Rating: 
Summary: Did it ever go downhill
Review: Johann Sebastion Bach Smith is a self-made billionaire tycoon, surrounded by an obscenely huge mansion and a small army of servants. And fancy medical wiring is holding his body together. At 95 years old, Smith schemes to be born again by having his brain placed in a corpse, 20-40 years old with his rare AB blood type and no damage except in the brain, thus beings 145 pages of the most amazing, medical science fiction imaginable. Through Heinlein's excellent story-telling, the reader is brought into Smith's strange state of unconscious between life and death as mad scientist and fugitive, Dr. Boyle successfully completes an operation thought impossible and unethical and then disappears into the shady night. Smith slowly reemerges to be startled at the identity of the body's former possessor and to find that she has not completely left yet. It is spine tingling, stark and terrifying. So why the 2 stars? Because the book is 512 pages and what remains is embarrassingly frivolous. The rest of the novel explores such subjects as kissing, menstruation, shopping and female orgasm. The characters have a lot of sex, spend a lot of money, act nauseatingly rich and call each other stomach-turning nicknames. The last two-thirds of the book is mush at best, smut at worst. A return to its original quality, themes and intensity appears in the last chapter, far too late to save this tedious novel.
Rating: 
Summary: Real Science Fiction from the Master
Review: Mr. Heinlein has written many, many Science Fiction books, Novellas, short stories and the like. One must remember "SCIENCE FICTION" isn't just Starship Troopers and Star Wars, or DORSAI Novels and the like, its also the study of the Human Condition...like Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke and many others. "I WILL FEAR NO EVIL" is humanistic Science Fiction at its best. Its classic Heinlein written in his classic style and prose you will find i his LAZURUS LONG Epics. Basically its the study of a "dying" rich man, wanting to live, and of course, finds out without warning that he receives a WOMANS body. I Will not tell you the plot since that would ruin it, but its safe to say its one of his best. I will not say its his VERY BEST, since I find it hard to compare "Time Enough For Love" with "Starship Troopers" or "J.O.B.", but its definitly one of his best. Its also very unique to him. Yes, this IS Science Fiction. Nope no dragons, no elves, no Hans Solo guys. This is a great read....PERIOD. Its also recommend for older readers who would tend to understand it more.
Rating: 
Summary: Worthwhile, But Not Heinlein's Best Book
Review: This is far, FAR from being Heinlein's best book, but it is interesting and worth reading for several reasons. First off, let me make something clear: this is NOT science fiction. Now, Heinlein was never one to emphasize the hard SF elements over the human aspect, his books ultimately focused on the human condition, or were at any rate, comments on society, sex, or religion. The only part of this book that relates directly to science is a brain transplant! Yes, a brain transplant. This is, of course, aside from the fact that the book is set in the future. This is probably as close to mainstream literature as RAH ever got. Okay, so with that out of the way... why is it worth reading, you ask? For one, it has a very interesting premise: a man has his brain transplanted into the body of a woman. This sounds simple, but think of all the complications that would arise. Here Heinlein has a pulpit for the differences between men and women, and he covers just about every conceivable area. Ask yourself this... if you were and old man who had his brain transplanted into the body of a woman, would it be heterosexual to have sex with a man or with a woman? There are countless other questions like this you could ask yourself for just such a situation, and they are all addressed in this book. Another thing about this book is that it is the most sexually explicit thing Heinlein ever put out. It doesn't have the incest factor that Time Enough For Love does, but it is more generally explicit, and downright preachy in spots. On the surface the book may seem sexist, but if you delve deeper you can see this is not the case. Indeed, this book was, after release, adopted by the Women's Liberation! Though the book is long and winding (and takes even longer to read than even lengthier novels due to the heavy amount of dialogue and witty banter that you will want to re-read), you want to keep reading, not for the suspense factor (which is more or less non-existent, as indeed, are conflicts of any kind) but just to see what shocking thing Heinlein will come up with next. Okay, so with all these neat points in tow, why only four stars? Well, for one thing, the book suffers from a lack of editing. Some speeches go on and on and on (the book consists almost entirely of dialogue-indeed, a good portion of it is the main character talking to theirself) and many catchphrases are repeated several times, thus diminishing their apparent wit. However, the book is still worth reading for the reasons outlined above, also because it is that rare book that will leave you questioning your values and mores, Heinlein treads here places that most authors wouldn't touch with a 10 foot pole. And it's put over in a thoughtful way, without constantly bashing you over the head like later Heinlein efforts. Also, the ending is rather nice and poetic. This is a truly "novel" novel that Heinlein fans will definately want to read, but if you are new to the Dean, I suggest you read some other works of his before tackling this one.
Rating: 
Summary: As long as it isn't our world....
