Rating: 
Summary: Predictable and Like Pocahontas
Review: I am a fan of Clancy's Jack Ryan and found this book to be very readable, BUT.... I found this book to be a lot like Disney's movie Pocahontas - colorful and full of interest, but nothing really happens until the end. This book could have easily been about 400 pages shorter, without hurting it. I was forcing myself to read through the long character thoughts/opinions about everything from what the best ammo is for a tank to communism. It almost seemed as though Clancy were trying to show off his extensive knowledge of warcraft, spycraft, politics, etc. I think Clancy hits the mark because he concentrates on the characters and their thoughts and relationships, but for a Clancy novel this one was slow paced and overly pontificating. I enjoyed it and would recommend it to Clancy fans (it is much better than his disappointment of Rainbow Six). My other disappointment about this book is that it is sooooo predictable. There are few red herrings and as characters are introduced, they seem to quickly fall into stereotypes and their function and the eventual outcome of their actions can usually be figured out about 600 pages beforehand. Nonetheless, I would still recommend this book to fans.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointment
Review: This is the last Jack Ryan book I will read. Clancy has dropped below my acceptability threshold. From an interesting premise and apparently reasonable research, The Bear and the Dragon becomes unacceptable by page 50. The most annoying aspect of this book was the quality of writing. The literary quality in Red October was acceptable -- not in John Le Carre's class, but acceptable. Long, torturous sentences, some simple grammatical errors, repeated cliches, and over-elaboration all combine to make a difficult read. I have to wonder if Mr. Clancy's editor has become intimidated by his success and refuses to confront him. And I also have to wonder if his success hasn't left him arrogant. I know that the adjective that first comes to mind when I see the stock picture of him (on the back of the dust jacket) is 'arrogant.' The ending is weak and incomplete. It was a let-down, after the work of getting through a book with an interesting premise, inadequate development of plot, poor and sloppy writing, to be given such an ending.
Rating: 
Summary: Did Tom Clancy really write this?
Review: ... or was it one of the net force writers? I loved the first 7 books in this series, so I tried one of the Net Force stories (Tom Clancy's XYZ, written by John Q Doe). I hated it. The story was ok, but the writing, which distinguishes, or at least used to distinguish, Clancy from other authors in this genre, was mediocre at best. Which made sense - Clancy didn't write it.The Bear and the Dragon leaves me with this same bad taste in my mouth. You'll find an unusual expressions uttered by one character and then repeated by a different character whithin pages of the first utterance, but then never again. Swear-words fly at an ungodly rate and temper tantrums are frequent (in general the characters are represented as too volatile to be believable.) And the really sad thing is, the book is a chore to read. Too much build-up, too little execution. I'm disappointed.
Rating: 
Summary: Note to those who don't like it. . .
Review: First, did you read ALL of the other books? This is an important part of the book.From the Japanese spy from Debt of honor, to the nuclear attack. Remember, Clancy made a parrallel world, not an exact replica of ours. (don't read on if you haven't read any other books yet) Red October was based on a true story, Patriot games and Cardinal of the Kremlin shared more of Ryans personality. Cardinal of the Kremlin is when the true series began, DON'T skip it. Clear and present danger shows Ryans advancement through the agency and introduced John Clark as a main charactar. Sum of all fears, this is an important book right here. This is where he seperates from reality, in an important way. This leads to the end of Russian-American Nuclear warheads in debt of honor, furthering Yamoto's plans, and the chinese's. Sum of all fears began to focus on something other than Russia/Soviet Union for a longer period of time. I know this is a review on The Bear and The Dragon, but these things must be understood. The book itself has a great story, the end is not a happy one, a Clinton-esque leader is put into power(remember Chet Numori?) who is portrayed as a ...leader that the government never condoned of. Since Bill Clinton never existed in the series, it went Regan,Fowler,Durling,Ryan. His fabric is showing weakness, which is why it earns a 4, not a 5. He mentions writing letters to each family that died in war like Bush Sr. did. Overall, this is a great book if you can handle the rhetoric(which i enjoyed, theory is important to his stories) and he isn't rascist, if he was he wouldn't have a black vice president.
Rating:
Summary: Not a bad story.
Review: The Bear and the Dragon was not a bad book. The only problem in my opinion was that it built every thing up and then didn't deliver. I love the way Clancy starts with several subplots that slowly combine and interact with each other resulting in one final confrontation. In this book that didn't really happen. Other reviewers seem to think the book was too long, I personally thought it ended a little too quickly. Maybe Clancy should cut out some of the building up and give us a more satisfying final conflict and resolution. Still, it's a good read.
Rating:
Summary: Time for Jack to retire?
