Rating: 
Summary: Get off your ass a buy this book....
Review: A masterpiece of spectacular scope and depth. Definitely one of my ten most favorite SF novels of all time. A must read!!!!!
Rating:
Summary: A Grand Adventure Through Space, Time, and Spirit!
Review: A powerful, sweeping novel which brings humanity and science together in outstanding fashion! Tracing the lives of several evolved immortals, this work not only portrays history, it gives it texture. In transcending the divisions between past, present, and future, Anderson endows the reader with a feel for the continuity and dynamism of humanity. Throughout the book, science is utilized as a means towards an end, not as an all-encompassing belief system, allowing humanity a sense of identity even within the shadow of infinity. Inspiring and intriguing, this is a classic.
Rating: 
Summary: Immortality explained
Review: A very good book about immortality, much in the form you may have seen it in the "Highlander" movies. In this book, though, there is no romance or magic involved, but tales of individuals, their lives and problems. The only thing I miss is a hope of a second book in the series. The ending isn't really an ending... Buy it.
Rating: 
Summary: I'm just not seeing it.
Review: After reading all the great reviews for TBOAMY I just don't see it. I've been reading Sci-Fi for over 25 years and this is one of the most boring, repetitive novels I've ever read. Basically the novel is written in a series of short stories following the lives of a handful of immortals. The problem is that the themes are very limited. You've got your "two immortals meet" theme, your "immortal tells his/her story to a carefully selected non-immortal" theme, and your "immortal escapes from a group trying to kill him/her" theme. These three themes are present in the opening chapters and repeated for over 500 pages. I only finished it because I never leave a book unfinished.
Rating: 
Summary: A freak of genetics
Review: Anderson's book is a tale of otherwise normal random immortals born throughout history and their travails while trying to survive multi-lifetimes of human experience. No magic swinging swords or flexing muscles. Just a poignant look at what it might be like to experience immortality surrounded by personalities flashing on and off like light bulbs around you. In a sense the book is an anachronism. The movie industry has almost made the concept cliché during the years since Boat of a Million Years was writen. Still, it's a lively, imaginative presentation. A good read.
Rating:
Summary: A freak of genetics
Review: Anderson's book is a tale of otherwise normal random immortals born throughout history and their travails while trying to survive multi-lifetimes of human experience. No magic swinging swords or flexing muscles. Just a poignant look at what it might be like to experience immortality surrounded by personalities flashing on and off like light bulbs around you. In a sense the book is an anachronism. The movie industry has almost made the concept cliché during the years since Boat of a Million Years was writen. Still, it's a lively, imaginative presentation. A good read.
Rating:
Summary: Great sci-fi
Review: Examines several intriguing near-immortal characters. Shades of the movie and TV series "Highlander", but Poul Anderson paints fascinating scenes and scenarios. Great writing. Thought-provoking.(Note the cover art and title are deceptive, this is not space-oriented sci-fi.)
Rating:
Summary: Great sci-fi
Review: Examines several intriguing near-immortal characters. Shades of the movie and TV series "Highlander", but Poul Anderson paints fascinating scenes and scenarios. Great writing. Thought-provoking. (Note the cover art and title are deceptive, this is not space-oriented sci-fi.)
Rating:
Summary: boring... bad characterizaion... blech!
Review: Given that this novel is titled "The Boat of a Million Years" and prominently features a space ship on the front cover, I read through 370+ pages asking myself "so where's the space ship?" before one finally manifested itself. Despite the fact that this book was NOT what I expected it to be, I did manage to eek some enjoyment from some of the early tales of the immortals. However, as others have noted, it quickly became formulaic. Around the 20th century, the author seems to have decided to abandon any pretense of character development. The female characters in particular are atrociously thin and two dimensional. I was left wondering how immortals who had lived some thousands of years could behave more immaturely than some 20-somethings I know. The future civilization which is briefly described but quickly dismissed and abandoned as "non-human" was more interesting in the 20 pages of the novel it occupies than any single one of the immortals or all of them taken together. I would urge anyone thinking of purchasing this book to reconsider. Blech.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent both as SF and historical fiction!
Review: Great book, going all the way from 1000 B.C. up to the far future, and never losing the reader's interest. It is somewhat disjointed, but it manages to overcome this since the stories are so closely connected.
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