Aliens: Genocide

Aliens / Predator / Prometheus Universe

by David Bischoff

Another science fiction adventure from the popular "Aliens" series.

Genres: Science Fiction, Aliens, Horror, Fiction, Comics, Graphic Novels, Science Fiction Fantasy

288 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 1993

About the author

aka Mark Grant (with Bruce King), Brad Quentin (with Terry Bisson)

Born in Washington D.C. and now living in Eugene, Oregon, David Bischoff writes science fiction books, short stories, and scripts for television. Though he has been writing since the early 1970s, and has had over 80 books published, David is best known for novelizations of popular movies and TV series including the Aliens, Gremlins, Star Trek: The Next Generation, and WarGames.

Reviews

[Ana Mardoll · Rating 1 out of 5]

Aliens Novels: Book 4, Genocide / 0-553-56371-8

"Genocide", the fourth book in the Aliens series (after "Earth Hive", "Nightmare Asylum", and "The Female War"), marks a switch from the Perry authors of the first three books (Steve and S.D.) to author David Bischoff and to a whole new set of characters. The switch is not beneficial to the series, and I will say up front that this is one of the worst, most poorly written novels I have ever read. With that out of the way, let's begin.

One thing needs to be clear up front: if you are hoping to read a book involving the aliens, this is NOT the book for you. This novel is 281 pages long and outside of a quick and dirty battle in the first 20 pages of the book, you will not see an alien until page 200. Not a single alien battle, not a single drop of adrenaline until page two-oh-oh.

Also, it needs to be pointed out: if you enjoy the aliens series for the fan details and the world building, this is not the book for you. Almost every possible detail fleshed out in the previous three books is completely contradicted here, from the major (babies now need 'royal jelly' to become queens) to the minor (Hiveworld's gravity is now 0.9 times that of Earth's, instead of 1.5, for no reason whatsoever). Most of the changes are unnecessary and repetitive (the term "royal jelly" is used almost once per page), and a lot of little details, like scientists calling the aliens "bugs" instead of "drones" just makes this book feel like it was written by a teenage boy.

Speaking of, it's time to cover what the 200 non-alien filled pages talk about. If you ever hoped to hear painfully corny references to "Ghostbusters" and "Superman" in a futuristic novel set after an apocalypse has wiped all of Earth's culture and most of its inhabitants away, this is the novel for you! If you look for terms like "hunky", "hump", and "horny bunnies" in your alien novels, then look no further. Note that there is not *actual* sex in this novel, because sex is for grown-ups and this novel was not written, apparently, by a grown-up. There is, instead, a lot of juvenile 'locker room' talk of sex, a lot of juvenile sexual angst, and a totally realistic angry feminist who secretly likes it when men inappropriately feel her up, because then she has the dual pleasure of decking them AND knowing that she's fulfilled her purpose as a woman by being hawt. Oh, yes, and every woman is described as having a smoking hot rack. As in - and this is a direct quote - "She was a hot, big-busted brunette with her spangled dress spray-painted on."

I really cannot stress enough how truly bad the writing in this novel is. I would regularly stop and read passages out loud so that everyone could groan and accuse me of making this stuff up. It's really that bad. I mean, the *only* description supplied for the alien queen's augmented guards is: "It was big and it was fast, and it was mean. The next one was even bigger, and even faster." Oh, yeah, I feel like I'm actually *there*, what with thrilling details like that.

We trudge on to the plot. Follow me here: The pharmaceutical companies on Earth are using alien royal jelly to create a new kind of steroid. There's a lot of profit in it, and even the military is interested in its applications, but the jelly is running out. So the plan is to gather up a bunch of marines and send them off to Hiveworld to collect a bunch of jelly. For a company who *literally* wants to sell drugs to kids. We've gone from an "Earth in danger of annihilation" plot in the first book, an "innocent people are being murdered by a madman" plot in the second book, and a "we must risk our lives on one last long shot to save Earth" plot in the third book, to this. Drugs for kids and athletes, and the marines might die in the process.

