Rating: 
Summary: The Moat Around Murcheson's Eye...
Review: ...Is the title this was released under in the UK. Which explains my initial confusion.But in reading the reviews, I feel as if I have been looking at the wrong book. What's going on here? A classic follow up to a classic novel, and so many people were disappointed! Many people disliked the first section of the novel, which dealt primarily with the Human Empire and the Mormons. They claim they had nothing to do with the story - untrue, as they sparked Bury's paranoia about the Moties getting free in the first place. I enjoyed the insight into the human Empire, and the fleshing out of an area that TMiGE was unable to focus on. The Blaine children being flat characters? Glenda Ruth belonging on 'Clueless'? Chris being an unimaginative Navy officer? Ridiculous! They are cunning, manipulative individuals, raised by Motie Mediators, and they act every bit the part. Perhaps those who commented thus failed to look under the glossy exterior of the characters - Glenda's relationship with Freddy (an interesting new character, incidentally), say, and Chris's disbelief in the Motie threat (he spent less time with Jock, Charlie and Ivan than his sister). Bury, for all the 30 years, hasn't changed a bit - bar his unusual friendship with Kevin. He still follows his beliefs, he is still terrified of the Moties - and he still hates the Blaines with a passion (not quite the clear-cut 'good guy' I've heard him accused of). As to the lack of new technology and races, and lack of development by the Moties...of course not! Barely thirty years have passed, not enough time for substantial new technology to appear (bar the 'magic' coffeepots and the expanding Langston Field). A society will not change much in this period, and nor will a species genetics! And as to 'no new alien races', well: the Mote books have always been about the Human-Motie relationship, and adding new aliens would be unbelieveable, disruptive, confusing and above all; destroy the impact and flow of the story. Another comment I read was that a reviewer modelled himself on Kevin Renner. I'd model myself on a Motie Mediator - perhaps even Renner's own Fyunch(click!). In conclusion; The Moat Around Murcheson's Eye/The Gripping Hand is a worthy and impressive follow-up up to a classic. Read it, hate it if you must, but try looking under the surface and you'll find a lot more than some people seem to have. Incredible. One of the greatest SF books I've ever read.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing
Review: A very disappointing sequel. Like many others who have commented, I am a big fan of "The Mote in God's Eye", and although sequels often fall short of the original, this one fell shorter than most. It has flaws that would discredit a first novel by an unknown author, quite frankly: characters are introduced and developed, made interesting, and then dropped without explanation and never referred to again. Same for subplots. The dialogue is confusing, and the protagonists make leaps of logic that I found impossible to follow. Perhaps worst of all, I did not recognize the "Empire" of this story as being the same "Empire" from TMIGE. Certainly, 30 years had passed, but too many things had been stood on their heads, and none of the characters seemed to have noticed. It was as if the authors decided that the social and political background of the first book was no longer commercial, and so they performed major surgery on it -- unfortunately doing a sloppy job and killing the patient in the process.
Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Review: A very disappointing sequel. Like many others who have commented, I am a big fan of "The Mote in God's Eye", and although sequels often fall short of the original, this one fell shorter than most. It has flaws that would discredit a first novel by an unknown author, quite frankly: characters are introduced and developed, made interesting, and then dropped without explanation and never referred to again. Same for subplots. The dialogue is confusing, and the protagonists make leaps of logic that I found impossible to follow. Perhaps worst of all, I did not recognize the "Empire" of this story as being the same "Empire" from TMIGE. Certainly, 30 years had passed, but too many things had been stood on their heads, and none of the characters seemed to have noticed. It was as if the authors decided that the social and political background of the first book was no longer commercial, and so they performed major surgery on it -- unfortunately doing a sloppy job and killing the patient in the process.
