Rating: 
Summary: Gut wrenching truth is hard to take.
Review: Thought provoking and insightful, a look into what is still the american society. At times I was given over to deep sadness and meloncoly, other moments were like the sun shining through the clouds. A wel written emotional rollercoaster to pick and choose your moral from. I am happy to say that though it is not the reality we live in there is an ideal we could work with. In creativity and knowledge base Ayn Rand led me on a journey through the unthoughtof field of architecture into human greed, shame, and ultimit joy. Written in multifaceted and ever changing/growing perspectives, I dub this a look into the human spirit.
Rating: 
Summary: There's a word for books like this...
Review: Bombastic. Another good one is narcissistic. And, of course, boring. Wretchedly, perversely boring.If you need a plot summary, oh well. Howard Roark is an ubermensch, I mean architect, and the "ideal man" of Ayn Rand's philosophy. Roark "rebels against convention" and builds ugly buildings, whereas others design aesthetically pleasing buildings, incorporating elements from earlier works, and therefore are evil second-handers who have no integrity. Howard Roark is an unpleasant human being, one who a sane person cannot relate to. He is obstinate, excessively so, and mostly seems like a projection of a stoic god onto a plane of "mere mortals." He is a hero by definition--he commits rape (in the name of love, if that's to be believed), blows up buildings, and generally acts like an ***hole and yet Rand expects us to believe his ideal-ness. Don't worry, though, this book's not just a shallow plot, with bad architectural ideas and characters who wish they were 2-dimensional. It's a "philosophical novel." Well, actually, no. Dune, by Frank Herbert, is a philosophical novel--a study of a messianical figure, and his triumphs and ultimate failings. A novel with a heavy philosophical theme. Fountainhead is a monumental tribute to pseudo-intellectualism. You see, Ayn Rand's "philosophy" is called Objectivism. It's a fairly simple, if not valid, viewpoint: good actions are intended to benefit the individual, and all that stuff that appeals to people looking for justification for who they are. It's proven by the tried and true method of "You must interpret reality, but since reality's objective, people who disagree with me are wrong." And Fountainhead hits you with this philosophy about as subtly as a brick. It's amazing how easily people swallow this crap. Unfortunately, Rand's followers subscribe to her ideas in their totality (imagine a crowd chanting, in unison, "we are individuals," and you'll get an idea of the attitude), and preach them. If you want to read a novel with lots of philosophical ideas, read something interesting like Stranger in a Strange Land or Dune. If you want to read great philosophy, you have centuries to choose from. Read Plato or Descartes, read Sartre or Machiavelli. Read the Bible. Or the Tao Te Ching. Or the works of Marx and Engels. Take a serious philosophy course. Just stay away from the stylings of Ayn Rand. Once you've gotten through some decent philosophy, Rand will just seem puerile.
Rating:
Summary: The Fountainhead
Review: This book is the absolute worst piece of rubbish I have read. Obviously written by a deranged, hateful, evil person about deranged, hateful, evil people attempting to convert innocent youth into deranged, hateful, evil people. If you simply "have" to read her work, then I strongly suggest that you first read Jeff Walker's fabulous book entitled, "The Ayn Rand Cult" which will bring some hope and perspective for you when you are caught up in the psychotic world of her aweful bizarre drivel.
Rating:
Summary: Overly simplistic pseudo-thought
Review: Like the rest of Rand's work, this is an occasionally entertaining but sloppily reasoned diatribe promoting a surprisingly stilted and immature view of economics and society. Hers is a stridently simplistic and sophomoric philosophy, far removed from the kind of carefully reasoned discourse one expects from someone alleged to be a "great philosopher". Rand's plots are unctuously contrived to buttress her obsessively monochromatic portrait of human nature, one oblivious to life's true subtleties and uninformed by a deeper wisdom. Her characters are cardboard cutouts designed for little more than advancing her childish laissez-faire rhetoric, and seem utterly incapable of even thinking of the kind of insightful questions that could mar the author's heavy handed operatic themes. Perhaps most troubling for me personally are her paeans to reason, something I consider to be the foremost of human accomplishments, but which in Rand's clumsy hands devolves disgracefully into blind, uncritical adherence to her churlish libertarian dogma of unrestrained greed and reckless individualism. With such "friends", reason needs no enemies! There are those that actually argue that the fact that Rand is so vilified by thoughtful reviewers means that she must be "on to something". This is a remarkably vapid observation, for one still routinely hears and reads much justifiable criticism of numerous historical figures who have helped to reverse human progress. Perhaps you can think of a few... To conclude, fans of Rand's books, in my experience, seem to have been all-too-easily bamboozled by one-dimensional characters with no trace of nuance, profound-sounding but empty-headed sophistry, and all-out rhetorical sledgehammer blows wielded in the service of avarice. My advice to readers is to pick up some real philosophy or science or carefully reasoned economic work -- or even the latest thriller -- and to leave Ayn Rand's deluded, crackpot vision to the dustbin of history.
