Take a photo of a barcode or cover
lauraslibrarycard 's review for:
The Valley of Horses
by Jean M. Auel
I liked this book overall, and understood why Auel wanted to really flush out the character Jondalar: so that he would be liked and considered the perfect match for Ayla. HowEVER, I had a few problems with this story, some of which are just mine and probably wouldn't have made the story any better:
1) Jondalar was sometimes came off as an arrogant prick, especially when he was all like 'every woman wants me and I've never been turned down and I'm good at everything.' (And what was the point of mating with many random women along the way, other than to emphasize his man-lyness?)
2) Thonolan sounded cool and I liked his character and was pissed that Auel just killed his mate and child off BOOM and not 20 minutes later he was dead too.
3) IT TOOK 13.5 DISCS TO GET TO THE POINT WHERE THE STORIES FINALLY CONVERGED!!!
4) I know Ayla is a great character, but she was perhaps overly great: she constantly has fabulous luck with discoveries/inventions/tames wild creatures and seems to never run into serious problems, she is ridiculously beautiful and perfect to Jondalar, and she picks up 3(?) languages in the space of a summer, magically speaking Jondalar's language after having a DREAM.
(To me, it would have been really cool to have the teaching of Zelandonii last a lot longer and it would have been nice to see how some of the abstract concepts/words were explained, but Ayla's brain is sooo freaking honed that she just picks up the language(s) in no time at all!)
Though this sounds negative, I liked the book and plan on continuing the series~ I just wanted to put down the few things I was frustrated about!
1) Jondalar was sometimes came off as an arrogant prick, especially when he was all like 'every woman wants me and I've never been turned down and I'm good at everything.' (And what was the point of mating with many random women along the way, other than to emphasize his man-lyness?)
2) Thonolan sounded cool and I liked his character and was pissed that Auel just killed his mate and child off BOOM and not 20 minutes later he was dead too.
3) IT TOOK 13.5 DISCS TO GET TO THE POINT WHERE THE STORIES FINALLY CONVERGED!!!
4) I know Ayla is a great character, but she was perhaps overly great: she constantly has fabulous luck with discoveries/inventions/tames wild creatures and seems to never run into serious problems, she is ridiculously beautiful and perfect to Jondalar, and she picks up 3(?) languages in the space of a summer, magically speaking Jondalar's language after having a DREAM.
(To me, it would have been really cool to have the teaching of Zelandonii last a lot longer and it would have been nice to see how some of the abstract concepts/words were explained, but Ayla's brain is sooo freaking honed that she just picks up the language(s) in no time at all!)
Though this sounds negative, I liked the book and plan on continuing the series~ I just wanted to put down the few things I was frustrated about!