Rating:
Summary: An entertaining talk-a-thon
Review: Eighteen years in the making! the cover proclaims. Not that I believe they spent the last eighteen years writing it but I guess everyone is allowed some poetic license. To any potential readers out there if you're thinking of reading this book and haven't read The Mote in God's Eye, then stop right now and go read that book and then come back. Okay? I'll wait. In any event, as you no doubt figured this novel is a sequel to that SF classic, which detailed First Contact with a race very different from humans in good and bad ways . . . and the worst way caused us to seal them up in their solar system to prevent them from spreading. But now it's thirty years later and there's a good chance that the Moties are going to come out. Now what? Do we wipe them all out or try to negotiate with them in hopes of forming some kind of compromise. As you can probably infer, this isn't as action packed as the last book was, in fact it consists of mostly dialogue, pages and pages of people talking and trying to manuever politically and strategically and whatnot. So some fans were probably put off from page one. But all in all for a book that has been slammed a million times it's not that bad . . . sure the engrossing mystery is gone and so are lots of the breakneck action but excitement can be found in the slow build up and the endless back and forth talk. If anything the two strikes working against the book are it's too long (especially toward the end, which just keeps going and going and going . . .) and none of the new characters are memorable at all. The old people are back, mostly Kevin Renner and Horace Bury and they make out well but even the others aren't even featured and the newcomers (especially Jennifer and Glinda Ruth) are so one note that it borders on annoying. However, the Niven/Pournelle team manages to capture your attention once you've gotten far enough into the book and by stringing along a series of minor climaxes they successfully keep the reader moving along with the plot (which, for all the manipulations, is oddly straightforward). So no, they did try something different with this one so they have to get credit for that . . . without the shock of the new that the last book had this novel can't hope to measure up but it's an entertaining book on its own and a welcome look at a race and concept that deserved revisiting.
Rating:
Summary: An entertaining talk-a-thon
Review: Eighteen years in the making! the cover proclaims. Not that I believe they spent the last eighteen years writing it but I guess everyone is allowed some poetic license. To any potential readers out there if you're thinking of reading this book and haven't read The Mote in God's Eye, then stop right now and go read that book and then come back. Okay? I'll wait. In any event, as you no doubt figured this novel is a sequel to that SF classic, which detailed First Contact with a race very different from humans in good and bad ways . . . and the worst way caused us to seal them up in their solar system to prevent them from spreading. But now it's thirty years later and there's a good chance that the Moties are going to come out. Now what? Do we wipe them all out or try to negotiate with them in hopes of forming some kind of compromise. As you can probably infer, this isn't as action packed as the last book was, in fact it consists of mostly dialogue, pages and pages of people talking and trying to manuever politically and strategically and whatnot. So some fans were probably put off from page one. But all in all for a book that has been slammed a million times it's not that bad . . . sure the engrossing mystery is gone and so are lots of the breakneck action but excitement can be found in the slow build up and the endless back and forth talk. If anything the two strikes working against the book are it's too long (especially toward the end, which just keeps going and going and going . . .) and none of the new characters are memorable at all. The old people are back, mostly Kevin Renner and Horace Bury and they make out well but even the others aren't even featured and the newcomers (especially Jennifer and Glinda Ruth) are so one note that it borders on annoying. However, the Niven/Pournelle team manages to capture your attention once you've gotten far enough into the book and by stringing along a series of minor climaxes they successfully keep the reader moving along with the plot (which, for all the manipulations, is oddly straightforward). So no, they did try something different with this one so they have to get credit for that . . . without the shock of the new that the last book had this novel can't hope to measure up but it's an entertaining book on its own and a welcome look at a race and concept that deserved revisiting.
Rating: 
Summary: poor writing here, what happened Larry?
Review: Felt like a book written by two Big Names without their heart in the project. After the first 100 pages finally something of interest happens: the Bury-Blaine confrontation. But until then what? Hand-shaking and "How've ya been?" Any new information different from TMiGE? None. And when we finally get to the Moties, any substantially new information? Not much. The authors created one of the All-Time Best SF cultures: dynamic, rapidly adaptable, changing, a threat to The Empire of Man. What happened after 30 years? Not much there but plotting t h r o ugh-the-motions-to-the-end-pick-up-our-advance-and-royalties-story-telling. Rape my lizard! Where was the Editor for this thing? Scrap the first 100 pages. Cut to the chase: the Moties! How 'bout some basic story-telling skills? Find the character(s) flaw(s) and have the protagonist(s) (Moties!) attack the character(s) at their weakest point. Instead, what does this book give us?--'Evry body here's a good guy feel. Even the devilishly evil Bury (remember TMiGE? he kidnapped a Navy guy and videotaped his slowww execution!) is clean and pressed. This book is very politically correct, doesn't offend anything or anyone. Where was the Editor? At times rambling narrative and dislocated dialog. What's the story? The Moties! What does the first 100 pages have to do with the story? Nothing. What do Mormons have to do with the story? Nothing. What does Glenda Ruth Blaine's quote "sex appeal" unquote, have to do with the story? Nothing. Where was the editor?--seeing big sales numbers if L & J would just whip out anything, something please oh pretty please I have quotas to meet! --The preceding is from a DEVOTED Niven & Pournelle reader. Buy all they put out, have enjoyed all they put out (well, execpt ONE) to various degrees, and was disappointed by The Gripping Hand. Not a bad book, just not worth reading.
