John Leighton

The way everything came together at the end gave me the same sense of wonder as the ending of A Prayer For Owen Meany did.

If I had read Mother and Child as a standalone, I would have given it 4 stars but as a collective I can only give 3. However, if I had only read Phoenix in the Ashes and Voices From the Dust, they would have been lucky to receive 2, there was no substance or relevance to them whatsoever.

Deciding to catch up on a writers back catalogue can sometimes be a mistake, especially when going back over 30 years. I have enjoyed more modern Masterton but cannot say I enjoyed this. The writing style is so naive & simplistic & the plot is almost comedic. This book is of its' time, as is the protagonist Gene, with his 70's opinion of women, who deserved to be mauld but not in the sexual way he would have liked. I feel that the one star is required for Mastersons well imagined mythology.

I give this book 3 stars, based on the fact it was well written and informative (by a person close to the source).
As for Gandhi, I came away with the feeling that he seemed to live under the dictum, do as I say, live as I say, wear what I say or, I will fast until I die (like a petulant child).

Good to read a proper pulpy “nature attacks” book from the 70s, especially one that is written so well (hard to believe that can be said about this genre but it is). What I especially liked was an American writers nod to James Herbert's The Rats, as if it was part of the same world inhabited by his killer spiders: “Bates paused for a moment, selected a news clipping from the pile in front of him.”Here's an item from a newspaper in England. About two years ago the poorer section of London was horribly infested with rats, definitely a threat to human life on account of spreading infection and rat bites. There was even reports of packs of these rats literally tearing small children to pieces. “
Brilliant.

A good selection of stories from a writer, I am ashamed to say, who's books I have never ventured into. There was not a bad story amongst this collection but I did enjoy The Woman Who Loved Pigs most.

Think this would have been better as a novella rather than a novel. It meandered like the roads the family were stuck on and just seemed to go on and on, to the point where I didn't care about their fates and hoped they would just plummet off one of the freeways they travelled (so many Americanisms in this book, like freeway, asphalt and roadhouse for a book based in Scotland and featuring a British family, annoying). Saying this, I was going to give a 2 star, then about 3/4 of the way through a new character was introduced, a sort of ‘“gunslinger”and the action seemed to build up, hence the 3. I kept thinking, whilst reading this, that Stephen King would have done this material so much justice, the single parent, stuck on a never ending road, trying to protect her family from the dangers all around, right up his street (or down his road).

Big fan of the movie but never read the book, until now. Some give it negative reviews due to the vast differences between the two, the fact that the book concentrates mainly on the troops training and character development, whereas the movie more on the fighting. I liked those differences. In this way, the two complement each other and you can go from one to the other and see a journey.
Others say it is not really science fiction but of course it is, with its battle suits and arachnid beings, just subtly done.
As for Heinlein displaying too much of his political views? Don't a lot of writers? Aren't a writers opinions the basis of many books?

Dragged on far too long. I'd had enough of Jimmy “The Hand” by the end of the second book, enough to have to tolerate with him more. The only thing that kept my interest and gained it a 3 star was the Pug storyline.

Like an action video from the 80's, this book has over the top guns, over the top villains, over the top sex (no pun intended) and is over the top fun.

Three stars for my first ever Hamilton. “Crap on that!” (Read the book and you'll understand).

An interesting & informative read. A little too short though, would have preferred more on the better known inmates, esp. Richard Dadd but as the writer informs us, there are books in exsistance which cover these people specifically. Found the first half more interesting than the second, which just read like a shopping list of escape attempts.

Found this short book rather dull, even at such a short length I found it too long. There may have been one or two funny moments but nothing worth remembering. I even found myself rather infuriated at the authors responses to letters which seemed to be genuinely helpful. Not funny at all.

Have been a fan of Terry Pratchett's books for many years & really enjoyed reading them, there has been the odd one which has dragged somewhat but nothing that was not rectified by some good laugh-out-loud moments. I never thought I would see this day coming when I would be so disappointed in one of his books, so disappointed that I wished I had given up on it several times(only didn't because I no longer give up on novels, no matter how poor, wasting the time put into unfinishing books). Where was the story? where were the laughs? This seemed like a murder mystery but with morals shooting off every other page, written by a writer trying to find his footing, not by someone as established & readably good/funny as Pratchett.