REVIEW: The Plains of Passage by Jean M. Auel

This book was a long time in the reading because of my development and special study at Uni, so it ended up being a 15 minutes before bed affair. The last quarter was a hard-to-put-down read and so I read most of it this week.

As predicated, it featured exorbitant amounts of environmental description and sexual encounters which rarely strayed from the same repetitive formula. For the first two thirds of the book I think it's safe to say that NOTHING happens except maybe Ayla fell over once or something ... I really enjoyed the encounter with Attaroa, if only the rest of the book was like that! This was the first ever book that I skimmed (several pages at a time mind you). At least Auel structured it so it was east to skip pasted the 15 paragraphs on the 74 types of grass growing in the area.

In spite of this I am looking forward to the next book, although I worry that it was be very similar to The Mammoth Hunters and the meeting of every other tribe from The Plains of Passage. You could pretty much just change the names and you're reading the same scenario.

I bought the new release The Order of the Scales, the last in the trilogy by Stephen Deas, so I think I will read that before The Shelters of Stone. I also preordered Inheritance (WEEE!!!) and got the coolest hard cover book about the world of Algaesia for free. It has things you can scratch and rub and little things that pop out. Speaking of, I am going to have to reread all of that series (for the third time) before the last book comes out because I don't remember anything. AND IN EVEN MORE IMPORTANT NEWS!!! The last books from the Obernewtyn series are FINALLY being released. It seems there are two which are coming out at the same time which is strange ... The Sending and The Red Queen. It is safe to say that they day these come out I will be holing myself up in seclusion until they are done. Actually, I will have to reread all of those too ...

At the moment, my to read list is ordered as such:

The Order of the Scales - Stephen Deas
The Shelters of Stone - Jean M. Auel
The Name of the Wind - Patrick Rothfuss (possibly followed by Wise Man's Fear)
The Black Prism - Brent Weeks
The Novice and The High Lord - Trudi Canavan

This of course doesn't take into consideration the release of Inheritance and required pre-re-readings or the release of The Gray Wolf Throne and its ambiguous publishing date ... or the release of a paperback of The Land of the Painted Caves.