I'm not sure why we're supposed to care that the marines might die, seeing as how they seem to deserve it. The ship captain plays crossword puzzles rather than steering the ship, the commanding officer fails to point out the obvious that if the scientists on board wanted to experiment with creating an alien queen, they could have waited until they were back on Earth rather than dragging it along (note: absolutely nothing exciting or interesting comes from this side-plot), and the grunt marines include such characters as the "Jilted Girl Who Pretends Aliens Look Like Her Ex-Boyfriend" and the "Fun Loving Guy Who Brings His Saxophone For The Trip". Not only does he bring his saxophone on the trip, he takes in on the drop ship down to Hiveworld, although that might be a spoiler, since it's his clever "throwing the saxophone at an alien" that saves the day at the end of the novel. I really wish I was joking about that.

Did I mention that, while the marines are surrounded by thousands of hostile aliens, with only an extremely new and experimental force field protecting them, they spread their food out on the ground to have a fun picnic? Did I mention they set up a game of horseshoes? They also stroll leisurely through the hive of the Queen Mother, discussing such things as their personal life, their sex life, and the various moral issues arising from this drug collecting scheme. When one of them *does* die from the inevitable alien ambush, I was just relieved that maybe they'd shut up now.

This book is one of the worst books I've ever read. The writing is terrible, the alien fan material is flat-out wrong (based on the other books in the same series, books that this novel is supposed to be a direct sequel to), and the action genuinely does not exist. You will never feel any suspense while reading this novel, simply because it isn't here. Pass on this book, and go back to the last three novels and to Wilks and Billie.

~ Ana Mardoll

[Sebastian · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is a solid gold indicator for how low you can go as a writer and still get published by a major publisher.

I mean, four books into the “Aliens” series it should be quite clear I ain’t exactly looking for Dostoyevsky here – I am reading these on a series of beaches, sun, sand, cocktails and all. I’m looking for slightly schlocky reading that more or less keeps to the canon and features aliens in a prominent role, but still this one managed to surprise me with how godsawful it is. The plot, the characters, the style, I made it to the end the same way I’d rubberneck a horrible car crash – just to see how terrible it all can be, and... well, one thing to say for the author, he certainly managed to far exceed my expectations.

What’s really weird is that it actually starts almost promising, circling a potential light retro postapocalyptic drug-run story with an almost military cyberpunk flare, but by the end of it we are drowned in the author’s teenage-level outbursts of zit-face testosterone vision of humanity crisscrossed with, and I’m not even going to put up spoiler warnings here, a gods damn marine dragging a gods damn saxophone into battle with the aliens and then – at a crucial point of the “story” – getting out of a tight spot by smacking a xenomorph in the head with the gods damn thing.

This is now my gauge mark for zero on the 0-100 scale for quality of writing.

[Quentin Wallace · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's strange to me just how polarizing this one seems to be. I remember reading the original Genocide comic series years ago and not being very impressed, but for whatever reason I thought this novelization was worlds better.

It's definitely a better Aliens story than Alien 3 or Alien Resurrection. A group of marines is sent to the Alien hiveworld in order to harvest royal jelly, which is used to produce the drug Xenozip. That's pretty much the plot in a nutshell, but there are various subplots going on that keep things interesting. We are also introduced to a new species of Alien, as there are now "Reds" and "Blacks", much like ants. And of course they don't get along. Some of the characters are a little thin and cliché, but that's almost to be expected in this type of story.

If you're an Aliens fan or a fan of sci fi action/adventure/horror, I think this one is worth a read.

[Glen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a pretty decent book which adapts the original Dark Horse series. It’s a mid series novel apparently but, serves just as well as it’s own one off that follows a corporate businessman who contracts to the military with his pharmaceutical firm Neo-pharm. Scientists have been hard at work looking to use the Aliens Royal Jelly and dna to make strides towards bioweapon tech as well as performance enhancing drugs however, the lack of new Royal Jelly reserves on Earth force the Colonial Marines to use their combined might to assist in a source for new material.
This novel had tons of action and good volleys of dialogue throughout the read. The ending fell a bit abruptly/flat for me as it IS a book series and I felt it wrapped a little too cleanly for being an Aliens book. Again it’s part of a series so I get we may feel a bit unfulfilled at the ending since it should carry forward into the next novel. 3 ⭐️ for some damn fun bug hunting and some interesting characters. No regrets.

