Another pretty good one...

Very interesting story, opens up horizons.
Did not like the narrator's voice, but it's a personal thing. It grew on me by the end.

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Can't wait for the next one!

Huge shout out to the Author, Ms. Ballantine. I don't know how it would stand up as a stand alone book, but as a fan of the Alien Series this book has left me wanting more.

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Good story, not so good narration

Solid entry into the Alien franchise. Intriguing story and well paced action.

However the narrator's performance was mediocre at best. The enunciation and tempo was confusing, names and sentences came muddled together. Perhaps this is a recording issue and not the narrator's fault (some of her character voices were quite good) but I found the pacing to be unpleasant to listen to. I ultimately decided to slow down the playback at .9 -.95 speed and it improved things.

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fun listen.

good book, was a fun listen. only thing I wish was different was a full cast to narrate the book to help seperate the characters and places. they kind of jumble together in some spots and I had to re listen to chapters to get it. but otherwise a good book. would make a great movie.

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I love alien everything but

The reader is so dry I think she might be a bad dictation app. It's like Captain Janeway on Valium. or

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1 person found this helpful

I don't like Ridley Scott!

1) I don't like how Ridley Scott added goo. (I don't recall seeing them in the comics, not that I have read that many)

2) The VA did a good job, but they weren't able to do an Australian/New Zealand accent. If characters are going to be from there, then they should use a VA who can do them.

3) While I turn a blind eye to the goo, I personally wanted to see (hear) military action. I don't want to spoil it, but lets just say a stupid character led to a lot of people dying, which shouldn't of happened. Yes they were running for their lives, but they shouldn't of entered it.

4) This is about the comment section. I'm tired of seeing conservatives bitch about trans people. Saying someone is trans, isn't being woke. No different than saying someone is black or is a woman. It's just a writer describing a character. If you go to Amazon.com reviews, there's a lot of men crying of sexism.

They must of listened to another book, as I am a male and didn't feel sexually discriminated against. There was a character who has had bad experiences with men, and is in a sexual relationship with a male robot. When said robot disobeyed her commands, she made a comment about men.

Conservative men are the biggest cry babies. Try being a woman and not allowed to work, vote, get a divorce and so forth for many centuries, and this is still a reality in some parts of the world today, with conservative men in the first world always trying to claw back rights women have.

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2 people found this helpful

A poor entry in the canon

"It is the intent of every murderer, poured into a mould and painted pitch black. It is a symphony of death. A masterpiece of hellish design". This is a fantastic desicription, but its from The Cold Forge by Alex White, not this half-baked disappointment of an alien story.

I found this story and its performance tiresome, at best, and annoying at worst. There is no build-up of tension or horror because the author can't write that. Xeno encounters are brushed over - I suppose the author must think we know all about them, can take it as read, and can leave it to our imaginations. There's virtually no dialog either - its all narrated. The xeno elements are almost cut-and-pasted from the books and films - did chatGPT write these parts? "Check those corners", "stay frosty", "In the tube five by five". Yep its has that stuff lifted frm Aliens. Please.

I couldn't follow who was who in the vast array of characters, and the performance was so flat that it was impossible to tell. Others complain about the wokeness, and its true that all the action gets done by females, which is fine, and most of the male characters (what few there are) are jerks or "retire" from the action early. By the way, the characters are SO stupid except when the plot requires them to hack some piece of technology, then its hey presto done. Really? In the time it would take us to replace a toner cartridge in a printer they have hacked a prouction piece of technology to do something it wasn't intended to do.

Other cliches: a tiresome Newt-Ripley-like ralationship; the AI-that-wants-to-become-human; the incredibly-stupid-corporate-man-is-his-own-worst-enemy; the-bar-with-a-fixer.

Other nonsensical tropes (spoilers): a tailings stream out of the mountain mine that has been fully mapped and explored, having a (surprise!) massive hidden Engineer's temple inside; the black goo can now transform a person into a complete xeno in less than 10 seconds; tech has batteries that always run out of charge, nothing ever workds; miners have laser cutters that in a quick slash can cut xenos and stone in half, but the marines use pulse rifles that have almost no effect (like the Mobile Infantry in Starship Troopers); and so on.

A poor showing.

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More about woke idealism than an Alien novel

Slow start, only made it in an hour and a half and had to stop. If your a male reader…. The only characters you can relate to are the misogynistic guards who written in such a way, they are disgusting. I guess this author wanted to do an Alien novel and ended up pushing terrible agenda. Do not recommend.

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3 people found this helpful

An unfortunate repeat of the last.

It really is a shame, in the new publishings they started off so strong with Out of the Shadows and Sea of Sorrows, but since the last book, their selection of authors has really lacked quality.


Similar to the last book, this one is catered exclusively to those who really the region Oceania, like New Zealand/Australia. (curious they didn't learn their lesson from the British author.) Also has unnecessary wokeism in it; something tells me if you're worried about being in service to an evil corporation for generations or the ability to eat; your last concern is whether or not you want to mutilate your genitalia.

It at least attempts to establish a world, but also wastes wayyyyyy too much time on it.

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