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A review by phyllocrania_paradoxa
The Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean M. Auel
3.0
An enjoyable (if far too long) novel about what it might have been like for Neanderthals to meet anatomically modern humans.
Things I liked:
-the creative ideas of the Clan using mostly sign language and sharing memories.
-Ayla's relationships with Iza and Kreb, I was less invested in Ubba and Durq.
-Broud being a whiny little bitch the whole time, he was a good villain.
-the differences between Clan and Others, including both positive and negative interactions, and quite realistic (imo) interpretationg of how hybrid offspring may have been viewed.
-Brun's character, the strong and stable government we all long for.
Things I didn't like:
-Just from an evolutionary perspective, men apparently not knowing that sex makes children, or who their own kids are, is stupid. Evolution is pretty solidly geared towards people propagating their line, and that involves people favouring their own children.
-Also, nobody in the Clan ever figured out that kids look like their mums too? And these people who can remember their great x10000 grand-amoebas can't figure out that babies come 9 months after sex?
-Main character is blonde and beautiful (yawn) which fun fact is extremely incorrect for this time period (light skin mutation ~25k years ago, Neanderthals died 40k years ago)
-The rather annoying internal monologues of the characters
-The author repeatedly saying the same thing about 1000x (e.g. Brun values Zaug, Ayla biiig, Ayla bloonde, etc.) both in descriptive passages and then usually in dialogue as well, just repeating again what we already know
-I was warned about the uh...steamy scenes in this series before starting, but happily this book doesn't have any. Just a horrible rape scene, because all novels seem to have one I guess? Anyway it was only one 'throbbing member' so I shall overlook it.
Anyway I wrote out my annoyances here but overall I did quite like it. I am tempted to listen to the next one, but I read the reviews and from what I gather it turns into soft-core porn, so I'll probably skip it.
Things I liked:
-the creative ideas of the Clan using mostly sign language and sharing memories.
-Ayla's relationships with Iza and Kreb, I was less invested in Ubba and Durq.
-Broud being a whiny little bitch the whole time, he was a good villain.
-the differences between Clan and Others, including both positive and negative interactions, and quite realistic (imo) interpretationg of how hybrid offspring may have been viewed.
-Brun's character, the strong and stable government we all long for.
Things I didn't like:
-Just from an evolutionary perspective, men apparently not knowing that sex makes children, or who their own kids are, is stupid. Evolution is pretty solidly geared towards people propagating their line, and that involves people favouring their own children.
-Also, nobody in the Clan ever figured out that kids look like their mums too? And these people who can remember their great x10000 grand-amoebas can't figure out that babies come 9 months after sex?
-Main character is blonde and beautiful (yawn) which fun fact is extremely incorrect for this time period (light skin mutation ~25k years ago, Neanderthals died 40k years ago)
-The rather annoying internal monologues of the characters
-The author repeatedly saying the same thing about 1000x (e.g. Brun values Zaug, Ayla biiig, Ayla bloonde, etc.) both in descriptive passages and then usually in dialogue as well, just repeating again what we already know
-I was warned about the uh...steamy scenes in this series before starting, but happily this book doesn't have any. Just a horrible rape scene, because all novels seem to have one I guess? Anyway it was only one 'throbbing member' so I shall overlook it.
Anyway I wrote out my annoyances here but overall I did quite like it. I am tempted to listen to the next one, but I read the reviews and from what I gather it turns into soft-core porn, so I'll probably skip it.