[Sebas · Rating 1 out of 5]

I hadn't signed in to Goodreads since 2015, but I felt compelled to warn people about this book, that's how utterly appallingly bad it is. Where to begin?

Well, at the beginning, I guess. The prologue tells us David Bischoff cannot write female characters or horror, but in fairness to him, the rest of the book swiftly proves he cannot write male characters or science fiction either. The entire thing is a misogynistic, poorly written lump of awful people doing awful things for awful reasons. Lines like “Grant smiled, glorying as much in his own manly scent as in the mists of perfume and femininity that wafted his way from this choice little bundle of boobs and buttocks and blond hair he’d bedded down with last night, after de rigeur champagne, caviar, and camera clicks.” make me feel a wave of sadness for the blameless English teacher who taught Bischoff about alliterations. If only they knew then what they had wrought.

At some point the sentence “His tailored camel-hair coat hung over his tailored suit perfectly, every angle and nook and color complementing the jut of his square jaw, the tilt of his brain-filled brow, the steely slate of his penetrating eyes.” is perpetrated, because frankly I have no other word for this sort of writing. I suspect I will sit upright in bed screaming the phrase "BRAIN-FILLED BROW" every night until death brings me blessed relief.

The plot is idiotic, the writing atrocious, and the characters are one-dimensional and flat, yet still utterly loathsome. If you are stuck on a desert island with this book and a single coconut, eat the book and read the coconut.

[Jim Carreer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked it, it flipped the dynamic of the original Aliens story a bit on it's head, with the main female character being the battle hardened marine and the main male character being the civilian along for the ride. The overall tone and characterizations fit squarely into the original movie's universe, which does somewhat date the book overall, but not in a way that should discourage readers who are here for more of what that universe provides.

Additionally, I'll say these older franchise books take a much different, and in my opinion better, tact at describing the nature and origins of the Xenomorphs. In particular, expanding on the idea that they share much in common with social insects like ants or bees. Indeed, the insect kingdom is ripe with horror when scaled up to human proportions, and I've always thought the movies that followed the original Alien and Aliens missed opportunities to expand and explore that.

[Jean-Francois Boivin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the fourth in series of "novelizations" of the Dark Horse Comics graphic novels, this one based on ALIENS: GENOCIDE, written by John Arcudi from a story by Mike Richardson. It takes place 21 years after the events of the last book/comic ALIENS: THE FEMALE WAR and covers all aspects of the comic with a lot of great additions by David Bischoff. One example is a nice new chapter to introduce protagonist Col. Alexandra Kozlowski* that takes place three years before the main action, back when she was a Captain, with events that would later serve as a dramatic hook for her character arc all through the rest of the story.

Bischoff is one of those authors who dabbled in different fiction genres, and was at the begining of his media tie-in phase, after writing two episodes and one novel of STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION. His other ALIENS book, the non-canon ALIENS VS PREDATOR: HUNTER'S PLANET would also be published later in 1994. Aside from his two ALIENS books, I am not familiar with his work but I really love his writing style, it is very descriptive but with short sentences, and the dialogue is like spoken aloud not literary. It feels like this story, about the epiphany of millionaire company CEO and playboy Daniel Grant, was perfect for Bischoff's style. It's not a gore- or aliens-centric story (although there are plenty of aliens, they do not play a central role to the action, just serving as looming menaces), and has an optimistic ending (for ALIENS) and general feeling of hope for humanity as Earth is rebuilding itself a few decades after the alien invasion.