Rating: 
Summary: Mostly mediocre, but has its good parts.
Review: First off, I read this off and on during one semester - no other fiction for 3 months. I found that ultimatly, it didn't keep my interest much of the time and I gravitated toward my circuit textbook more often. I was excited after reading the Mote in God's eye because of its innovative ideas, creatures, and good characters. I was disappointed when nothing of the sort appeared in the gripping hand. The gripping hand described the motie political systems and ever-changing rule and power-struggle. That's pretty much it. History is interesting when you read about specific battles and relationships and clandestine occurences. These are described but the motie species is still much to distance to really care or be interested in. The writers' had yet to humanize the moties enough for anyone to be interested. I have an inkling that they began to mimic human society very specifically just like the finchclick-guys mimic their human mentor's - successfully only some of the time (some go insane). I was never sure if it was intentional or that's just what they did. The writers' never made that clear enough. Also the mimicked alliences may have been too tediuous and I always wondered if some of the things they were doing could be found in a middle-eastern history book (their most prized finchclick guys were modelled after the muslim trader character). I sware that the writing changed tones and style 180 degrees all over the book. This must be due to the two writer's because I found myself just becoming enthralled with one aspect of the story and utterly bored with parallels. Like the snow monster mystery in the beginning had my interest piqued, but the story completley switched to a loosely motie-related substory - which was boring. I think that I have to read more of each author's non-collaborative books' to find out who made this book so difficult for me to finish.
Rating:
Summary: Mostly mediocre, but has its good parts.
Review: First off, I read this off and on during one semester - no other fiction for 3 months. I found that ultimatly, it didn't keep my interest much of the time and I gravitated toward my electric circuit theory textbook more often. I was excited after reading the Mote in God's eye because of its innovative ideas, creatures, and good characters. I was disappointed when nothing of the sort appeared in the gripping hand. The gripping hand described the motie political systems and ever-changing rule and power-struggle. That's pretty much it. History is interesting when you read about specific battles and relationships and clandestine occurences. These are described but the motie species is still much to distance to really care or be interested in. The writers' had yet to humanize the moties enough for anyone to be interested.
I have an inkling that they began to mimic human society very specifically just like the finchclick-guys mimic their human mentor's - successfully only some of the time (some go insane). I was never sure if it was intentional or that's just what they did. The writers' never made that clear enough. Also the mimicked alliences may have been too tediuous and I always wondered if some of the things they were doing could be found in a middle-eastern history book (their most prized finchclick guys were modelled after the muslim trader character).
I swear that the writing changed tones and style 180 degrees all over the book. This must be due to the fact that there were two writers because I found myself just becoming enthralled with one aspect of the story and utterly bored with parallel ones. Like the snow monster mystery in the beginning had my interest piqued, but the story completley switched to a loosely motie-related substory - which was boring. I think that I have to read more of each author's non-collaborative books' to find out who made this book so difficult for me to finish.
Rating: 
Summary: A terrific sequel! You'll love it if you love Niven!
Review: First the praise- This is a terrific and spellbinding sequel to "The Mote in God's Eye". "The Gripping Hand" keeps you turning pages with a well crafted suspense and tension not quite equal to "Mote" but completely engaging in all comparisons to SF's best. The caveats- Niven and Pournelle seem to have kept pace with current science but their characterization in this story is totally 50's and 60's. All the characters and the society seem to sound like WWII generation jingoistic capitalists, a la Heinlein. Some of the dialogue and attitudes can be jarring to more philosophically liberal or younger readers. What tends to gall me the most about Niven books is the importance given to the character's title or educational degrees in society. This is a hierarchal, elitist view that nags anyone of more egalitarian bent. Niven seems to think people with titles,rank,or money are more important or capable or better. I categoricly disagree with that, probably because I'm from a younger generation with less faith in society's institutions and those persons it elevates to high title and office. So it's like I said- If you can put aside the WW2 generation characters you will find a terrifically interesting and well-paced science fiction sequel that is the equal of most any SF books written during most years. If you read "Mote in God's Eye" don't miss this because as a sequel it's almost as powerful and great!
Rating:
Summary: Larry Niven ... another way to spell unique
Review: Following up on "The Mote in Gods Eye" was a difficult job, which is why it took so long. Staying true to the original, this sequal does not dissapoint.
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