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Summary: Good thing it wasn't his first book !
Review: Had this been his first book it would never have been published and we'd all be saying "Tom who?". Instead I'm saying "Tom, what happened to you?". Though slightly better than Rainbow Six, the story is far too linear, repetitive (The word "Klingon" appears over a dozen times - spread through the book!) and ordinary. The final chapter must have been phoned in by those same Klingons. (Among other things Ryan invites the entire crew of a destroyer over to the White House to get drunk with him.) The last line is simply revolting and unworthy. I suspect Tom is using some kind of high end computer program, plus assistant writers, to generate is latest "material". If so he should either get back to basics or give it up entirely. Thanks for a fantastic run Mr. Clancy. Please don't ruin your legacy with this kind of work.
Rating: 
Summary: Worth the read
Review: A very good book. The scene in the hospital, with the cardinal and the minister fighting to help a father and mother save their child in the process of being born from a forced abortion, with CNN filming the event, is riveting. The technologies for spying and conducting war are fascinating. Its interesting that you can sometimes learn more by reading a novel than you can from traditional sources....
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Summary: Not Up to Mr. Clancy's Previous Standards
Review: This book is in desperate need of an editor. There are characters introduced then forgotten, misspellings and redundant statements, cultural anachronisms (sorry, I have spent a lot of time in Russia and no one calls anyone 'Comrade' anymore). The whole thing feels like a second draft that could have been tightened quite a bit. Sorry, I think Mr. Clancy has stretched himself too thin.
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Summary: Clancy gave up too soon!
Review: The first Clancy novel that I read was "Red Storm Rising". I became hooked and read everything that he put out after. This book started out ok, but it seemed as if he just ran out of ideas and then ended the book. I love America winning as much as the next person, but this easily? Come on, now! Book could have been shorter and a little bit more realistic. Everything seemed to fall right into place, instead of wicked plot turns like the ending of "Without Remorse" (his finest novel in my opinion). I agree with the person that said that he needs to end the Jack Ryan series. Jack is old and boring. If he wants to keep with some of the old characters, maybe he could write a book about Clark's exploits in Vietnam. Now that would be interesting.
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Summary: Best Book I've ever read
Review: The Bear and the Dragon is by far the best of all books, especially Tom Clancy, that I've ever read. The detail Clancy uses in the book is superb and I couldn't put it down. I can't even describe it.Kudos to Clancy
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Summary: Hang in there and you won't be able to put it down
Review: Yes, as with all Clancy novels, you must endure the set-up. A good 300 pages worth of setting up the characters and plot of the book before the action explodes. It was well-worth it to keep reading. A truly incredible book - it stands out among his novels as one of the great ones, and I've read them all. Clancy's President Jack Ryan makes you long for such a President in real life. Again, if you just make it through the first 300 pages, you will be richly rewarded with a fantastic story that makes the rest of the book seem to end too soon. I'm looking forward to the next one, Mr. Clancy.
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Summary: Not Clancy's best, by far
Review: As an avid Clancy fan, who's read all of his books and owns most of them in hard cover, I found this book to be a bit of a dissapointment that doesn't even approach Clancy's normal high standards. Its a definite "must read" for Clancy fans, but for everyone else I'd highly recommend skipping this one at least until reading most of Clancy's other books. The plot of the book, as the title implies, focuses on Russia and China, but mostly the latter. In a nutshell, a diplomatic incident plus some trade negotiations with the U.S. gone badly awry lead China to seek to take advantage of some new found economic luck by their neighbors to the north. There are a lot of parallels between US / Japanese relations leading up to WW2. along the way, there are assasination attempts and spycraft, but at a high level that sums up Clancy's latest effort. First, the book's bad points: 1. Obviously Clancy now considers himself above editors - cause its obvious this book was not edited at all. There are at least 7 or 8 occasions where characters thoughts are repeated, verbatim, 2 or 3 times over the course of the book (for example, Ryan's belief that 'Daughters are god's punishment to fathers for being men' ... Ryan 'thinks' this about 4 different times during the book) and there are a fair amount of spelling/typo type errors that detract from the enjoyment of the book. 2. The structure of this novel simply isn't as good as Clancy's best efforts - the plot is very straightforward and not at all unpredictable - but more importantly it really is not very intricate - One of Clancy's fortes is to start with seemingly disparate story lines and seemlessly relate them together in the scope of the larger story (the Sum of All Fears is an excellent example of this)- in this novel, however, none of that occurs - the reader can pretty much see, immediately, the signifigance of just about everything that occurs. In the end, Clancy spends (depending on your point of view) 600 to 800 pages of this 1000 page book building toward the climax - which leaves the climax too short and the buildup is just not executed in Clancy's usually superb fashion. 3. The book almost seems unfinished - there are a lot of plot points that are left dangling when it really seemed like Clancy had intended to finish them. 4. Clancy has been developing a penchant recently for repeating the same ideas conveyed in his previous novels. In Rainbow Six, he basically repeated the whole bio-warfare aspect of Executive Orders. In the Bear and the Dragon, at the end of the book he pretty much repeats what was a very large aspect of Debt of Honor. On the plus side, this is Clancy after all, and it is still a good read. The novel's premise is a good one, and in that sense its a good follow on to some of the plot threads Clancy started four books ago in Debt of Honor.
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Summary: Implausible Techno Shoot 'em Up
Review: Get an editor for the 1,000 plus pages of text containing repetitions of entire paragraphs, spelling errors and misuse of words. Get more thorough research on all countries that are central to the action. This book had the opportunity to educate Americans about the people and culture of the PRC, and increase international understanding of our differences and similarities. Instead, Clancy has shown us cliche mainland Chinese - and hasn't even gotten their names right! (Chinese keep the names they are born with all their lives, and they are said "last name" first.) Back to the drafting board, Tom!
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Summary: Damn the facts; full speed ahead!!
Review: One of things I've liked about Tom Clacy's books is their realism: military, political, diplomatic. And I've appreciated how well researched his books usually are. BUT, he's gotten really lazy, in my opinion. While the military scenes are up to his usual standards, his portrayal of diplomats in general and American diplomats in specific is nothing short of insulting. If they were really as inept as Clancy would have us believe, I'd start building a fall-out shelter ASAP. His portrayal of White House crisis decision making is just about as bad: simplistic, adolescent-minded characters who see everyone else as thugs with too much testosterone. But worst of all is Clancy's portrayal of Communist China, which has undergone tremendous changes in the last 20 years (and still has a long ways to go) as if it were frozen in time, circa 1980(and this story is supposed to take place in the near future, not the past). Unfortunately, I'm afraid that too many people will think Clancy's imaginary China is the real one. If so, it will prove to be as irresponsible as it is ill-informed.
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Summary: Tom Clancy and the Abasement of fiction writing
Review: I know that I am just adding to the number of people who are displeased and thorougly discouraged the way Clancy writes; verbosity at its best. I think Clancy needs to read his first novel "The Hunt For Red October," and classic thrillers written by such reputed authors like Fredrick Forsyth to really "re-learn'" the art of writing a thriller. It's all good to strut one's military knowledge, but for god's sake it's useless if you can't hold the attention of the reader. As readers have pointed out, this book barely gets your attention till after 300 pages. Even then, the reader has to cope with voluminous details as if he's due to sit an exam the next day. Clancy should seriously think about his future work and I dare say the publisher must be faulted too for letting this book go on the shelf. It's a total comedown for American fiction writing. Tom Clancy seems to be building a repuitation for abasing himself. Publisher, please spare us this!
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