Rating:
Summary: interesting
Review: Beautifully written, an interesting view of a often dark side of humanity. kind of left me questioning everything.
Rating: 
Summary: grey is the color of death
Review: Firstly, it is not weakness to feel emotion; Roark is a passionate person. His perfection, as the ideal man, comes not from his suppression of emotion (he never suppresses an emotion), but from his lack of negative emotion. He feels no jealousy when Keating brags to him of his success. He feels no disappointment when the architecture community mocks his efforts. It's best summed up as Roark stated to Toohey, when Toohey asks what Roark thinks of him: "I don't think of you". Roark doesn't need any outside confimation of his success, because he has not let anyone else define his terms. The point of the whole book is that it is glorious to be a passionate person, to live up to your potential. This is possible. But don't create your success on other's terms. Don't define yourself by other's standards. Don't lift yourself up through other's failures. Be who you are, not what everyone expects you to be, and you have nothing to fear. I especially enjoyed the number of people who wrote how this book inspired them in their youth, but as they grew older, they realized its shortcomings. I agree, it is much easier to realize the book's shortcomings as opposed to your own.
Rating:
Summary: W. W. H. D.?
Review: This book is overlong, filled with ponderous prose, and many banal trivialities. It could have benefitted from a decent editor. It is nevertheless a greatly inspiring book. While the characters are generally drawn in black and white, at least "white" is well-defined in a creative way, and in many respects gives the readers some true perspective which in fact may be applied to their lives. On my wall at work, I have written: "What would Howard Roarke do?" and while I can't say that this has greatly influenced all of my major (or even minor) life decisions, I value the availability of this benchmark personality, no matter how perfect (and hence unrealistic). It is very easy to be cynical about Ayn Rand and I have enjoyed that pastime myself. However, her work survives due to the truly insights it provides. I recommend The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged for both good stories and potentially life-changing ideas.
Rating:
Summary: Simply great
Review: Effective encompassing of a philosophy by literary means, this is an inspiring tale of a man who LIVES life, not subsides in a body dominated by society. The length of the text might deter, but it is worth the later. Flowing verse that keeps the reader flipping. Highly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: intense novel from a powerful voice
Review: As a junior in high school, a decade and a half ago, I read The Fountainhead nearly seven times. And although I wouldn't say that I was an Ayn Rand fanatic, I did read quite a bit of her work. At this point in my life The Fountainhead wouldn't have quite the same meaning that it did to me at age seventeen. However, I think that I still could appreciate aspects of the novel, which is certainly a modern classic, though some might say (and some might be really offended by this term), a cult classic. What comes to mind for me looking back is the strength of the protagonists and the really powerful way in which the author portrayed each character. For me as I read the book, the characters really came to life. Although I may not have understood it completely or caught nuances that might be apparent to me now, the characters were very well developed. Thinking back on the novel, what must have resonated strongly for me was the bravery, the belligerence, and the independent spirit embodied by Howard Roark and Dominique Francon. To my adolescent thinking these were really admirable and essential qualities, and even now I appreciate aspects of the integrity of their characters. Also I think that there is something in the novel that hooks into an environmental ethic. Though certainly the rape scene embodies an opposite spirit. If I were to recommend any of her work, it might be The Early Ayn Rand, because the stories seem to come from a less extreme and polar place than the later works that I have read, and they reveal an intelligent, articulate, tenacious, and developing author and artist.
Rating:
Summary: The best novel ever written
Review: OK, well it's at least the best I've ever read. Lots of people tend to judge this book based on their opinions of Objectivism. Don't. Whether you agree or not with Rand's political views, this is a great story and an extraordinarily well-written novel.
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