Let me begin with the admission that I was unable to finish this book. I made it to about page 90 and just had to put it down. So, my review will be based on that fact. Also, there are probably what would be considered to be some plot spoilers here, so please skip this review if you don't want to know information that might reveal some plot twists too soon.

I am a Bladerunner fan. I love the original, and I love the director's cut. I own them both. I have watched them so many times, I have lost count. I thought it was awesome that somebody wrote a sequel. I was reluctant to buy it, because I am not a fan of Mr. Jeter's other works. However, I finally picked it up one day.

I was determined to finish this book. Even when I saw that J. F. Sebastian, to me a person who was irrefutably killed in the movie, was still alive. And then, Pris is still alive. I thought at first Mr. Jeter did a fair job with the characterization of Deckard, and then that began to disappoint me, too. Then finally, the thing that made me put the book down. Mr. Jeter would have us believe that Pris was not truly a replicant.

I ask any fan of the movie if this is even conceivable? To me it was not, and was the final nail in the coffin for the book for me. I just couldn't go on any further. The book became an insult to it's source material in my opinion. I honestly don't see how any one who is a true fan of the movie could enjoy this novel.

Like many sequels, this one would have been best left unmade. Most sequels are more stillborns than vibrant offsprings. The best sequels are the ones we create in our own minds. I applaud Mr. Jeter for his effort to create a sequel to such a bastion of sci-fi history, but I question his outcome. Like any author, he deserves praise for his talent, and his creation, but it is not for me, and I would imagine, not for many Blade Runner fans as well.

Based on the merit of reading the first 90 pages or so of this book, I do not reccomend it. I'll stick to the movie, but this book is not Blade Runner canon to me.

In seeking to emulate the film, while borrowing from Dick's novel whenever convenient, Jeter has done well in a venture that could be much worse than it is. His action sequences are hacked together, not to mention bland, as is his characterization of Deckard, who I felt played second banana to another character from the film who figures into the plot here. Occasionally, however, Jeter supplies his characters with musings about the distinction between human and replicant (or lack thereof) and we get just a taste of what it was like the first time we actually GOT Blade Runner (which probably wasn't the first time we saw it). I applaud most Jeter's bold denouement, which isn't afraid to shake things up and actually move the story forward. It came close to sending chills down my spine, as the ending of the film's director's cut. I also appreciate its consideration of Rachael's characterization in Dick's original novel, and how the two seemingly polar opposite personalities gel.

A movie-nerds' ... dream, what they'd all wished had been done with Highlander. A continuation of the movie's story in the style of Dick's book, with multiple scenes which are reporductions or reflections from the original (another Deckard/Batty fight in the rain on decaying city infrastructure). Pretty good for the Geekbook mindcandy category.

Visiting the book store some time ago, I noticed that the author of this novel has busied himself converting Phil Dick's masterpiece into a franchise. Having read Noir, I am not too tempted to see how Jeter may have twisted Bladerunner's already dark milieu.

Action in this novel starts out right away, but I had to read the first chapter over, because I could not picture Jeter's scene.

Noir is brutal. It is the sickest and most perverse future vision I have ever read. Not that that is necessarily bad, but.. Imagine a world were even death is no escape from your creditors; where mysterious machines shoot down every aircraft that ever leaves the ground; where copyright infringement is punishable by means far, far worse than death... and it goes on and on.

On the post-apocalyptic Earth human life is a worthless commodity. Sexuality is explored in many forms, but invariably they are sickly perverse and closely linked to death and mutilation. This did more to demonstrate the author's own inclinations than to present anything remotely plausible. The penalty for selling someone else's intellectual property in Jeter's world is to have one's brain and spinal chord forcefully removed and placed on life support. The offender's still-living, still-aware neural tissue is then used to make stereo cables or to control small household appliances for the personal amusement of the artist or author that was wronged. Doesn't take much analysis to see the author's own personal agendas being manifested here.

The protaganist is an 'asp-head', and agent of the Collection Agency, the company that performs the torturous executions as described above. He is a non-dimensional character who is, of course, very darkly motivated. There is nothing good at all in McNihil's life, he has made sure of that. The hero has taken the steps to have his vision altered so that the world appears to be a darkened version of the world of 1930's cinema. There is no daytime in McNihil's world, a condition that suits well the otherwise flat character.

All of Jeter's frequent cultural references, and his occasional use of German quotes are both totally incomprehensible. This may not be entirely bad though, as it does seem to add something, though certainly not authenticity. One thing is clear: Jeter's southern California is much different from any that anyone will ever see.

