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By far a terrible perqual to HALO 4.
For most on the site this name will be all they need to understand how it turned bad.
Karen Traviss
Now onto in depth review I'll try to keep it spoiler free.
Karen Traviss for all she put in the forward of the book seemed to not fully understand a lot of the characters, and universe of Halo. she portrayed the spartans vary badly in the book not as the strong soldiers with there convictions to protect the UNSC no matter there past or what the UNSC did to them as kids but turned most of the Spartan-II's sniveling children un-sure on how to handle a truth they already knew. She turned Halsey into more of a flippant bitch who wasn't sure of her action or her past, same with CPO Mendez the man who trained the Spartan-II and III, these were two people who knew the consequences of there action and knew the needs of the Earth and her colonies outweighed there moral choice no matter how bad it was, and they were ok with it. To just whiners looking for atonement or some sort of punishment.
The sad thing was it seemed Traviss was able to write new characters well or build on existing characters the reader hardly knew about, which was a plus those characters weren't badly wreten, except again for the two new S-II's that were introduced, One a washout from the project turned to hating Halsey because she couldn't cut it and was out for revenge, and the other a normal S-II who couldn't cope with the realization that they were taken as children and trained to be soldiers and became flippant on Halsey in fact all the S-II present in this book ended up wanting answers from Halsey from stuff they themselves already knew.
Travis seemed to make it her top priority to completely cast Halsey as the Bad guy needing to be destroyed. And destroyed her character and character associated with the character. But I could live with this turn of events if it wasn't for the poorly constructed narrative.
The book is essentially split up into three plots and I really wish she just picked one and stuck with it because it really destroyed the narrative in several places. If any of you have read any of the previous halo books you would know they focused on one topic and stuck with it making a vary engaging story that expanded on the known universe the good example of the books are the first three (Fall of Reach, The Flood, and First Strike) and the fourth book that introduced the Spartan-III's Ghosts of Onyx.
Traviss seemed not to be able to pick what she wanted to write. A ending to Ghost of Onyx (which at the end has a Shield world which is shown at the end of Halo 3 chief is falling towards which had me giddy with excitement that part of Halo 4 if not all including Halo Wars would all be neatly tied into Onyx but this is for not thanks to this book) A spy novel, or a preachy philosophical debate if humanity deserved to live after what they did to the S-II's
Instead of a single coherent story we got three separate story's all with vary poorly done conclusions to them leaving way to many unanswered questions leaving readers to wounder if they will be answered in Halo 4 or not. Not to mention in the Spy plot it paints the Elites way to Mandaloriany and by that I mean if you read the books most people would know the Elites are a warrior race with strong belief to family linage, honor, and loyalty.(hell one of there motras is "on the blood of our fathers on the blood of our sons we will serve the Covenant to our dying breath.") Which is fine they were the military back bone of the Covenant for generations but in the end the elite plot degraded into the Mandalorian civil war on this site and I mean exactly like the Mandalorian Civil war on this site.
Onto each of the plots:
The continuation of Ghost of Onyx Plot:
It started off well but eventually degraded into a philosophical debate boiling down to we should never have created the Spartans in the first place.
Spy story:
Again started off good with a devious ONI plan to keep the UNSC safe in the shaky cease to hostilities, but degrades into burn the witch attacks on Halsey.
Preachy Philisophical story:
This was handled poorly in the begin through both of the main plots I put it as part of the main because you can't turn a page with out someone asking the question is this right? Should we be doing this? oh and the ever popular is there a GOD?
((If you want full explanations I can give them on my likes dislikes and examples to them but I want to put little if any spoilers in the review.))
For most on the site this name will be all they need to understand how it turned bad.
Karen Traviss
Now onto in depth review I'll try to keep it spoiler free.
Karen Traviss for all she put in the forward of the book seemed to not fully understand a lot of the characters, and universe of Halo. she portrayed the spartans vary badly in the book not as the strong soldiers with there convictions to protect the UNSC no matter there past or what the UNSC did to them as kids but turned most of the Spartan-II's sniveling children un-sure on how to handle a truth they already knew. She turned Halsey into more of a flippant bitch who wasn't sure of her action or her past, same with CPO Mendez the man who trained the Spartan-II and III, these were two people who knew the consequences of there action and knew the needs of the Earth and her colonies outweighed there moral choice no matter how bad it was, and they were ok with it. To just whiners looking for atonement or some sort of punishment.
The sad thing was it seemed Traviss was able to write new characters well or build on existing characters the reader hardly knew about, which was a plus those characters weren't badly wreten, except again for the two new S-II's that were introduced, One a washout from the project turned to hating Halsey because she couldn't cut it and was out for revenge, and the other a normal S-II who couldn't cope with the realization that they were taken as children and trained to be soldiers and became flippant on Halsey in fact all the S-II present in this book ended up wanting answers from Halsey from stuff they themselves already knew.
Travis seemed to make it her top priority to completely cast Halsey as the Bad guy needing to be destroyed. And destroyed her character and character associated with the character. But I could live with this turn of events if it wasn't for the poorly constructed narrative.
The book is essentially split up into three plots and I really wish she just picked one and stuck with it because it really destroyed the narrative in several places. If any of you have read any of the previous halo books you would know they focused on one topic and stuck with it making a vary engaging story that expanded on the known universe the good example of the books are the first three (Fall of Reach, The Flood, and First Strike) and the fourth book that introduced the Spartan-III's Ghosts of Onyx.
Traviss seemed not to be able to pick what she wanted to write. A ending to Ghost of Onyx (which at the end has a Shield world which is shown at the end of Halo 3 chief is falling towards which had me giddy with excitement that part of Halo 4 if not all including Halo Wars would all be neatly tied into Onyx but this is for not thanks to this book) A spy novel, or a preachy philosophical debate if humanity deserved to live after what they did to the S-II's
Instead of a single coherent story we got three separate story's all with vary poorly done conclusions to them leaving way to many unanswered questions leaving readers to wounder if they will be answered in Halo 4 or not. Not to mention in the Spy plot it paints the Elites way to Mandaloriany and by that I mean if you read the books most people would know the Elites are a warrior race with strong belief to family linage, honor, and loyalty.(hell one of there motras is "on the blood of our fathers on the blood of our sons we will serve the Covenant to our dying breath.") Which is fine they were the military back bone of the Covenant for generations but in the end the elite plot degraded into the Mandalorian civil war on this site and I mean exactly like the Mandalorian Civil war on this site.
Onto each of the plots:
The continuation of Ghost of Onyx Plot:
It started off well but eventually degraded into a philosophical debate boiling down to we should never have created the Spartans in the first place.
Spy story:
Again started off good with a devious ONI plan to keep the UNSC safe in the shaky cease to hostilities, but degrades into burn the witch attacks on Halsey.
Preachy Philisophical story:
This was handled poorly in the begin through both of the main plots I put it as part of the main because you can't turn a page with out someone asking the question is this right? Should we be doing this? oh and the ever popular is there a GOD?
((If you want full explanations I can give them on my likes dislikes and examples to them but I want to put little if any spoilers in the review.))
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