Rating: 
Summary: recommend this to everyone you know who loves sci fi!!
Review: This book was recommended to me, and I have passed along my weary copy to others. A definite step into a different direction for me, I truly enjoyed this series of novels. Although it is a bit creepy at first, the overall story is erotic and loving, sad and full of despair, ending on a bitter sweet note.
Rating: 
Summary: A Great Read!!!
Review: This was a wonderful story. The characters, the plot and the pace are perfect.The first book was the strongest, but comes to a rather sudden halt. The second book was outstanding. The 3rd book is the weakest of the 3, but if you stick it out to the end all of the plot lines and threads left lying about are tied together. I wish for a 4th book, as more could be explored with these characters. The rituals, androgynous characters, and striking writing make this hard to put down. The best fantasy book I have read since "Lord of the Rings".
Rating:
Summary: Bodies change a lot easier than mindsets...
Review: While I won't repeat what others have said more eloquently, as a rabid feminist who adores Wraethru, I wanted to point one thing out . While it's true that in the first book, "they evolve from men and act and think like men," no woman should let that turn her off the books! It's one of the main themes of the trilogy -- that they _do_ begin as human men (or boys at least), and it takes time and pain and growth for the Wraithru, as individuals and as a culture, to adapt to their changed circumstances and develop a new way of being based on their new identities ... their new potentials... and not on the old male/female models that they inherited from human society. Besides, if you give up too early, you'll miss the women's deus-ex-machina at the end. :-)
Rating: 
Summary: The Man Show
Review: I seem to be in the minority here, but I couldn't get beyond page 75 in this story, which struck me as a gay male fantasy of a world where women are no longer necessary. These hermaphroditic Wraeththu are clearly men, they evolve from men and act and think like men, as far as I can see. Once I figured out that much, I just couldn't be bothered to read the remaining hundreds of pages. Give me a good feminist sci-fi gender bender any time.
Rating:
Summary: Exceptional
Review: First of all, Wraeththu is no book common. In no regard. By any measure you put on it, it would still be outstanding. In theme, in language, in story and style. Storm Constantine has a way with words, despite a certain lack of action (although there is that, too) it never gets boring. It also may not be to everybodys taste. Due to its sensual and sexual contents some people may find it hard to read. However, if those things don't bother you, or if you enjoy them, that is your book. I, for one, quite love it. About the story, well, it is science fiction so far that it is set in future earth, however, it remains unknown in what future. It could be a different planet or entirely fantasy for all its references. Fact is, humankind is crumbling rather rapidly, and a mutation, the race of the Wraeththu, is taking its place. Wraeththu are stronger than men, more beautiful and posses a set of mental powers. They also solved the age-old problem of men and women in evolving into one gender, containing both. Storm has done a fine job with that idea. Since young men can be turned into Wraeththu, it seems obvious that they have a little of a identity problem, since bearing a child is not something they are used to! But it is not overdone, not boring. Despite first person, none ever gets whining about. Storms people are very strong, develloped to finest detail in such a way that the reader just can't resist them. Those are three books. In the course of those three books, the rising of Wraeththu and the downfall of humankind, is followed as some kind of backdrop to the story. We see it develop from a small movement of some freaks into something that finally spans the whole of the world, leaving the barbarism of their early days slowly behind. By the end of the second book we kind of figured that the real main character of that whole things is actually not Pellaz (first person in the first book) or Swift (second book), but a Wraeththu named Cal. He drops in and out of the first two books as he pleases and isn't in the front of the story much, but he is there, throwing a longer shadow than the rest. It is hard to know when it happens, but from a certain point, the reader finds himself in love with Cal, where he is in rather good company, everybody loves Cal, despite his lack of loveable attributes. Anyway, thrid book, is first person Cal. It was delightful. Storm has adopted his way of speech for the book and keeps it up throughout most of it. Cal speaks cynical, passing judgement over human and wraeththu (and everybody els for that matter) alike with cool indifference. It should be impossible to write that character in first-person. Luckily, no-one told that to Storm and she just did it. Wonderful! Gods, have I really written all that? Finally, if you want an excepional read, wonderful written and not-so-common. Here is the book for you!
