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4.15 AVERAGE
4.15 AVERAGE
adventurous
medium-paced
4.5 out of 5
"Silence is strength."
"When death comes, see the beauty in life."
You'd think taking Xenomorphs and putting them in a medieval/stone age-esque era wouldn't work, but Scott Sigler took that wild concept and pulled it off big time!
I love how the iconic Xenomorph is portrayed as a literal, world-ending threat here. Their presence gives the story a constant air of dread and anxiety, even during the down-time moments. You really get the feeling the people of Ataegina are living on borrowed time in a world where the apocalypse already happened, and unless they find a way to fight back against the Xenomorphs (or 'demons' as they're called here), said apocalypse will repeat itself, and humanity will officially go extinct.
As for the rest of the book, while it took some time for me to get fully invested in the world, story and characters, once everything kicked into gear I didn't want to stop reading.
Our three main leads, Ahiliyah (Liyah for short), Creen, and Brandun were lovable with understandable motives (though I imagine it'll take readers some time to warm up to Creen), the world and lore of Ataegina was great, the action and horror elements were nothing short of amazing, the medieval battle tactics used to fight against the 'demons' were fascinating to read about, and finally, the book got surprisingly emotional at points. On top of the themes of sheer hopelessness, and humanity's selfish ambitions and tendencies, this story does not hold back on character deaths, with many we get to know dying left and right when it hits the fan. I'm not ashamed to admit I shed a few tears when this happened, and had me wondering if humanity had any chance at all of surviving this threat.
The only reason I won't give this book a full 5 stars are due to a few small issues. I forgot the term for it, but the Hold where our three main leads live in is very sexist, with women unable to become warriors, and having to work harder than the men unless they serve as literal breeding machines as young as 14 years old. This unfortunate fact is hammered over everyone's heads, especially during the first 110 pages (said pages suffer from slow pacing I might add), and it gets annoying and depressing real quick.
Ahiliyah's relationship with her 'lover', Tolio, felt non-existent, only there to get some hormones out. Tolio coming off as an unlikable twat despite his attempts to understand his girlfriend more certainly didn't help.
Finally, the book pulls a 'new character is introduced solely to spout exposition and then die', which is a trope that absolutely infuriates me. To the book's credit, at least the way this plot element was done wasn't too rage-inducing.
Overall though, none of these issues change the fact Aliens: Phalanx was an amazing, addicting read, and easily the best Alien/Aliens novel I've read thus far! Possible minor spoiler, but if this book had an end credits song, it would be After everything that happened, I thought the song fit so well.
"Silence is strength."
"When death comes, see the beauty in life."
You'd think taking Xenomorphs and putting them in a medieval/stone age-esque era wouldn't work, but Scott Sigler took that wild concept and pulled it off big time!
I love how the iconic Xenomorph is portrayed as a literal, world-ending threat here. Their presence gives the story a constant air of dread and anxiety, even during the down-time moments. You really get the feeling the people of Ataegina are living on borrowed time in a world where the apocalypse already happened, and unless they find a way to fight back against the Xenomorphs (or 'demons' as they're called here), said apocalypse will repeat itself, and humanity will officially go extinct.
As for the rest of the book, while it took some time for me to get fully invested in the world, story and characters, once everything kicked into gear I didn't want to stop reading.
Our three main leads, Ahiliyah (Liyah for short), Creen, and Brandun were lovable with understandable motives (though I imagine it'll take readers some time to warm up to Creen), the world and lore of Ataegina was great, the action and horror elements were nothing short of amazing, the medieval battle tactics used to fight against the 'demons' were fascinating to read about, and finally, the book got surprisingly emotional at points. On top of the themes of sheer hopelessness, and humanity's selfish ambitions and tendencies, this story does not hold back on character deaths, with many we get to know dying left and right when it hits the fan. I'm not ashamed to admit I shed a few tears when this happened, and had me wondering if humanity had any chance at all of surviving this threat.
The only reason I won't give this book a full 5 stars are due to a few small issues. I forgot the term for it, but the Hold where our three main leads live in is very sexist, with women unable to become warriors, and having to work harder than the men unless they serve as literal breeding machines as young as 14 years old. This unfortunate fact is hammered over everyone's heads, especially during the first 110 pages (said pages suffer from slow pacing I might add), and it gets annoying and depressing real quick.
Ahiliyah's relationship with her 'lover', Tolio, felt non-existent, only there to get some hormones out. Tolio coming off as an unlikable twat despite his attempts to understand his girlfriend more certainly didn't help.
Finally, the book pulls a 'new character is introduced solely to spout exposition and then die', which is a trope that absolutely infuriates me. To the book's credit, at least the way this plot element was done wasn't too rage-inducing.
Overall though, none of these issues change the fact Aliens: Phalanx was an amazing, addicting read, and easily the best Alien/Aliens novel I've read thus far! Possible minor spoiler, but if this book had an end credits song, it would be
Spoiler
"Now We Are Free" from Gladiator.
4/5
The strength of the phalanx is the spearman, the strength of the spearman is the phalanx.
This was a nice surprise! Even though Aliens: Phalanx is considered by many fans as one of the very best novels from the Alien property, I had wondered if it would really stand out as a genuinely good book, or just be something for diehard fans only. I was happy to discover a quite enjoyable read, and one that is highly unique and fresh to this series. Originality is the greatest strength here, as it's just so different from the usual Alien story. I found myself liking the main central characters the more I read. It had some genuinely intense moments throughout too.
Phalanx is probably my second favorite Alien story (outside of the movies) behind the wonderful Out of the Shadows audio drama. This honestly is better than most of the films save for the obvious first two masterpieces Alien and Aliens. This is a sci-fi series that I have always really been fascinated with. I hold those first two movies in such high regard, and almost everything that has come after it has been average to terrible. These novels/audio dramas have almost all been very solid and I'm glad I've given these a chance, especially Out of the Shadows and Phalanx. Check this one out if you're really longing for another good Alien story!
The strength of the phalanx is the spearman, the strength of the spearman is the phalanx.
This was a nice surprise! Even though Aliens: Phalanx is considered by many fans as one of the very best novels from the Alien property, I had wondered if it would really stand out as a genuinely good book, or just be something for diehard fans only. I was happy to discover a quite enjoyable read, and one that is highly unique and fresh to this series. Originality is the greatest strength here, as it's just so different from the usual Alien story. I found myself liking the main central characters the more I read. It had some genuinely intense moments throughout too.
Phalanx is probably my second favorite Alien story (outside of the movies) behind the wonderful Out of the Shadows audio drama. This honestly is better than most of the films save for the obvious first two masterpieces Alien and Aliens. This is a sci-fi series that I have always really been fascinated with. I hold those first two movies in such high regard, and almost everything that has come after it has been average to terrible. These novels/audio dramas have almost all been very solid and I'm glad I've given these a chance, especially Out of the Shadows and Phalanx. Check this one out if you're really longing for another good Alien story!
adventurous
dark
emotional
hopeful
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
fast-paced
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
mysterious
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
adventurous
dark
tense
medium-paced
adventurous
dark
emotional
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
A wonderful read! If not for the cover art, the first few hundred pages were just damn good sci Fi, without the Alien tie in. I love the idea of things happening in relative vacuums as a result of Weyland Utani corruption. I loved the characters and the world they lived in. I just can't stand it when a character who has always been aggressively against having children suddenly becomes hyper focused on becoming a parent. It ruined an otherwise strong character. I know it's meant to be a symbol of her gaining hope for humanities future, but hope does not a mother make.