I've loved the series, but loved each installment a bit less than the last. So I've decided not to read The Land of Painted Caves. I've heard such terrible reviews, and raelly disliked the 5th book. I can't imagine getting anything but frustration and disapointment from this last one.
I first read The Valley of Horses when I was 12. I absolutely loved it, and it might have something to do with why I became so interested in archaeology! I read The Clan of the Cave bear a few years later, and then started working my way through the series.
The Clan of the Cave Bear and the Valley of Horses are the only ones I would ever recommend to people - the others I felt lacking. As others have said, Ayla was just to perfect of a character, and I never felt sympathy for boring Jondalar. I didn't understand their wierd hollow relationship and felt the sex scenes were artificially inserted and unecessary.
I love the setting of Clan of the Cave Bear - I'm really interested in human evolution and especially Neanderthals, and was so sad that the author didn't continue with her characters in future books. It's really interesting to read the book and see the 'state of the art' of what researchers believed about Neanderthals, and how it is different from today's research. I'll always love reading that one!
But the land of painted caves - even though I'm heading to central France next month to go on a dig, and I'll be in the area of many of the sites I'm sure she describes in the book - I'd rather read about from other sources, as I just don't think I'll enjoy it.