Rating:
Summary: The most amazing book ever written
Review: If you think books like War and Peace, Star Wars, Little Women, etc. are CLASSICS, think again. This has got to be the most amazing of all books I've ever laid my hands on. I would thoroughly enjoy Storm Constantine to write about Zack, Ty, or maybe even Pell/Cal's experiences after book 3. I most identify with Calanthe, and might I recommend a good psychotherapist after finishing this book ;) Really though, it is slightly depressing to finish this, because the only way to keep the story alive is to imagine, but you never know what really happens after the story is over. If there were infinate amounts of Wraeththu books, I'd gladly spend the rest of my life's spare time reading them! This is definately a highly recommended book for all to enjoy. I would really love to see an RPG (on line of course, live-action aruna just wouldn't catch on...) of this story.
Rating:
Summary: My First Storm Work
Review: An absolute masterpiece of fiction. The storyline was anything but anticipated. I loved it and had trouble putting it down. Many sexual issues are covered here, so if you are timid or non-accepting of alternate styles of living you might want to think of not reading it. There is much in the way of occult religions that kept me very interested. Each book takes a first person view point of a different character, you can see how characters view situations differently. I would highly recomend this book to any mature reader. This was my first Storm book and now I am slowly developing a private library.
Rating: 
Summary: Amazing, Stupendous, Incredibly....
Review: mediocre. I bought this tome hoping to read not only a great story but gain a few insights on gender and androgyny. Sadly, the writing is so simplistic, that one never really feels anything for the characters. The amazing transformation that some of them go through is rather two dimensional. The three stories that make up the book are quite simple, and for the most part lack suspense or an intriguing plot. The last story, "The Fulfillments of Fate and Desire" is the best of the lot; but even it suffers from a "tacked on" ending. The subject matter could have made for a fascinating book, but it seems that the author's inspiration ended there.
Rating:
Summary: best read this year
Review: because of subject matter I would not recommend this book to just anyone but few people would really have a problem with it. The text is well written, with a lot of energy. The author has a web site now ck it out. Her other books are same subject, not as well written. Best read this year.
Rating:
Summary: ORANGES + APPLES = ORAPLES!
Review: She said, "Read WRAETHTHU! You'll like it." She was a lesbian and a good fiend, but I'd recently bought into the theory that lesbians are taking over the gay-publication scene; I'd ended my subscription to a once-much-enjoyed gay book review, because I was tired of reading reviews about books by women for women. What really made me even more leery, this go-round, was her follow-up, "If you liked A SLIP TO DIE FOR, you'll be sure to like this book." Sure! A SLIP TO DIE FOR is a large-type short (211-page) mystery novel by William Maltese, WRAETHTHU is a small-type three-book sci-fi trilogy behemoth of 700-odd pages. If ever there was a case of comparing oranges and apples, I figured: "This is it!" Therefore, while I was encouraged by her obvious raves for ASTDF, I couldn't help but suspect she may be out to trick me into committing myself to the obviously lengthy read of yet another "lesbian" novel (or, in this case three-in-one lesbian novels). Thoroughly surprised when, after a week of reading (and 700-odd pages later), I've discovered I did thoroughly enjoy the sci-fi WRAETHTHU which IS comparable, in many ways, to the shorter mystery-genre A SLIP TO DIE FOR. Both books deal with sexual ambiguity. WRAETHTHU's protagonists are mutants who incorporate both the male and female genders. ASTDF's Stud Draqual is a man so femininely attractive he's forever mistaken for homosexual. WRAETHTHU's world is peopled by hermaphrodites, ASTDF's world is populated with he-she transvestites. WRAETHTHU and ASTDF are filled with manipulation and murder. Both books deal with sex as a pleasurable experience and as something decidedly "more" complicated. Both books take you into worlds (one, the present-day; the other, the future), that you're not apt to experience in your own mundane reality. So, for anyone "into" books that test your take on gender-bending, and on other things that may, or may not, be what they first appear, don't miss out on this genuinely exciting and absorbing WRAETHTHU trilogy. And if you end up liking what you read in WRAETHTHU, read ASTDF! In that, you just may find you like it (and see the same "Oraples" similarities seen by me and by my lesbian friend before me).
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