Rating: 
Summary: Stuck in a rut
Review: A challenging book that raises a lot of serious questions. what if you could go back in time and alter one of the greatest atrocities of our history? It's a unique novel, and certainly a notch above most current sience fiction. But after developing some wonderful concepts and characters, I feel Dunn lets his characters (and readers) down in the last third of the novel. The conclusion is ultimately unsatisfying.
Rating: 
Summary: Good..ultimately unsatisfying
Review: A challenging book that raises a lot of serious questions. what if you could go back in time and alter one of the greatest atrocities of our history? It's a unique novel, and certainly a notch above most current sience fiction. But after developing some wonderful concepts and characters, I feel Dunn lets his characters (and readers) down in the last third of the novel. The conclusion is ultimately unsatisfying.
Rating: 
Summary: A hard-edged time travel novel - it presses lots of buttons
Review: A great read. This book not only makes you think about the interesting topic of time travel, but grapples with the hard issues of the Holocaust.
Rating:
Summary: The Ultimate Dilemma!!!!!!!!
Review: An intriguing premise. Given the chance to alter one of the most horrific events in human history,would you? That is the quandary faced by the characters in this powerful book. Time travelers have a chance to minimize or eliminate the Holocaust? Should they? This book will really get you thinking. The camp scenes are powerful and are the meat of the novel.They are vivid and thought-provoking.The characters are fully fleshed-out. There is even a Nazi with remorse!The time travel scenes are not as good as the war scenes but that does not matter!Read this book for an enjoyable intellectual exercise.
Rating:
Summary: An ethical quandry
Review: Days of Cain by J.R. Dunn: In the future, there is a group that is committed to "preserving the integrity of past events." However, there is one among them who has decided to alter the events at Auschwitz by going there as a prisoner. I won't lie to you, this one is a rough read --- not due to the prose, but due to the subject matter. Usually I avoid horror and sci-fi books about The Holocaust, because I feel that they belittle it by just using it as a convenient setting that is so horrific on its own that the author feels they do not have to expend much effort, and as a Jew it kind of pisses me off that they seem to find The Holocaust as little more than that. This book is an exception, however. The Holocaust is used as a backdrop for a story about ethics, a "what would you do if you had the chance" question.
Rating:
Summary: An ethical quandry
Review: Days of Cain by J.R. Dunn: In the future, there is a group that is committed to "preserving the integrity of past events." However, there is one among them who has decided to alter the events at Auschwitz by going there as a prisoner. I won't lie to you, this one is a rough read --- not due to the prose, but due to the subject matter. Usually I avoid horror and sci-fi books about The Holocaust, because I feel that they belittle it by just using it as a convenient setting that is so horrific on its own that the author feels they do not have to expend much effort, and as a Jew it kind of pisses me off that they seem to find The Holocaust as little more than that. This book is an exception, however. The Holocaust is used as a backdrop for a story about ethics, a "what would you do if you had the chance" question.
Rating:
Summary: A stunning, visionary work.
Review: Deeply moving, highly involving and tense, this book is far more complex than it might appear at first glance. While appearing to be merely a science fiction novel, it deals with the impact of an obscene period of history on the souls of those who participated, as well as those whom time travel has gifted with the ability prevent it from ever happening. Despite the SF trappings, this is a very human novel, illustrating the terrible madness that overcame Germany during the war, as well as its lasting effect on humanity. One reviewer has claimed Dunn "insults" through his use of "Christian trappings", betraying a lack of familiarity with the subject matter. Dunn makes use of Frank Tipler's "Omega Theory" to provide a platform for forgiveness and divinity that fits with the technological aspect of the future in the novel. Dunn displays an astonishing grasp of emotion in "Days of Cain", moving the reader to tears at one moment, then despair, then rage, and finally joy and wonder. I've bought several copies of this book for friends (two of them Jewish), all of whom have later enthused about it. A remarkable work by a truly gifted author.
Rating:
Summary: The action of this book is mental and moral, not physical.
Review: Don't expect a Martian cliffhanger by Edgar Rice Burroughs when you read _Days_ _of_ _Cain_, or, for that matter, any of Jeff Dunn's novels. Not that he can't give us great action when he wishes. The shoot-out finale in _This_ _Side_ _of_ _Judgment_ and the attempted attack on the death camp by heliocopters from the future in _Days_ _of_ _Cain_ are as rivetting as any thriller I've read. But Dunn doesn't operate primarily on that level. He's more cerebral. His angst-ridden heroes and heroines grapple with world-class ethical and philosophical dilemmas, a sign of SF's growing maturity in the last decade or so. _Days_ _of_ _Cain_ is a fine "read," well-paced and gripping.
Rating:
Summary: The action of this book is mental and moral, not physical.
Review: Don't expect a Martian cliffhanger by Edgar Rice Burroughs when you read _Days_ _of_ _Cain_, or, for that matter, any of Jeff Dunn's novels. Not that he can't give us great action when he wishes. The shoot-out finale in _This_ _Side_ _of_ _Judgment_ and the attempted attack on the death camp by heliocopters from the future in _Days_ _of_ _Cain_ are as rivetting as any thriller I've read. But Dunn doesn't operate primarily on that level. He's more cerebral. His angst-ridden heroes and heroines grapple with world-class ethical and philosophical dilemmas, a sign of SF's growing maturity in the last decade or so. _Days_ _of_ _Cain_ is a fine "read," well-paced and gripping.
Rating:
Summary: Dunn offends: abuses the Holocaust with Christian theology
Review: Dunn's audacious 'Days of Cain' attempts to make sense of the Holocaust with a litany of tired science fiction tropes: time travel paradoxes, artifical intelligence, cowboy gunslingers, holy renegades, and metaphysical musing on the nature of evil. This is ground well tread and Dunn plods along it with some skill. His writing, though never excellent, provides sufficent suspense, character development and sense of place to propell the story. However, his choice of the Holocaust, and more specifically Auschwitz, as the focus of the novel's dilemma is vastly offensive in light of story's moral framework. Like so much science fiction concerned with ethics and religion, the novel's theological foundation is lifted whole cloth from Christianity. Dunn frames a harrowing tale of the sufferings of European Jews with explicitly Christian notions of good and evil, of heaven and hell, of God. And by doing so Dunn offends the memory of those who died in the Holocaust. I believe no Jewish reader will find 'Days of Cain' palatable. Dunn co-opts Jewish symbolism, language, and historical experience into a cleverly dressed-up Christian morality play.
|