Finally, Jeter calls into question his own knowledge of the use of the English language, using the word 'connect' as a direct replacement for our beloved 'f' word. I.e. You are such a connecting loser, and so on. That, sadly is his only attempt at modifying dialog to appear authentically futuristic, and it doesn't work at all.

I finished Jeter's Noir, and found to my surprise that he managed to salvage a decent ending from this rather unredeemably twisted work.

I can understand people not liking Jeter's "NOIR." It's difficult, at times convoluted, and oh so brutal. (By the same concept, I understand people who don't like Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction, although it seems universally respected as something significant in the world of film.)

Similarly, I think people can say they don't like NOIR, but people who want to say this book is bad simply don't get it. You have to respect what Jeter does.

Roger Zelazny once said in an essay regarding the masterful Philip K. Dick "his story takes you from here to there in a God-knows-how, seemingly haphazard fashion, which, upon reflection, follows a logical line of development -- but only on reflection."

The same can be said of Jeter and NOIR. As you read this book, you worry that jarring, sarcastic, or dark concepts are thrown in just because, but by the end of the novel the neural tissue speaker wires, the indeadted, McNihil's eyes, and much, much more are so VERY important to the plot and "resolution" of the story.

Wonderful. Fans of all genres should read this. Fans of science fiction aren't really fans if they don't. Like it or not, it's a unique experience, and in the world of 1/4" deep science fiction, that is unique indeed.

Noir is a book that one has to want to read. The first chapter throws you into the setting too quickly for you to understand, but for those what dare read on, it gets better. Noir, like all cyberpunk fiction, takes place in a bleak future. The world of Noir is dark and gloomy, reminiscent of the word noir itself. Corporations are few but powerful, either merged or subsidized into larger ones. Middle-class can be said to be non-existent, and death is no longer an escape from poverty. It has a lot of statements against certain issues that are present today, such as management and information theft, that are blown out of proportion. The plot revolves around McNihil, a protector of copyrights, who sees the entire world like an old black & white detective movie. He gets hired by one of the huge corporations to retrieve something, and gets thrown into something larger than he could have imagined.

The storytelling is of excellent quality, allowing deep visualization of the scenes in the book. However, many minor things get overlooked, but it doesn't impede the story all that much. I enjoyed this book a lot, and would recommend it to anyone who can devote enough time to this book to fully appreciate it. My suggestion is to be ready to reread things, as things can get very difficult. If you can get past the difficult parts, the book can be very enjoyable.

This book was better than the first, however it's still boring! Characters are written badly, and there's way too much time spent inside their heads. It's like the author doesn't trust readers to pick up on things for themselves, so everything is spelled out. The flow, if you could call it that, is interrupted by wordy descriptions, most of which contain large and unnecessary words. What is meant to be exciting plot twists are boring and confusing. I think if a different author had taken this project on it could have become quite wonderful, but the style of Jeter is terrible. It's hard to get into and hard to understand. There's way to many character views to keep track of, not to mention the jumping from 'Now' to 'Then'.

Even a serious Star Wars fan, such as myself, can find little enjoyment in this Trilogy. Unless you are a HUGE fan of Boba Fett, I'd reccommend skipping this book, or borrowing it from your library or a friend. It's definately not worth spending your money on.

Picking up at the exact moment The Mandalorian Armor concluded, Slave Ship has Boba Fett (now fully recovered from his partial digestion in the Sarlacc's gut) skipping over the dangling knots of the conspiracy he helped set in motion many years before. Just as was the case in the trilogy's opening chapter, Slave Ship jumps between past (shortly after the destruction of the Death Star that concluded A New Hope) and present (roughly parallel with Return of the Jedi) as author K.W. Jeter takes us on an intimate tour of the gutter of the galaxy. While it certainly is a smartly written tale, the series lacks a sympathetic character to root for. The reader simply watches nasty people do nasty things to each other for several hundred pages, and Boba Fett is far too robotic in his characterization to seem to warrant a three book arc. Nonetheless, fans will gobble it up and ask for more.

This book follows along the same lines as The Mandalorian Armor, but that's expected in a trilogy. The "now" and "then" convention is still used to denote the two different time periods, although this time we see that the "then" portions are really the story Dengar is telling to Neelah. Although this switching still seems a little awkward to me, it grows on you after a while.

My favorite part of Slave Ship was the focus on Kuat of Kuat. In The Mandalorian Armor, we barely get a glimpse of this ultimate engineer, but in Slave Ship his character is fully fleshed out. His troubles with the ruling houses of Kuat provide the background for my favorite scene in the novel. Also, the subplot with Kuh'dar Mu'bat and his upstart Balancsheet is interesting.

I still wish Jeter would have stayed with the original characterizations of the bounty hunters. Also, his writing style still does not seem well-suited to a Star Wars book, although it improved from The Mandalorian Armor.

