Rating: 
Summary: Independence Day meets the Selfish Gene
Review: Man has pretty much conquered inner space. The Moon, Mars, Mercury, asteroid mining, spaceships, fusion drives, human hibernation to cope with long journeys and boredom...the hard sci-fi fan has plenty to enjoy here. Niven is good at picking up realistic science, across the disciplines, particularly physics and biology, and taking the ideas to the next stage, and the next, and the next. By and large it hangs together well. But the real reason I like this one is the entertaining alien species, the Pak. The pinnacle of evolutionary success for this race is the Protector, the full-adult warrior class member who lives to fight and further his genetic blood line by winning territory and destroying all competition. It is as if Mr Niven anticipated Dawkin's 'Selfish Gene' hypothesis and 'Independence Day' in a leap of the imagination one day in the early 1970's. The nearest thing on earth to the Pak was probably the militaristic Spartan civilisation of ancient Greece. And now the Pak are coming. Earth is a failed Pak colony, a two-and-a-half million year old experiment gone awry. Man was never meant to evolve under his own steam. They want their territory back...
Rating: 
Summary: Clever explaination of human life cycle.
Review: Niven shows his wry insight into the real world and human life in this early novel set in the known universe future history.
A young man loses all memory of a few weeks of his life and is determined to find out the cause. He is astonished to find an explaination that harks back to the Garden of Eden and forward to an intergallactic war.
"If a human being is just an egg's way of making another egg" begs a question about the need for grandparents. Niven answers the question and a number of others including: why do old people get arthritis and why do their teeth fall out?
This novel is required reading for "Ringworld Engineers".
Rating:
Summary: Protector One of the Keys to Known Space
Review: Often overlooked in comparission to the Ringworld series of books is Protector. And this is a shame as it is one of the keys to Larry Niven's wonderland known as Known Space.
The Pak race has a three stage life cycle. Childhood (self explanitory); breeder (adulthood) and with the Tree Of Life Root becomes the sexless (both in deed and form) ultra smart Protector.
Phssthpok is a childless (meaning he will die soon) Protector who has traveled from the galaxy's core to save a lost colony of Pak Breeder whose Protectors have died out. What is this lost colony? Well it is the third planet from a medium yellow star. Phssthpok sets into motion a set of events that will change all of Known Space.
You can read other novels of Known Space without ever reading Protector but reading it makes the expierence all the more richer.
Would you trade away some of your humanity to become faster, stronger, smarter and nearly immortal? This is one of the things you will ponder as you read this novel.
A very enjoyable read.
Rating:
Summary: Stupid cover--great book
Review: One of the best books of all time. Please disregard how stupid the cover looks. It kept me from reading the book sooner. My wife and I both think this is a classic and brilliant piece of work.
Rating:
Summary: One of Larry Niven's classic's
Review: Protector is an interesting, fast story that will leave you wanting more. Our protector, a Belter (lives in the asteroid belt) named Brennan is transformed by an alien virus into a protector for us lowly breeders. Taking the threory of the stingy genes one step further, a protector is a super being whose only purpose is to protect his progeny. Without decendents a protector simply stops eating and dies. Lucky for us Brennan is infected with this virus and made a protector, because our parent race, the Pak, is on their way and will not be pleased when they find us.
Rating:
Summary: An interesting, fast story that will leave you wanting more.
Review: Protector is an interesting, fast story that will leave you wanting more. Our protector, a Belter (lives in the asteroid belt) named Brennan is transformed by an alien virus into a protector for us lowly breeders. Taking the threory of the stingy genes one step further, a protector is a super being whose only purpose is to protect his progeny. Without decendents a protector simply stops eating and dies. Lucky for us Brennan is infected with this virus and made a protector, because our parent race, the Pak, is on their way and will not be pleased when they find us.
Rating:
Summary: An entertaining, if short, book
Review: Protector is fairly entertaining. If you're looking for a quick, fun read, or if you want to pursue other Known Space books (especially the Ringworld series), go ahead and pick up Protector. If you're looking for high drama and/or deep characters that you can care for, Protector probably isn't for you. One of the things I like about this book, and other Niven books, for that matter, is that *most* of the science is solid. The descriptions of certain technologies are detailed enough to be intriguing and enjoyable for anyone.
Rating: 
Summary: The last Known Space work before it all went downhill
Review: PROTECTOR was Larry Niven's fourth full-length novel in the Known Space universe, and the last Known Space work written before the series' decline in the mid-1970's. PROTECTOR is a tale of how human beings came about, a story made apparent by the arrival of an outsider in human space.Phssthpok, a member of the Pak species, has travelled for thirty-thousand years to investigate what happened to colonists that set out from his world three million years before. The Pak have two stages of life, a "breeder" stage of limited intelligence, and a "Protector" stage which comes about once they have eaten the root "tree-of-life." Protectors are nearly-immortal, extremely strong individuals who are driven to protect their bloodline at all costs. If a protector has no progeny to protect, he either loses his appetite and dies or manages to feel that the entire Pak species is his family. Jack Brennan, a miner of the asteroid belt, is the first to meet Phssthpok when he reaches the solar system in the 2130's. Brennan eats the tree-of-life root and becomes a protector, revealing that human beings are the remnant of the Pak colony of three-million years ago, but that colony couldn't produce tree-of-life because of a lack of thallium oxide in the soil. Phssthpok dies and Brennan, having become a monster, disappears. Thus ends the first half of the novel, which originally appeared in 1967 as the novella "The Adults." The second half of the novel occurs two hundred years later. Roy Truesdale, an inhabitant of Earth, wakes up to find a cassette explaining in his own voice that the last four months of his life have been wiped from his memory. Truesdale sets out with a policewoman from the Belt to explain the mystery of those four months. He meets the man no calling himself the Brennan-monster and agrees to help him destroy the wave of Pak ships which left to follow Phssthpok. The ending is surprising and well-written. PROTECTOR is not the best of the Known Space novels, that honor certainly belongs to Niven's award-winning RINGWORLD. However, PROTECTOR is an entertaining novel and at a mere 200 pages can be swiftly read. It also fills in a gap in the Known Space timeline (the 2300s), which fell between the era of Lucas Garner (PROTECTOR, WORLD OF PTAAVS, FLATLANDER, etc) and the arrival of alloplasty on Plateau (A GIFT FROM EARTH). Finaly, reading PROTECTOR is necessary to understanding the sequels to RINGWORLD. If you enjoy the Known Space universe, PROTECTOR is a worthy purchase.
Rating:
Summary: Best Known Space Book
Review: Reading this book is like eating peanuts. Once you start you can't stop. This is about the best of Niven's know space books. Known space of our solar system is settled and quite productive. The PAC is an interesting and very alien creature. Indeed, of most aliens, this is one of the most dangerous to normal humans. Larry did an outstanding job making one of the best novels I've ever read. True Niven fans will not be let down. Note, this book is a must read for Ringworld, Ringworld Engineers, and Ringworld's Children coming in Summer of 2004. Enjoy!!!
Rating:
Summary: Best Known Space Book
Review: Reading this book is like eating peanuts. Once you start you can't stop. This is about the best of Niven's know space books. Known space of our solar system is settled and quite productive. The PAC is an interesting and very alien creature. Indeed, of most aliens, this is one of the most dangerous to normal humans. Larry did an outstanding job making one of the best novels I've ever read. True Niven fans will not be let down. Note, this book is a must read for Ringworld, Ringworld Engineers, and Ringworld's Children coming in Summer of 2004. Enjoy!!!
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