Rating: Summary: great! Review: I loved this book, as well as the whole series. It's very interesting, and the plot and characters are great.
Rating: Summary: great! Review: I loved this book, as well as the whole series. It's very interesting, and the plot and characters are great.
Rating: Summary: A great Book! Alien contact/love story done well Review: I picked up this book to have something to read on vacation, and couldn't put it down. I read a LOT of scifi, and this story about an alien life form and its social development/ human relationships is outstanding! I can't wait for her next one.
Rating: Summary: Worth Reading Again Review: I read a lot and I read Fantasy & SciFi almost exclusively. This means that once in a while I pick up a book I've read before in a bookstore and start it before I'm sure I've read it already. Sounds silly, I know, but I did that recently with Beholder's Eye and recognized very quickly this was a re-read.Guess what - it didn't matter! Some books depend on a twist ending or have greater impact on the first read - this one is a just a good read all the way through. Good characterization, novel concepts and a universe I like to read about.
Rating: Summary: I thoroughly enjoyed this book Review: I really enjoyed reading this book. The characters were very believable and their emotions fit the scenes perfectly. The monster in the story was stupid yet extremely powerful and this was explained very believably. I have always enjoyed reading about powerful (within reason) characters and the author did a very fine job of making them powerful and yet not omnipotent. We also got to see the main character solve her problems using a strategy and not just having luck save the day. I enjoyed this book so much I looked for the other books this author wrote and am now reading her third book. She is a very good author and her plot driven characters are highly credible.
Rating: Summary: Do eye behold an excellent book here? Review: I really enjoyed this book a lot. We see a lot of different worlds and races in it with a variety of characteristics, and Czerneda does a very good and convincing job of portraying them. She could write many more stories in this universe if she wanted to. Many books are predictable. Sometimes they surprise you. But much of the time, "Beholder's Eye" had so many possibilities that I had no idea what to expect next, and was often pleased with where it took me. Esen, the main character, is a web being, a shape-changer, who takes on at least a dozen different forms over the course of the story, though she uses two of them for most of the story. In each form she takes on the instincts and emotions of whatever form she assumes, with some amusing results. Ragem, the primary human character, is quite intelligent but at a level we can easily relate to. The key characters. both good and bad, are smart enough to make the story all the more interesting. All around, an excellent read.
Rating: Summary: Average Review: I thought this story was average as SF novels go. The characters drives and motives were a bit one dimensional. There were no real surprises in the plot. Just a battle of survival between similar life forms. It would have been interesting to get some kind of motive for the Enemy. The Enemy acted like a unthinking monster for the most part just going around eating people.
Rating: Summary: Superb science fiction from a born storyteller. Review: If you missed Julie Czerneda's debut novel A THOUSAND WORDS FOR STRANGER, you missed a grand tale and should remedy the situation immediately! But don't let it delay you from reading BEHOLDER'S EYE, which offers new perspective and point of view in a universe far in humankind's future. This is a story of first contact, and extended unobserved contact, but told from the "alien's" point of view. It is a grand adventure, in the classic science fiction sense, filled with page turning excitement and written with a thoroughly modern sensibility. From the first few pages, the reader is captured by both the plot and the characters, and the developing friendship between the protagonists is both poignant and fascinating to watch develop. There is obsession and passion here as well. Esen-alit-Quar is not your classical hero, but Captain Kearn is a "Captain Ahab" of classic proportion. And most of all it is a wonderfully told tale that will keep you entertained from beginning to end. Highly Recommended!
Rating: Summary: Something Truly Remarkable Review: In her WebShifter series, Julie manages to do something truly remarkable; she avoids the use of gratuitous sex, violence, language and implied vulgarity that so many contemporary SF novels rely on to drive sales. Rather than try to shock or disgust you, she lets Esen's marvelous "voice" take you through the story and use your imagination to fill in the details. The plot isn't earth shattering, but there are more than enough intriguing races (Panacia, Kraal, Lanivarian, etc., - not to mention Es's own species!), character interactions and imaginative details that you can't help but sit back and enjoy the romp. Esen is incredibly alien, all the while having an emotional element that is so human, it's hard not to like her. This is the first book in a long time I'd happily recommend to teenagers, let alone other adults. Bravo, Julie! Give me more!
Rating: Summary: Never reveal your true nature to another Review: It should have been simple enough to follow that first Rule, the rule intended to keep Esen's kind safe in a universe filled with aliens willing to distrust and fear anything as different as the Web. They were the last survivors of their race, able to live on and communicate through energy, capable of assuming the shape of any other species. But when Esen, youngest and least experienced, is assigned to a world considered safe to explore, nothing is simple any more. She stumbles into a trap no one could have anticipated. To escape, she must violate the most important rule of her kind, and reveal the existence of her species to a fellow prisoner - a human being. Now the Web is in danger of extinction, for even if the human does not betray her, the Enemy who has long searched for her kind may finally discover their location.
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