Alien: Phalanx by Scott Sigler

Started by Corporal Hicks, Jul 10, 2019, 12:59:28 PM

Author
Alien: Phalanx by Scott Sigler (Read 88,816 times)

Hudson

Hudson

#345
Final thoughts:

It loses momentum for me over the final 150 or so pages, but I would still put it up there with The Cold Forge & Out of the Shadows as one of the more successful books in the series. I think my main problem is that this book does a really thorough job of building up an engaging group of characters, and has a really good eye on crafting a compelling human story that says quite a bit about various non-Alien franchise things, only to leave us with an extended ending sequence focused on physical action that doesn't serve as much of a culmination of any of those substantive elements. Boring battle scenes, and then more boring battle scenes. None of that stuff was very interesting to read,
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especially considering Albus Dumbledore dies too early, eliminating a solid thread of tension
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. A lot could have been cut and/or summarized. In particular, everything closely orbiting battle tactics. Anything involving the chess game Liyah plays, and then the considerations of that information coming up later. I found all of that excruciatingly boring from a pacing perspective. I'm not planning a D&D campaign.

Overall, you could cut a lot from this and still have a solid novel. I thought it was a cool idea and it was mostly well executed. It was generally a fun book to read, and I felt like it did a good job of reaching for more than the vast majority of Alien novels. The portrayal of the Aliens was effective, which feels like a roll of the dice each time I start reading one of these. Still have to be that guy about the proofing of the book. The typographical errors are persistent through the whole thing.
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For instance, was it 318 or 319 years? Two numbers are given on the same page.
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Not a good look. If I was the Fox/Disney suit in charge of these books, that would piss me off.

Other disjointed thoughts:

* This was a better YA novel than Echo.

* The fat character is named Panda, and is generally described as being overweight and good at his job because his job is sedentary, which is good because he won't have to move around much, which would be difficult for him because he's fat. See the pattern? The book constantly reminds you that Panda is the fat character. For all the self-awareness of the novel, this is never reconciled from what I could tell. It's just there so you can laugh at a fat person. Panda is fat, and that's all there is to it. These moments are straight up 90s Adam Sandler.

*
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The book ending with the image of Liyah cradling her baby has a very man-writing-women-characters vibe to it. It's a woman so she better have kids!
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*
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The plot twist is cool, but it was predictable. The book was relying on subverting Alien conventions by transitioning to sword & shield, so, the PLEASE DON'T SPOIL THIS plea at the beginning basically revealed that something worth spoiling was going to happen, and my mind immediately leapt to The Village in space. Plot wise, it's fine. It makes sense and I think it's a cool idea. However, I still don't really get how you could go 300+ years and no one would ever have discovered the leaves had a chemical property to them that blocked the acid blood. But okay. Also, when did we decide that if someone is an android, their dialogue has to be really badly written? This character dials back all the interesting progress made by Davis in the Zula Hendricks stories.
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* I would read more novels in this particular series/thread if more were published. I would even look forward to them! I think there's still a lot you can do with this concept.

Kradan

Kradan

#346
Quote from: Hudson on May 25, 2020, 04:23:05 PM
*
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The book ending with the image of Liyah cradling her baby has a very man-writing-women-characters vibe to it. It's a woman so she better have kids!
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I have the same problem with it

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Whole relationship between her and someone-whose-name-I-can't-remember feels off and completely unnecessary
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Stitch

Stitch

#347
Quote from: Hudson on May 25, 2020, 04:23:05 PM
The typographical errors are persistent through the whole thing.
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For instance, was it 318 or 319 years? Two numbers are given on the same page.
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Not a good look. If I was the Fox/Disney suit in charge of these books, that would piss me off.

One thing that was glaringly obvious to me was that on at least one occasion, the main character's name was misspelled. I get that it was a big book, and longer than most of the EU novels released recently, but the proofreader(s) slipped up a lot.

Hudson

Hudson

#348
Quote from: Stitch on May 26, 2020, 06:17:58 AM
One thing that was glaringly obvious to me was that on at least one occasion, the main character's name was misspelled. I get that it was a big book, and longer than most of the EU novels released recently, but the proofreader(s) slipped up a lot.

It's really not a good look after Bug Hunt, which you would hope was embarrassing for anyone involved in a way that it would light a fire under their asses the next time. Apparently not. And yeah, it's a long book, but not nearly the first time a long novel has been published in a media franchise's EU or otherwise.

The Cruentus

Quote from: Kradan on May 25, 2020, 11:36:12 PM
Quote from: Hudson on May 25, 2020, 04:23:05 PM
*
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The book ending with the image of Liyah cradling her baby has a very man-writing-women-characters vibe to it. It's a woman so she better have kids!
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I have the same problem with it


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]While I suppose an argument could be made for that, the whole situation and backwards society thing means that women are treated less than men in some of the settlements. I cannot remember for sure but I recall something about breeding being a necessity and some women purposefully have children to avoid doing the runs. So its more of a surviival thing than a they-women-so-they-must-have-kids thing..
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SM

SM

#350
Agreed.

SiL

SiL

#351
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That still falls into "They're women so they must have kids", though. It's just engrained deeper into the world the story takes place in.
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SM

SM

#352
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Yeah it's part of the world that is established early on and reinforced throughout.
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HuDaFuK

HuDaFuK

#353
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More to the point, it definitely conforms to the way the world was back in technologically comparable times.
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SiL

SiL

#354
Quote from: HuDaFuK on May 27, 2020, 07:55:03 AM
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More to the point, it definitely conforms to the way the world was back in technologically comparable times.
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... of 400 years into the future?
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HuDaFuK

HuDaFuK

#355
Quote from: SiL on May 27, 2020, 08:06:02 AM
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... of 400 years into the future?
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...of medieval pre-industrial society.

The book may present an antiquated viewpoint, but it's hardly out of sync with the world in which it takes place.
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The Cruentus

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Yeah, I think only one settlement there had any progression and that was the one led by a woman. To give credit where credit is due, the franchise overall has been progressive as whole, even in the 90s. It has a large amount of LGBT characters and women are usually the main protagonist, but I suppose once in awhile, old views and habits will leak through in some stories but at least here, its kind of in sync with the setting as Huda said.
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Hudson

Hudson

#357
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All I'm seeing is "it makes sense with the story." Yeah, true. And also not my point.
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SiL

SiL

#358
Quote from: Hudson on May 27, 2020, 01:16:49 PM
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All I'm seeing is "it makes sense with the story." Yeah, true. And also not my point.
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I read a tweet last year of someone saying fantasy worlds can easily accept dragons, goblins, magic, etc. but somehow have to stick to medieval gender inequality for their world building and it's stuck with me since.
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HuDaFuK

HuDaFuK

#359
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If sexist portrayals of women are some kind of institutional problem with fantasy books, I couldn't say. I've said before how sword-and-shield stuff really isn't my thing and this might well be the only such book I've ever read.

I certainly don't think sexist portrayals of women are a problem in the Alien series. And as such this book really didn't bother me :-\
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