Rating: 
Summary: Save your time!This novel is a bomb!
Review: I no longer have RED STAR RISING with which to compare this novel, but it is my recollection that this is merely a rewrite of it with only the names of the characters and countries changed and the military equipment brought up to date! I feel cheated! I won't read Clancy ever again!!!!!
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Summary: Offensive language, sexual content, shallow Ryan
Review: I found the book to be full of offensive language and more explicit sexual content than I am willing to endure. I have been a Jack Ryan fan since Hunt for Red October. I put this book down because of the f-word and other swear words occuring many times per most pages and because of the sexual detail. I also find that Jack Ryan has become less interesting and highly shallow as President. Where has the intelligent and courageous hero we all grew to love gone?
Rating: 
Summary: As always, the dialogue is the Achilles' heel...
Review: I know a person shouldn't read Clancy expecting sparkling dialogue but COME ON! Man, there were way too many excruciating scenes where I could barely keep reading the page due to the rolling of the eyes those scenes brought on. Jack Ryan has always been pretty hard to take. (As just one example off the top of my head, does anyone else remember the verbal clangers with the Prince of Wales in 'Patriot Games'? Ewww. It stopped me short in my rereading of that book a couple of years ago.) But as he rose in the government ranks he has had less and less to actually _do_ so we seem to get to hear more and more of his Boy-Scout-with-Tourettes ramblings. Plus we all get subjected to the itchy feeling that Tom Clancy is using his francise to push his own political beliefs (hey, I know its his book to write as he pleases but it still feels kind of cheap). Still the man can draw a plot and that kept me slogging to the (ironically, for a 1026 page tome) too-quick ending. Mr. Clancy, if you know your strength is in techno-plot and you are going to publish a 1000+ page book I wish the pacing would be such that the interesting stuff that shows off your strength occupies more than 10 or 15 percent of the novel! Of course what do I know, I am not a hugely successful novelist. Overall I found the book disappointing but if you are a Clancy fan it still has the elements... but the better elements seem to be waning.
Rating: 
Summary: Has Mr. Clancy turned over a new leaf?
Review: While I am enjoying the book so far, I enjoyed the others more. I am rather disappointed in an author of his stature using the "F" word so frequently. Occasionally maybe but not page after page. I hope that it gets better as I read further into the book.
Rating: 
Summary: reading this book is like homework
Review: This is my 6th Clancy book. I'm now at page 500 or so and just don't think I can finish it. It's like reading all his other books wrapped up into one. Nothing wrong with Clancy's ability to keep putting out quality material, but I think I've simply had enough. His writing style has become too predictable for me, and even though I don't know how the book will end literally, I do figuratively I think and, okay, maybe a bit literally too. After 500 pages I am so sick of the jumping around to different sub-plots. And trying to keep up with all the Russian and Chinese names and who's who, etc. Sheesh. In most of his other books I've read, by around page 300 it would start to really get interesting, but I don't find it here and I'm just past page 500. I think I would rather have teeth pulled than have to read one more paragraph of dialogue between Chavez and Clark. Those two are so feely-good with each other now that they're in-laws. If I read one more sentence where one of the characters in Russia is having yet another drink of Vodka (Clancy reminds you every other page that Russians like their Vodka and so do Americans who live over there) I will leave this planet. Okay, got that off my chest. I paid for the book, can't finish it....will donate to my local library. Just had to vent. But, if you're one that's never read Clancy before, then by all means dig in...I've simply read one too many.
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Summary: Clancy cures insomnia
Review: Clancy again disappoints his readers. Please - where is the editor? Cut out 40 % and the stuff might eventually become readable. The plot is highly predictable and very thin, the characters are at best two dimensional, with some racism added. Due to its length, this book ought to be a good cure against insomnia. There is too little action, the techno stuff is also quite weak. His politcial asides are hard to stomach. TC's views on social security: Who cares? Probably the age of the techno thriller is over. Anyway: If You want to read thrilling stuff, buy McNab, Bravo 2 0 or Immediate Action.
