Oberheim (Voices)

Total waste of time. I ended up skipping about half of the wording because it was redundant and boring. Characters are made up, thrown in, then either killed or disappear at random. There is no coherent stream of thought--no real character or story to follow.

The "book" is written almost as if it is a compilation of completely unrelated short stories by different authors thrown together for mere convenience. The initial chapter never relates to the rest of the story. The whole segment about the intelligent insects is completely unrelated to the plot.

In other words, this is a complete mess. The only redeeming characteristic is that the spelling and grammer are not nearly as bad as many self-published works.

I cannot imagine why the other reviewers felt there was anything intense anywhere in the story. This is as mild as they come.

I agree with reviewers. At the end, the rough edges give a whole picture. The language, containing a few typos, reflects that. Do not expect an easy story. The chess comparison with space battle is probably too simple, he forgot about hiding in orbit and all that (read Weber or Drake). Worth reading but not excellent.

I liked it. I can see how the other reviewer might think it was too intense, but I didn't. It's just a hard look at war, which is never pretty, told in a compelling way.

The multiple viewpoints take a while to get used to, as the scene switches from one battleground to another. But I liked it. It's like "The Illustrated Man" by Ray Bradbury in this way, and you do get to know the characters well enough without getting tired of them.

My only objection was the epilogue, which (I think) is some kind of symbolic life of Hemingway. I couldn't really understand it, though it too was very visual and intense.

This one (I've read the other two) may be a little too intense. Depends on what you like. The premise is interesting, and suprising unique considering its simplicity: a war in space between existing and evolving world powers.

But it's definitely not Star Trek. The prejudices that lead to war, the horrors of war, no punches are pulled.

It's also told from multiple viewpoints which, while adding perspective, may not be what people are used to. There are characters who come and go, reappear briefly (which is nice, finding out what happened to them), but in the end there is really only one: Olaf Brunner, an East German officer trying to hold off the right wing American aggressive (talk about pulling no punches!). Without ruining the ending, he feels himself no hero, while the author focuses again on the horrors of war.

Good, but very intenes.