Rating: 
Summary: Stupid premise but some good ideas
Review: I thought for a while I was in the middle of a sexual fantasy - a horny stream of consciousness that slipped from one scene to another. The authors continually fell into this mode as if that would make it somehow "literary". The premise is my biggest problem. To sum - it's the future and earth has 40 gazillion people who have squandered all the resources so mankind must find a new home. How fortuitous that one awaits (or so we hope) at our nearest star neighbor. First, population growth has been revised downward by the UN two times in the last ten years due to decreasing birth rates around the world. Secondly, why would a society that creates starships not use artificial products instead of "using the Earth's resouces". If all the Earth's resources are used are people living on the magma core? And the idea that salvation comes by traveling to another star (at a cost so great one could literally rebuild Earth) is a solution? It is if the Earth is going to be destroyed but the task of starting over on a new world is so mind-boggling that it makes the Earth's problems seem petty. Good parts: The VR machines (neat!), the discoveries, the resident evil and the ending.
Rating: 
Summary: Appalling Book
Review: I was expecting a sci-fi book. I was not expecting the graphic sexual nature of the book. I was so appalled by chapter two that I returned the book to the store. This book should have a warning on the label about the graphic sexual content. I also consider it to have depictions of child pornography. Very disapointing.
Rating: 
Summary: sex, death, sex, nothing, death and sex
Review: If you are looking for a challenge, try reading "Alpha Centauri". This is a book that is undeniably difficult to read. It is slow moving, full of (sometimes maybe unneccassary) graphic and odd sexual acts, and just not very likeable. BUT.... maybe it is difficult convey the type of darkly complex concepts that are expressed in this book without the type of framework it puts them in. Barton and Capobiance explore issues such as "what is the point of it all?" and "should we go on?" and provides starkly contrasting examples of some of the opinions that different people (and races) have on them. Such things are best examined in all their bleak detail under the mood created by the characters and circumstances of the book. There are simularities between this book and Barton's "Acts of Concience" both in mood, and in content. They both involve a lot of sex, although "Alpha Centauri"'s is more frequent and arguably stranger(?) and the aliens (when we eventually do learn of them) display a similar master/slave relationship to the wolfen/dollies from "Acts of Conscience". This book took me a long time to read, but towards the end became intensly interesting. Definately a book I will remember.
Rating:
Summary: sex, death, sex, nothing, death and sex
Review: If you are looking for a challenge, try reading "Alpha Centauri". This is a book that is undeniably difficult to read. It is slow moving, full of (sometimes maybe unneccassary) graphic and odd sexual acts, and just not very likeable. BUT.... maybe it is difficult convey the type of darkly complex concepts that are expressed in this book without the type of framework it puts them in. Barton and Capobiance explore issues such as "what is the point of it all?" and "should we go on?" and provides starkly contrasting examples of some of the opinions that different people (and races) have on them. Such things are best examined in all their bleak detail under the mood created by the characters and circumstances of the book. There are simularities between this book and Barton's "Acts of Concience" both in mood, and in content. They both involve a lot of sex, although "Alpha Centauri"'s is more frequent and arguably stranger(?) and the aliens (when we eventually do learn of them) display a similar master/slave relationship to the wolfen/dollies from "Acts of Conscience". This book took me a long time to read, but towards the end became intensly interesting. Definately a book I will remember.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing
Review: Intruiging premise but the end was a letdown (yes, I did finish it, in spite of the fact that I got fed up with the gratuitious sex... found it mostly unnecessary to the story). I felt it usually interrupted and intruded on the story, probably a way for the authors to pad it out. I'm not a prude, but I found most of their behaviours completely unrealistic in keeping with basic human nature. If you like weird sex, you'll love this book. Otherwise, don't bother.
Rating:
Summary: Intruiging, profound hard-sf...but not without flaws
Review: Nearly everything about "Alpha Centauri" was powerful and dramatic, with the characters, the science, the politics, the aliens, the technology, etc. But I do agree that the sex tended to take over the plot. I'm not a prude, and I will say that the sex scenes were well-written, but they took away from the credibility of an otherwise excellent story and confused the story's focus--which is a big shame.
Rating: 
Summary: Fabulous.
Review: Simply excellent. Barton ranks as my favorite all time sci-fi (and sci-fantasy) author.
Rating:
Summary: Interminable...
Review: There is some interesting sci-fi in this novel, but not enough to push the (rather gratuitous) sexual themes into the background. When I read a book about the moon landings I don't expect an extended treatise on the astronauts' sex lives. Ditto for a trip to Alpha Centauri. Unfortunately, that is about all this novel boils down to. Also, it is so cynical and depressing in its view of human nature that the reader just may be tempted to join another species, perhaps even another phylum (I'm not sure the authors' haven't done so already, to judge from their obvious unhappiness with life in general). While I didn't get much sci-fi pleasure out of this reading experience, I did get a practical demonstration of Zeno's paradox: the more I read this thing, the farther I seemed to be from the end (and what blessed relief when it did arrive!).
Rating:
Summary: Interminable...
Review: There is some interesting sci-fi in this novel, but not enough to push the (rather gratuitous) sexual themes into the background. When I read a book about the moon landings I don't expect an extended treatise on the astronauts' sex lives. Ditto for a trip to Alpha Centauri. Unfortunately, that is about all this novel boils down to. Also, it is so cynical and depressing in its view of human nature that the reader just may be tempted to join another species, perhaps even another phylum (I'm not sure the authors' haven't done so already, to judge from their obvious unhappiness with life in general). While I didn't get much sci-fi pleasure out of this reading experience, I did get a practical demonstration of Zeno's paradox: the more I read this thing, the farther I seemed to be from the end (and what blessed relief when it did arrive!).
Rating:
Summary: The author succeed in making sex boring
Review: This book is so boring it's virtually unreadable after the first few scores of pages. As other reviewers have noted, it bogs down in sex (and sexuality, and gender roles), and is hopelessly complex. It's trying to deliver at least a half dozen political messages at once, and is so laden with them that it fails on all of them.
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