Anyone read the Halo novels?

[[]V[]essenjah]

Anyone read this series? First series of novels based on a video game that I actually liked. They really had the characters down pat and thus far the combat situations are very well thought out.

I've completed reading "The Fall Of Reach," by Eric Nylund. I thought the ship to ship battles in this novel were well written. It has thus far been my favorite.


"The Flood," based on the Halo game was written by William C. Deitz and I'm now reading it. I'm on chapter 3 out of 12 chapters and thus far it is pretty good. However, I noticed they managed to keep all the characters in sequence with each other, however, I didn't like the fact that the prologue for Halo in "The Fall Of Reach," didn't match the beggining of "The Flood." However, all the main and side characters were in tact.


The novel I am working my way up to is, "First Strike," which takes place between Halo 1 and 2. I really liked Eric Nylunds style a little better even though I like the fact that Deitz seperates the book into 12 chapters rather than 37 with a lot of extra computer jargon and military breifings. I understood it but it was at times annoying to read through a hole page of it. One chapter was just an encrypted message being sent about a stealth ship. Deitz seems to hold that down thus far. I like both styles but am looking forward to "First Strike" more.


Anyone else read these books?


I certainly thought they did a much better job than Peter Telep with the Descent novels.

Anyway, next up after these novels, I'm going to read "The Taking," by Dean Koontz. I've heard good things about it.

[Top Gun]

You didn't like the Descent novels? I rather enjoyed them.

[[]V[]essenjah]

Well first off, there were some un-necessary scenes with Dravis and certain employees. No one wants to read about grandpa and his secretaries. They also made the Benjamine, the main character look like an ick. The physics were all off and they didn't even use the same missions. Half the missions we walked around with a plasma pistol on the ground, rather than fly. Most of the flight scenes were more like Star Wars than Descent.


Equinox was the only book I even cared for out of the series. Read them all, didn't like 'em that much.

In the books, they also didn't use any of the same weapons that were focused on in the games and they never used the same ships. In "Stealing Thunder," he used a Starhawk instead of a Pyro-GX. In Equinox, the mercenary (character that replaced the leader of the black pyro's flew a Pyro-GX and not a Black Pyro.) They also flew GX 2's which were never mentioned in the games. They even used the wrong aliens. They really had no resemblence to the games at all other than some character/ship/weapon names and a couple of sentences per book.

The Halo novels stay perfectly in sequence with the game, follow all the same environments, and the same characters, no un-necessary crap, and lots of well, thought-out action. They also explain what happens with the troops and all the ship to ship battles with captain Keys.

[Admiral Thrawn]

Yea, I've read both the Fall of Reach and First Strike. First strike was my favorite, but both were good books. I REALLY hope that the halo2 storyline picks up where this book left off, and if so, then the game has a LOT of potential when you consider Dr. Halsey's plans, and the rest of the Spartans.

And since Nylund has worked closely with the Halo Development team in the past, I'm quite sure that the story will be in harmony with Halo 2

[DCrazy]

Supposedly, Halo 2 was developed to match the book perfectly.

[Samuel Dravis]

I read 'The Flood'. I guess it was ok...but not the best scifi I've ever read by a long way.

[[]V[]essenjah]

LOL, The Flood was probably the least liked novel out of the three books. I've been reading through it and I haven't been impressed as much by it as The Fall Of Reach. I haven't made it to First Strike yet. The Flood wasn't even written by Eric Nylund so of course it wasn't as good. Eric Nylund I thought was the better and more interesting writer out of the two.

Read The Fall Of Read, Samual. By the way, The Flood is just a slightly more advanced version of Halo 1. It follows the game Halo exactly but adds in a few side plots that explains what keys and the other soldiers were doing. That was it's purpose, so it didn't really move the story along that much. The other books are where the story really comes together. It never went really in depth with the plot where these books and Halo 2 should really progress the story along.


Anyone know if Nylund wrote the story for Halo 2?

[Mr. Perfect]

Does Red VS Blue count?

[Top Gun]

Does Red VS Blue count?

It should.