Review: The characters in this book are so two dimensional it's scary. There is no conflict of any kind. Everyone is happy if they're good guys and angry if they're bad guys. The conversations are trite with the same catchphrases appearing over and over again. The "witty" banter between characters is the entire book, all people ever do is talk and none of them seem to be able to do so in an intelligent manner. I have no trouble accepting Heinleins drawing of people since this is a work of FANTASY, but I do find it hard to believe that the world he draws would be in such a sorry state when full of such loving and generally bland people. The sap runs pretty heavy in this work.
Rating:
Summary: Don't you fear any evil either
Review: Heinlein's gift for humorus dialogue was seldom used to better effect, since he delights in characters who play verbal games with each other. Some of the other reviewers have complained about Henlein's assertion that "contraception is the woman's responsibility." A number of these reviewers seem to verge on accusing RAH of sexism. Let's analyze this a bit: isn't taking responsibility for your own body the first step towards taking control of your life? I should think that feminists would view this attitude kindly. All such minor qibbles aside, the novel is a full-blooded read stocked with memorable characters. Granted, Mr./Ms. Smith makes a big deal of deciding who she/he is going to sleep with next, but put yourself in his/her place. If you suddenly found a surgical fountain of youth after enduring decades of senility, what would you do? Again, you might not agree with Heinlein's ideas of how to spend a second youth, but why should you agree with every book you read? Let henlein challenge your values; few writers these days dare to do it. Books should be food for thought as well as enjoyable fluff. Heinlein was able to give us both.
Rating: 
Summary: Unbeleivable Women
Review: Maybe its just my upbringing clouding my mind, but I find it hard to veiw Heinlein's characters as realistic. The men for example; This old guy, 100+ just got his brain transferred into the body of this young lady. It boggles my mind how no one has the slightest inhibition towards sleeping with her. And the women, there's scene where Joan( Yohann's female persona) is talking to her maid, and the maid says something along the lines of 'Concraception is the woman's responsibilty'. Being a man raised by three generations of women I guess I'm just imdued with a femenists minsdset. Barring the unbeleivability of the charcters its a good story though. The dialougue is a little chessy at times and its a bit drawn out, but compared to some of the true drivel thats being plied today its a pretty good.
Rating:
Summary: Simply a good book
Review: By now you must know the basic idea: old rich guy (Johann) tries to commit suicide by attempting a brain transplant. He survives and ends up in the body of his former secretary (Eunice), who's "ghost" is with him. Ok, a good deal of the book is about who to kiss or sleep with next (everyone), and some of the dialogue is predicable (example: Johann/Eunice talk about sex, Johann says Eunice has a dirty mind, then she says that it's his mind). Some themes are a little repetitive (let's get Jake to do what we want but have him think it's his idea). But none the less, I found it a good and thought provoking book. In the words of another reviewer, "Heinlein spins a good yarn." There are plot twists, foreshadowing, symbolism, and the ending should make you think. Were the ghosts (yes, he picks up another) all in Johann head? As well as other unanswered questions. So in short: It does have lots of talk of sex (not much actual sex though, the chapter ends or there's a break in the text), but if you can deal with that (I didn't find it hard) it's a great book. -Leon Maurer
Rating:
Summary: A 500 Page Cerebral Exercise!
Review: A Mr. Smith is very old and not far from death, however, this Mr. Smith is extremely rich, so he pays to have his brain transferred to a young body whose previous owner died of massive brain damage. So starts this novel, with several surprises in store for the reader, which I will not mention here so as not to spoil them. There is much banter back and forth between a couple of the main characters which I found enjoyable and well done. A lot of this book, in fact most of it, explores man/women relationships, some may not like this and want a shoot-em up space opera, which this is not. This book is the near equivalent of a university course, say, Human Relations 101, expertly written. Heinlein was always great at looking at the human nature side of things. Another of my favorite authors, William Barton, also writes in a similar style and if you like these types of science fiction novels I do recommend him.
Rating:
Summary: To an earlier reviewer . . .
Review: . . . who wanted to know where the title comes from: yes, it's a Biblical reference, like several of Heinlein's titles (_Stranger In A Strange Land_, _Job_, etc.) This one's from the twenty-third Psalm: "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me." If you know the plot, you should understand the reference now.
Rating:
Summary: Dull...dull....dull
Review: OK, so what am I missing about Heinlein's writing that everybody likes so much? This book was awful! In typical Heinlein style he fills the book with endless inane bantering between characters (in this case the main character keeps talking to himself) and then key points and plot twists get the better half of a paragraph and then its on to more endless rambling. About ¾ of the way through the book I kept thinking of potentially good plot twists or events that could spice up the story, but nothing happened, it just went on and on up until the last sentence which concluded the story without any fanfare. It literally was a chore to read this book.
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