It's a good book, and definitely worth reading if you like Star Wars. I'd still recommend beginners to start with another series though.

I really enjoyed both "Blade Runner" the movie (it's in my top five favorites of all time,) and the PK Dick book the movie was based on, "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep." _BR 2_, however, is just unfiltered tripe.

This novel attempts to be a sequel to the movie, rather than the novel, and, let me say it again, it's done so in a truly awful manner. The (un)original bits that Jeter came up with are frequently interspersed with flashbacks to the movie in a really uninteresting manner, and the writing itself is clunky and amateurish. One example, and I swear I'm not making this up or embellishing it in any way:

"She ascended to the appointed place, at the appointed hour. Without effort, almost without will, thermal sensors had registered her presence within the small space, a disembodied voice had asked if she'd wanted to go up to the building's roof, far above the dense weave of structure and light that formed the static ocean of the city."

[SPUTTER!]

Oh, and there are more equally bad paragraphs I could throw at you, but I won't foist those other atrocities off upon you - I don't dislike *anyone* that much.

If you, like me, thirst for ever more "Blade Runner" Stuff, my best advice is to stay right the heck away from this novel, and read some of the other (non-fiction) pieces that have been written about _DADOES_ and about the movie - you'll find it far more satisfying, and you'll be much less inclined to beat your head repeatedly against something hard and/or spikey to erase this travesty from your brain.

Oh, was I using my Outside Voice when I said that? Well, K.W. Jeter, I would apologize for such a scathing review of something you are in all likelihood very proud of; however, I don't recall anyone apologizing to me for the hours of my life I lost whilst reading this book, so I'm calling us even.

This book is the sequel to the movie not a sequel to Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?, for being what it is it's a very good continuation, there are a couple of things that bothered me but were background elements, not anything to do with the story itself, I would really like to know what other people think about this book, not many people have reviewed it even though it's selling. I don't suggest you to read the third book, unless you are a hardcore fan.

This story is a sequel to the BR movie. Though at time the author can get a bit wordy and drag things out, it's not enough to really take a star away from the book. The story comes together nicely in a world where everyone is out for themselves and no can be trusted. The plot twist at the end left me saying wow and the story can easily hold your attention.

The editorial review above really ought to contain a spoiler warning, so completely does it reveal the plot of this novel. Many of Jeter's usual trademarks are here, such as the generally unsympathetic characters and dirt-under-the-nails setting, but this time things seem rather slight and under-explored. It's rare that any book could use another hundred pages so in that sense this is a rare book indeed, since there are plenty of areas the author needed to expand upon (although not necessarily explain, as the mysterious nature of this thin slice of horror is very effective). The denouement rushes in as rapidly as the car from which Mike is tossed into the desert, exacerbated by the breakneck speed of Jeter's prose, as crisp and sharp as any of the scalpels here used to gruesome effect. Stephen King would probably have taken 1200 pages to tell this tale, spelling everything out along the way; K.W. Jeter may have leaned too far the other way, shaving more from his story than was healthy for it. A nose above the usual horror fiction, but not Jeter at his nerve-jangling best.

There is little to recommend for this book. The only way I finished reading it was by reading only the first and last sentences of a paragraph. Near the end of the book, I was only reading the first and last paragraph of a chapter.

This book is really bad.

Jeter's "Blade Runner 2: The Edge of Human" was a fairly good read that captured most of the feel of the movie Blade Runner. (It's important to realize that these books are sequels to the film, not the Phillip K. Dick Book "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?") I got the feeling that Jeter's intention of his first sequel was to provide closure to what happened after the events of the film and would create new adventures in the Blade Runner future. Instead, in "Replicant Night", he goes right back to Los Angeles 2019 and revisits scenes that were done in the film. I felt I did not need those scenes embellished any further, I wanted something fresh. Unfortunately, there was nothing fresh about this book at all.

K.W. Jeter is an exceptional and creative author. His first sequel to BR, The Edge of Human, was almost flawlessly Phildickian and definitely fascinating. That said, Replicant Night is a letdown. The creativity is still there (many new and interesting concepts are explored), but the ponderous reiteration every other chapter reads like a marketing decision: "Now, K.W., people only read one chapter per night. Don't want to lose them. Also, Dick was always so vague. Make sure you spell things out and hammer them in. After all, we can't expect commercial success if the reader has to think, can we?" Apart from the dead horse syndrome, still twitching in the form of "who's really human?", and the silly role-reversal device of Earth vs. Anywhere Else, Jeter has no qualms about re-enacting exact scenes from the movie in EVERY SINGLE POSSIBLE WAY, usually with re-incarnations of primary characters. In fact, new characters never seem to last very long. Break out of the cycle, dude. Please.

