want a real life adventure? come to Australia we have spiders bigger than your hand.

Heads up - this review is all over the place, mainly I just wrote down whatever came to mind and didn't bother putting it into a more coherent order....

A rather strange book, but I enjoyed listening to it for the most part. It was a nice distraction while I was cooking, catching the bus, doing chores, etc.

I do want to point out these odd kissing and naked scene's - what was with those? mainly the naked fighting scene, that just seemed particularly bizarre. Freudian slip perhaps? Or perhaps it was just meant to be innocent boys fighting in the nude and it just came across a little weird via the audio version?

One of the best things about this book was it's surprises and slow build. You have an idea something was going to happen but no clue when, where or how - it was fun, though I didn't bother trying to guess like I usually would, just enjoyed the ride.

The characters were a bit....meh. One could say it's because the author didn't put enough effort into creating and building them, only using them as chess pieces as needed, or someone else could say that the reason they came off so bland was because Ender could never truly get close to anyone enough for us to truly get a read on them, and therefor they came off a distant and maybe more 2 dimensional.... me being the cynical bitch that I am favor the first opinion more. Though I did love the fact there was no love interest!

I have mixed feelings about the narration - some of it was good, other times a bit iffy.

The ending was enjoyable and satisfying. And i especially enjoyed the authors little speech at the end. He's pretty funny, maybe a little up himself (hard to tell when your only listening to an audio tape) but I had a good laugh at a lot of what he had to say.
Apparently there's a movie - after listening to the author explain how he....changed it, I must admit to be rather interested in watching it. Here's hoping its good!

Not sure I'll read the other books attached to Ender's Game though they did sound interesting - we'll see.

9% - I listen to this now and then, usually while I'm cooking dinner or going for a walk. It's a tad....strange, but the narrator does a pretty good job with the different voices, especially the adult voices... mixed feelings about the voices for the children. Though the speech pattern is fantastic - something i miss out on when I'm actually reading.

25% - Taking me a while to get through it all, but I'm enjoying it while doing my chores, etc.

Pg 124 - This is going less into the creepy territory and more into the disturbing, disgusting and sick area - not quite what I was hoping for.

Pg 179 - I'm done. This book is more disturbed then I'm willing to sign on for. I was looking forward to seeing the bad guys caught, even tried skipping to the end, but the whole child-sexual-abuse thing it has going on is making me nauseous. Kudos to the author for writing such disgusting images & thoughts, I imagine its a very realistic look into the mind of someone just like this, but I want to enjoy my reading experience.

DNF

Pg 88 - So creepy. Loving it!

Pg 91 - Geez, how many messed up and perverted people and families are there in this book!?

Side note: been a few typo's so far, most obvious being 'club night' instead of 'night club'. Also some words I don't know, my guess is they're common UK slang, so obviously unfamiliar to me.

Pg 100 - What a Bitch!! you can't judge a dog solely based on its breed, and you should never fucking kick it for that alone! Even the cops are apparently monsters. -_-

Side note - so as you can see my opinion of this book is slowly degrading.

I got to page 9 and was so completely bored I decided to give up. I imagine had I read the other books I might have been more interested in the funeral scene, however all I noticed at the time was the large amount of descriptions of the surrounding land, the people and mainly the sword. For some unknown and odd reason there was a ridiculously large amount of information about this sword. Its a sword for fucks sake, we don't need to know all the details within the first few pages!

Usually I'm okay with info dumping, I read a lot of UF where they have a tendency to dump you in the deep end and wait to see if you swim or sink, unfortunately in this case I sunk, and I sunk quickly. 

At this time I have zero desire to continue. Shame the cover and blurb were intriguing.

I don't recall Charlie being this whiny or annoying. 

My fave while reading about charlie bitching and whining, cause life it just too unfair.
Ball up women, your a cop!

