I loved both books, minus the villains. If White ever writes a third Alien book, he should tone down the over the top nature of his villains.
In terms of this sort of continuity, after reading Colony War and Inferno's Fall, they do feel like semi-sequels to those aforementioned because they take place some time after and even make references to those stories as well as bringing characters back. It's to the point that it does feel like it's certainly building up to something big, which I'm kind of fine with, but it could be done better because Colony War was essentially the lowest point imo.