Review: I have been a big fan of Tom Clancy since he first started writing, but I was greatly disappointed with this effort, the eighth installment in the roller coaster life of Clancy's favorite lead character, Jack Ryan. The plot sets ex spook Jack Ryan, now the President after having successfully run for reelection, after a disaster in a previous story left him the senior ranking official in the US Government, embroiled in yet another attempt to save the United States from a diabolical scheme concocted by one of her major enemy nations. To be blunt, I was given the impression that Jack Ryan's current job title, President of the United States, while not having any major adverse effect on Mr. Ryan's ego, has rather gone to the head of the author, and adversely effected the overall quality of the delivery of this story. First, continuing a trend that has to some extent been a hallmark and perhaps a selling point of Clancy's work, the book overall is a platform for Clancy to sell his own personal political views. However, this time around, it seems that this political diatribe has taken front seat to the plot itself, and makes for some very tedious reading for most of the book. Secondly, Mr. Clancy has become sloppy in his research, which is unfortunate, as the quality of his research has been a major selling point of much of his previous work. Particularly, his handling of Asia and Asian characters in the story is almost painful to anyone who has even the slightest second hand knowledge of modern culture and society in China or Japan. He has a habit of making sweeping authoritative statements about these two cultures which are embarrassingly inaccurate or outright wrong. Granted, as a resident of Japan I am biased in this regard, yet I feel any reader who has even been on vacation once in Asia will feel a bit uncomfortable with some of Clancy's blind mistakes. Granted, his previous work about an actual modern shooting war between Japan and the US was a major departure into the realm of fantasy, so perhaps we should not expect too much from Clancy regarding Asia. In closing, I wish to point out that other recent works of Clancy's have not had these problems of accuracy or readability, particularly those works which dealt with characters other than the venerable Mr. Ryan. Perhaps it's time for Mr. Ryan to retire? At least, I really hope he doesn't run for a second term in office......
Rating:
Summary: Too Long
Review: I love Clancy books but this one is 200 pages too long. That translates into severe predictability. There are no suprises anywhere in the book. The technical aspects are lacking also.
Rating:
Summary: Review #737
Review: It is amazing that there's anything left to add after 736 reviews, but here goes... First, I went ahead and read the thing despite all of the trash talk on this page. I took everyone's advice and skimmed the middle part. Having done that, the book wasn't half bad. I think the cries of "racism" are overdone. Certainly there were a few racial slurs tossed around. But that is something present in every one of Clancy's novels--probably for the simple reason that such words ARE used by MANY people, particularly in wartime, when demonizing the enemy is considered natural. (In fact, many of Clancy's protagonists use such slurs to describe themselves....) The battle scenes were well done. I cannot speak for accuracy, given that I am not a soldier, but they were done well enough to hold my interest & credulity. The premise--Chinese attack on Russia--is plausible enough from an historical perspective. And the crusty old Great Patriotic War sniper was an excellent minor character. That being said, I think that the portrayal of Zhang and the rest of the PRC leaders was rather one-dimensional. In his other works, there was more character development--even Sean Miller from Patriot Games got better treatment, and he was just a minor-league thug when it came right down to it! Second, the whole war plot thing, well, Clancy has it down to a formula and it is getting tiresome. Evil Bad Guy Enemy Leader decides to wage war on innocents to take their oil/destroy their alliance/avenge himself. Thanks to the byzantine nature in which politics in the Enemy Country are done, he is able to manipulate the government to get his way. Moderate Enemy Government Official tries to dissuade Enemy Leader, but is pushed aside and reluctantly goes along. EVeryone is scared of him, so his underlings tell him what he wants to hear, rather than the truth. America's plucky intel people twig to the plot too late to stop it from happening but with enough time to sound the alarm. American technology and skill triumph on the battlefield, the bad guys ponder using nukes, but before armageddon can be unleashed, Moderate Enemy Government Official sees his chance, ousts Enemy Leader with the help of (or at least, in the name of), The People and sues for peace. Just seems tiresome. And, may God forgive me, but I was actually rooting for the ICBM to hit the U.S....would present an interesting problem to solve.... Third, the novel was decent at 1100 pages. It would have been good at 800 pages. It could have been GREAT at 500. Fourth, contrary to what Clancy has Zhang opine in this book, Ralph Peter's RED ARMY was a novel about a NATO/Warsaw Pact war in which the Commies won....and after only three days, no less!
Rating:
Summary: This Bear is benign,this dragon drags.
Review: Hi there Clancy! The journey from Red October to this Dragon tale has been a rivetting and rewarding one.Your research for every book is superb.But I think you've reached a plateau now with this genre of books and subjects.And this was obvious in The Bear and the D.....Ryan is a caricature of his early avatars.And you made the Chinese out to be stupid wimps(personally I would like to think they are) but they are not.They are the most inscrutable and dangerous race on earth. You've tried very hard Clancy, but sorry, it is nowhere near Red October, your most breathtaking offering.Why not look at third world nations?.Nithya Ramnath
Rating:
Summary: Repugnant
Review: I found this book to be terrible. I am fan of Tom Clancy ever since reading Red Storm Rising and Hunt for Red October over a decade ago. This book seems to have no basis in reality at well. His description of China and its people are off the wall. It is obvious that Tom Clancy has never been to China or interacted with its people based on this book. I have been to China about 8 times in the last year and visit places as varied as Beijing to Guangdong to Kaifeng to Suzhou to Shaolin. Tom Clancy has this distorted view of China...
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