The Great Zoo of China started off strong. The introduction gave us the setting for the story - a death scene, a hint of bad guys and dragons. Afterwards we were introduced to our characters, given tidbits of information about their history and relationships with each other. Then to the zoo and dragon, this part was great, they explained in detail how they came across the dragons, their skills, abilities, and physical structure, the linking DNA with other creatures, how the dragons played a part in history - all of the information was sound, if dragons did exist I could easilypicture them being just like this.
Later on we go for a little exploration around the zoo, check out the incredible skill of the Chinese when it comes to infrastructure, where the dragons live, their activities, where people would visit and how they'd interact with the dragons - then the action started and all logic and physics went flying out the window.
The action was badass! everyone....well almost everyone was dead within just a few hours, with the book describing the gory death scene's, the dragons eating peoples faces, blood and brain matter everywhere, the inability of people being able to fight and survive against such a brutal and intelligent predator..... think Jurassic Park times a thousand. Which was cool and all but the complete lack of realistic survival kept pulling me out of the story, the dragons were so badass, its ridiculous to believe anyone would survive, let alone CJ who continuously stopped during a life and death moment so she could watch the dragons kill everyone around her. And who would put her in charge of the group when there was a perfectly good military guy just standing around? He would be the most logical choice - of course she was the only person intelligent enough to figure that tidbit out as well. Sorry CJ but with how much importance you were given made me dislike you a lot more than I ordinarily would - she was a tough, intelligent, go-getter, who played with crocodiles for a living and was a vet. Really she was thatamazing, but it was overshadowed by the unbelievable parts she played in the book, girl was a glory hog.
Still the beginning was great and the action entertaining, and it had dragons so this book is still worth at least 3 stars just for that!

wait a moment.... so she's 5 feet away from the giant dragon - he leaps up out of water and drags down the chopper into the waters, and she's okay-dory? seems a little fishy in the physics department to me!

Please fawn over her more, maybe you'll be able to fly out of there on the giant head your creating.

....... seriously? If your close enough to hit someone with a makeshift flamethrower (hairspray and a lighter) and if by some miracle the grenades that person was carrying did go off....(pretty sure they're designed not too do that) ducking wouldn't save you shit - you and the grenade carrier would be splato all over the closest surfaces.

How is she alive when she stops and stars every time something dangerous happens? Oh two dragons are battling it out a meter away, the winner is bound to eat me - you know what might be a good idea, if i sit here and watch, wouldn't want to be surprised by the winner...maybe i can make a bet? IDIOT.

Well that's a ridiculous excuse to keep the chase going - though really i shouldn't be so surprised, facts and logic went out the window as soon as the chase started. No way any of the characters should be alive after the last few minutes. Also cars and gasoline trucks don't just explode that easily. Extra thought - shouldn't the Army trained bloke be taking over as leader, rather than the crocodile expert?

Page 102: The history is fascinating! Though it hasn't yet been explained if once the creatures come out of hibernation if they could go back - does that mean the dragon that was sent to check the surrounding area would soon die from incorrect habitat? I suppose according to legend it lived to be old enough to eat virgin princesses and be killed off by gallant knights or villagers. how did they decided which dragon to send out?

Page 125: Poor Ponies :'(

Page 140: Holy Fuck

Loving the interesting little tidbits about sharks and alligators. It's awesome how the author has mixed and matched animals to create the dragons - loving the pictures as well.

There were a few issues right at the beginning, a good chunk due to info dumping and the characters being ridiculously dumb and naive, but after 2 years (in book time) the characters grew up a lot, and changed in ways I could certainly appreciate.
So yeah there were some issues but really, who cares!?! I had such a blast reading it and learning about its history and current issues trying to control the galaxy, the dynamics between the Clones and the Humans and the strife cause by its soldiers being completely expendable, that I can easily overlook the flaws it did have. And now I'm highly looking forward to Rogue Clone and the trouble Harris is bound to get into with Freeman by his side! haha

Guttman is clearly some special kind of idiot. I can't believe he just told the stranger that - I can't believe the book is opening up on a scene like this, obviously shit is going to go down hill after this.

Also this idiot doesnt know how to play cards, his tell is a mile long. Oh how i am suffering.