This story is about a pathetic character, and unlike in most books, she never really improves. She just finally finds a couple people who won’t take advantage of her and treat her poorly, but she never learns anything, never really succeeds.

Just very depressing with no real payoff. I read it through, thinking it must redeem itself in the end, but no. I wounld not spend my time on this book.

Because there are 13 books, and I’m just not as motivated to read them as I was to start. I have just recently finished book 8, and the library has multiple copies of all the rest I need, so there is an end in sight

probably not the best book to introduce me to Rice’s writing, but this 1,000 + page book has an ending that is just a lead in to another book. The story, while interesting, is left meaningless without its conclusion, and I consider it somewhat bad form to end the first book in a series so that it could not stand alone (keep in mind that LOTR was intended to be a single book) and to not be able to come to a better conclusion of 1000 pages is just offensive to me since some really fantastic books tell some really fantastic and comlete stories in that breadth.

I don’t intend to read the sequels. The writing style is snobbish, and often lacks direction, foreshadowing is poorly done. The quality of the story itself doesn’t make up for these flaws in my mind. Rice will get another chance, but not with this series.

A simple story about religious soul searching, and finding of self, this book very much deserves its classic status, but more than that, its meaning and purpose remain important in todays society.

I have been listening to this on CD over the past month. While checking some of the other reviews, I realize parts of it may indeed have been tedious to read, but merely having to listen, I found the book entertaining, and quite satirical. In many ways it reminded my of vanitys fair, all but the end that is, which is a bit different from other books I’ve read from that era.

I read this book for school when I was young. This and where the red fern grows taught me a lot about death and love.

A somewhat difficult book to read, as Poe stuggles with the long format, but the story is quite interesting. I would only recomend it for serious fans of Poe.

What, for most of the book, seems to be a simple story of fantasy turns suddenly into a profound story that will leave you wondering.

Jean Auel spens a lot of time researching books for here earth children series, and it shows. The books are detailed (sometimes to the extreme) with information on primitive life, the world in which Ayla, the main character lives.

This book, the first in a wonderful series, truly brings to life a time before history. A time when inventiveness would mean the difference between survival and death, a time when there was more than 1 intelligent species on the earth.

A twisted and disturbing tale, which reveals human nature, the deep seated evils that lie even within children.

A band of children shipwreck on an island, with no adults to govern them, the children revert to primitive, wild behavior.

The children have not yet been sufficiently taught to supress their nature.