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Summary: Only for undiscriminating Clancy diehards
Review: What I thought I was getting when I picked up a copy of this book was a typical Clancy techno-thriller; tight, suspenseful, and satisfying, with "could-be" world conflict scenarios, high-tech weaponry and spycraft, and maybe a glimpse of Armageddon before a tidy win for the good guys.Instead what I got was bludgeoned over the head with some of the most jarring, heavy-handed conservative diatribe since...well, the last time Pat Buchanan said anything. We all know of the author's political sympathies, and generally, it's not kept me from swooping down on his new material...but in this book, it's glaring, mean-spirited, and smacks of racism and xenophobia. Even if you could care less about politics, it's distracting enough to take away from what would otherwise be a great story. The story deals with events leading to the discovery of oil and gold in a previously unexplored part of Siberia, which promises financial salvation for Russia. Unfortunately, the Red Chinese are having financial problems of their own, and aren't above a little subterfuge to take advantage of a weakened post-Cold War Russia. The United States, under the bold (and increasingly whiney - why did he run for re-election?) leadership of President Jack Ryan, catches wind of the scheme, and before you can say "Yippie-ki-ay", jumps into the fray...after 700 pages or so. The book bogs down halfway through in long, slow tracts of dialogue, and rehashed narrative. Some of the characters seemed almost parodies of themselves, particularly the Chinese ministers that are drawn so outrageously, you expect to read about them stroking their mustaches and cackling evilly. There are a few subplots that eat up too much paper, and I found I was skipping ahead quite a bit to get to some more meaty sections. Overall, the story was good, but the book really suffers from poor (and perhaps nonexistent) copy editing, repetition, and above all, the tiresome right-wing proselytizing. It's about 500 pages too long. If you're a diehard fan, by all means, read this book. If you dabble in Clancy novels, be warned: there are much better ones than this.
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Summary: Rehashing old stuff, no spark
Review: Without spoiling things, I felt that "The Bear and the Dragon" was, at times, a rewrite of "Debt of Honor" and "Red Storm Rising." Like other reviews, I think Mr. Clancy could have trimmed the book by a good 300 pages. I also did not like his extensive use of profanity. I don't recall him using so much foul language in his other books. Clancy is one of my favorite authors, but this book is not his best. It has it's moments, but most of it is quite flat and almost boring (i.e., the first 300 or so pages). I expect better, Mr. Clancy.
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Summary: Sleeping pill
Review: This is a 200-page initial review: "Not (yet) up to par." My reading habit is to go to bed and read for an hour or so. Of late I manage to prop my way through 3 or 4 pages before I drop the book. From reading some of the other customer reviews, it sounds like I have 700+ pages to go before the action picks up to classic Clancy pace --- final rating will be when I finish the book; ETR is 15 Apr 01. . . . :-(
Rating:
Summary: Embarrassing to read
Review: What was embarrassing was that the author reveals so much about his mind in this book--and it isn't pretty. When even a minister is supposed to think gutter-language thoughts at one point, it was clear that no one at the publishing house edited this book. Plus he tells us what seems like 10 times (maybe really only three times, but by then it seems like 10) the same rumors about Mao Tse-Tung's personal life. There is a reasonably interesting plot here. If you could remove every 4-letter word and bedroom scene to get to the heart of the story, the book would shrink by about one-half and might not be so bad. In its current form, anyone who doesn't use 4-letter words in every fourth sentence of every conversation is going to feel overwhelmed after a while. I certainly did, and I found myself just skimming over the dialogue after a while, watching for what might actually be important to the story. Perhaps this is a good argument for electronic books that you could manipulate and read in the form you want. If I could have in advance, I'd have put this in a Word document and done a host of "delete alls" on every 4-letter word I could think of. Then there might have been a mildly decent (albeit mildly racist) book left over. Even then, of course I'd have had to put up with his defense of Jack Ryan's smoking habit and other oddities... So I agree with most of the other reviews. What a big disappointment this book was, even if it had the usual exciting plot elements. I don't plan to buy any more of Mr. Clancy's books.
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