The characterizations are flat, and the novel is mostly just confrontation after confrontation with nothing to hold your interest. It was boring.

But the plot and characterization have holes you could drive a starship through. And I mean a big one, a galaxy-class ship.

The writing is pretty good, actually, so it's a shame to have to rate the book so low. The dialogue is better than fair, and the plot moves well until the end, when it completely falls apart.

I don't want to say TOO much about that, because it would give away too much. All I can really say is that the day that Major Kira can't handle one lone psychopath with a broken arm who's armed only with a knife one-on-one (to say nothing of with assistance from Dr. Bashir) without having to destroy an expensive and important piece of equipment, is the day that the author truly doesn't understand the characters s/he's writing about. Granted, this was an early book, but STILL...

Most of the second half of this book reads like a cheap slasher movie, with Major Kira playing the part of the terrified potential victim of the near-unbeatable slasher. Problem is, we've seen absolutely nothing to indicate that he really has the kind of semi-mystical invulnerability enjoyed by Freddie and Jason; Kira should have made mincemeat of him, without so much as mussing her hair.

"Bloodletter" is in what some people call the "horror" sub-genre of Star Trek, but don't worry, it's not a horror novel. I'd call it "suspense". It is very tense, nerve-wracking, and spooky and there are gruesome and freaky descriptions in some places. The chase in "Part 2" of the book is rather scary but very good. The plot has solid elements, and the characterization is great for an early book. I found the story to be inventive, suspenseful and very interesting. There were some neat twists and surprises, and another visit from the wormhole aliens (the Prophets). I liked seeing Kira and Bashir working together - that was well done. Overall, 8.5 out of 10. This novel is definitely recommended!

I liked some of Jeter's books from this time -- thought occasionally he did a pretty good job of rooting around in the dark places of the male psyche. At the time of my reading them, of course, I was a troubled teen and a big Cronenberg fan. In retrospect, I think THIS particular book of Jeter's, however, gets far too carried away in the abuse of women, which it depicts with glee -- the main character's alter ego is a violent thug who knows that there are SOME women out there who like it rough, who are attracted to violent men -- and who stalks the night, looking for women who want to be raped and killed. Sick stuff. It rolls around in it's blackness. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone...

Involving, intense, riveting horror/slasher novel reminiscent in its narrator's tone & in some aspects of plot construction 2 some of Barry N. Malzberg's better works -- the book is dedicated 2 Malzberg. The narrator is unreliable (tho it takes awhile 2 realize this), but the story is almost instantly involving, hypnotic, & the tension & bizaareness constantly escalates. The Nding is a bit disappointing -- the narrator disintegrates & Jeter pulls back his focus 2 a "God's-eye" view. But it's worth the trip. I Njoyed the writing style if not the subject matter & events. I'll B looking 4 more horror novels by Jeter....

This book is exactly what the cover says... warped. It takes a slightly twisted mind to think up something like this. But if you like scary books, then this is for you. Once I got used to the idea, it wasn't that bad.

If you're one of those fans of Deep Space Nine who enjoy that series' tendancy to supply a healthy dollop of psuedo-mysticism along with the usual Star Trek psuedoscience, you'll doubtless love this book. It was well-written, the characters were handled well, the plot moved nicely, and so forth.

If, on the other hand, (like me) you find the credibility granted the Bajoran mysticism and mumbo-jumbo (including Sisko's status as the "Emissary") to be at best minorly irritating, then this is definitely NOT the book for you. The basic concept was just a little too silly for words.

I don't understand why everyone keeps saying that this book is so bad. I picked it up, and couldn't put it down. Sure, it got a little overinvolved with some technological details at points, but it's not bad.

The only reason I will give it only four stars is because the author made one slight mistake. As I am writing a book about Federation starships, the author used both the runabouts Mekong and Ganges. Well, during my research, I learned that the Mekong is the runabout that was assigned to Deep Space 9 after the Ganges was destroyed. Just a little annoyance with me that the author did not research the information first.

Overall, a good pick. I highly recommend you pick it up to read.

I suspect that fans of Albert Camus and Stephen King would give more stars to this book. If you prefer protagonists who combat evil and overcome hardships, avoid this book. The book is set in California during the Depression. The book convincingly portrays the agony of the dust bowl victims who headed for California in the hope of starting a new life. Among the travelors is a man named Cooper. Cooper, to avoid a prison term, becomes a paymaster for an orange grower who employs and abuses migrant workers. A nanny employed by the orange grower believes that she has the power to control dead animals and dead people. Cooper, seemingly unable to control any circumstances, is driven by circumstances beyond his control into mental and emotional hell.