrayals within the novel and in real life. There is deeper substance to Jones' work, but I think it takes a perculiar type of mind to pick up on the nuances. Don't expect to find it mind shattering, but with an open mind you will be pleasantly surprised at the creativity of the author. I'd recommend the book and in fact the series to anyone interested in a light, amusing, read.
Rating: 
Summary: a painful read
Review: the book starts with one of the best prologues i've ever read. it's all downhill after that. the heroes are annoying and spend 95% getting their a**es kicked, whining, crying about the past. far more interesting are the villians. tavalisk could be excellent -- unfortunately his parts all follow the same pattern. any book where i long to see the heroes executed for stupidity and being so insufferably un-original can't be given more than one star. one good point: i actually liked all the sex & violence -- it set it apart from other fantasy i have read. this includes the all too infrequent scenes with bodger and grift, which are hilarious. julie jones, while by far the best looking fantasy writer i have ever seen, is no Robert Jordan.
Rating:
Summary: Great start for the author
Review: What usually turns people on to books are the characters. How do you realate to the character? How does that character make you feel? That is what is important in a book and that is one of the good things about JVJ's writing. The Baker's Boy was her first book and you can tell. This excuses the uniform plotline. While this book does have a typical plot it is still very enjoyable. Yes, it is a little explicit but then again the discriptions are excitingly vivid. So many Science-Fiction/Fantsy books make it sound as if fighting evil is all fun and games. It sounds so pleasant. JVJ makes the typical plot come more alive. It is a fast paced book that skips all of the lengthy descriptions about how green the grass was or how smooth the wood on the table. You won't find yourself skipping much of this book. Throughout the trilogy her writing progresses and by the time you move on to her other books you can detect a more mature writing style and unique plot. JVJ is definetly worth reading.
Rating: 
Summary: Great start to a wonderful series!
Review: This a beautifully written series with great characters! I bought this book originally for the cover art, it was well worth the money.
Rating:
Summary: a good book better than I thought
Review: I Read the Baker's Boy and while it started out slow it soon picked up the pace and soon I could not put it down. the Sory is about Jack a baker boy who one day finds out that he has magic powers but doesn't understand them or how yo use them so he runs away since magic if forbidden in the Four Kingdom. Menwhile Melliandra runs away so she doesn't have to be married to Prince Kylock a man she doesn't like but her father set up to marry, not knowing that by running away it fits into Barlis plans a wizard who has his own plans and trys to kill Jack and Melliandra. some sex and violance but not as bad as some reviewers think, there is defentliy an adult theme to the book but not that bad. I recommened this book to people who like fantasy books and a good story.
Rating:
Summary: This is an excellent book
Review: This is an excellent first book in a great trilogy full of magic and mystery. It is about a baker's boy, who one day discovers he can work magic and flees, since magic is forbidden. It is also about a girl called Melliandra, who is in an unwanted betrothal. Their two fates collide as they both escape the castle in which they lived. Countless other characters, brought alive by Jones' vivid detail, come into the mix to add still more intrigue. While this may seem a cliche plot, the story is anything but. Jones adds new twists around every corner to make this a very fast-paced book, with an interesting storyline. But her real accomplishment is her characters. The plot takes second place to the way the author characterizes the young refugees, among other characters. I felt as if I knew even the most insignificant character's mind. This is a very entertaining book that is wonderful if you are an avid fantasy reader such as I am. The author is a master with words and the effect they will have on the reader. I highly recommend this book!
Rating:
Summary: Better than expected
Review: I'm currently reading the third book in this series, but I don't feel compelled to finish it before writing a review on the first book (or the series as a whole). I'm impressed with J.V. Jones' creativity, plotting and writing ability. Not to say that I don't have criticisms, but I've read probably at least eight fantasy trilogies (or longer series), and this one stands up fairly well in my opinion - at least mid-pack. There are perhaps too many coincidences, perhaps (as another reviewer said) the main characters are 'in trouble practically all the time', perhaps other complaints... but the story is fairly complex, with all kinds of interesting threads, and the author leaves you hanging again and again as she jumps from one POV to another. I don't agree with another reviewer who said that there was a lot of rape, sadism, and that it was 'sex-riddled'. Yes, it's not a kiddie story, and there is violence. I might say there's a tiny bit too much, but perhaps not, given the setting of a medieval-ish world with marauding armies, powerful and vicious rulers and assorted other 'bad guys'. Don't get the idea that it's all violence, but there IS a somewhat ever-present undercurrent of danger - and of course, that's part of what keeps things interesting.
Rating: 
Summary: Ouch!
Review: My goodness this is a bad book. Poorly written, incomprehensible scene transitions, characters so similar it is impossible to tell them apart. And the story... the same, old fantasy tale of orphans that find out they have magical powers and the cabal of rich, powerful baddies out to get them. YAWN. Huh? This is a series that people fall in love with? What am I missing?
Rating:
Summary: Enjoyable, but not great
Review: The book was captivating, plot kept me interested, however the author's style was detrimental to my enjoyment. Jones adopts a very storyteller-esque style. I could imagine the book being narrated, however much of it seemed stylistically to be geared towards children, while the content was definately meant for adults. Also some of the interludes meant to provide humor serve more to further lower the quality of the book from truly impressive high fantasy, to a run of the mill pulp fantasy novel. The Baker's Boy was the most enjoyable of the three books in the Book of Words series for me, but that may be because the style hadn't worn me down yet.
Rating: 
Summary: A little Stale, Not much is new
Review: This book was not very fresh; the main ideas have been played out numerous times in numerous other books (an orphan boy with no apparent life; finds that he has super duper magical powers). The characterization of this book was not great either; truth be told there really wasn't much about this book that was interesting. I read it, just because I had nothing else to do. I started to the book and finished it because I hate to start books and not finish them, but finishing it was a task. The story is one of a baker's boy who finds he has magical powers and must run away. An evil sorcerer is scheming for the throne and mixes foul concotions and potions (as most evil sorcerers do). The boy runs away, find someone to teach him something about his power, and eventually is going to come back and challenge this sorcerer. This book was very ho hum, and not on the top of this field at all; if you are interested in fantasy you should not read this book, unless you have exhausted all other outlets and authors before this one.
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