Bischoff is also big on details like timelines and adding names to characters and planets previously unnamed. I love those kinds of details. For example, he names the planet where the Queen Mother was taken from by Ripley's team in THE FEMALE WAR and where the bulk of this book takes place: it is now G-435, nicknamed Hiveworld orbiting the star Achilles Two (p.177). He also like to add last names to characters who only had first ones, and middle names for the ones who had two. One feels like the author had the urge to create Billie's last name when he wrote "She'd studied the reports. Wilks. Billie whatshername." (p.127) but maybe was overruled by the editors.

ALIENS: GENOCIDE is a great adaptation of a comic story that was a little bare. Bischoff adds a lot of his own material, incorporates every single panel of the comic and makes the story a lot more interesting than the source material. Which describes the perfect kind of adaptation in my book.

*NOTE: In the comic she was named Alex Lee. Bischoff here makes "Lee" her middle name.

[Thomas · Rating 1 out of 5]

Oh my god, this book is so. Dumb.

"She could fight or make love with equal abandon. She just wasn't sure which she liked better."

One of the characters is named Henrikson.

Captain Hastings? He's retiring in a year. How much do you want to bet he makes it through the story?

Why on earth would a space marine take a saxophone on an intergalactic ship where he would spend most of his time in hibernation? And why would he take it planetside when it was time to go and face the aliens?

The attraction between the two main characters makes no sense.

In The Female War, the Perrys established that the Hiveworld had 1.5 Earth gravity. In Genocide, it now has 0.9 Earth gravity. Huh?

On top of that, there's no subtlety in how Bischoff creates the opening scene. It's so obviously the exposition, you have no chance to get lost in the story. Plus, the dialogue was just terrible.

Yes, I have regrets.

[Adam · Rating 4 out of 5]

We're finally almost at the release of Alien 3 in my journey through the Aliens time line... probably the great disruption of the alternate time line to a degree. Where, I believe, Dark Horse started writing more general adventures in the Alien(s) universe rather than trying to advance the time line on their own. Next up we have the novelization of the comic book series Aliens: Genocide. This is the first novel out of the hands of the Perry's, which given how good Aliens: The Female War wound up being, I was a bit sad to see since the improvement. However, let's give Bischoff a chance to tackle John Arcudi's comic series, which is also the first non Verheiden driven story.

If you haven't had the pleasure of reading the original comic series then this story sort of picks up a bit after where "Female War" left off. Humanity has been rebuilding after the Alien infestation and there's a solid amount of clean up of the last remaining nests. This all feels entirely abrupt and the thread about the Ancient Engineer alien from the first story is entirely lost. I was somewhat surprised that this novelization, as part of it's fleshing out tale, did not include the bridge in the story presented in Dark Horse Presents: Aliens - Platinum Edition, where we are told why the Earth is suddenly still inhabitable. Lot's of crucial stuff happened in there, but I guess in terms of the Dark Horse commission, they wanted Bischoff to stay strictly within the bounds of the original Genocide story.

So, with Earth rebuilding and science marching on to study the Alien organism in great detail a number of pharmaceutical firms are working on research. This is the story of Daniel Grant, CEO of Neopharm, and it's invention of a stimulant called Xeno Zip. There is a problem in the manufacture of Xeno Zip in that it requires the ingredient Royal Jelly only found with Alien Queens. With the eradication of the infestation on Earth they need to be looking elsewhere for more. Grant goes to the military to see if he can work out a deal on a joint mission to the Alien homeworld, which they call Hive World here. The one major leap, for me, story wise, was the idea that they were guaranteed to find more usable Royal Jelly at this location, even after Ripley removed the first super queen years prior. It sort of seems like a ridiculously silly idea given the situation... they lucked out in the end, sort of.

One of the major selling points of this arc was that when our "heroes" make it to Hive World they are greeted with a sort of Alien civil war between two different strains of Aliens. Basically, living up that ant analogy presented in Aliens sort of. In any event, this was entirely unexpected and it might be too much for our intrepid force to take on given that there are now thousands of Aliens fighting each other and, presumably, they'd be just as happy fighting the humans.

The story has a lot of staples of the Aliens series and touches on threads of corporate espionage and the like. It's something we've come to expect from the Aliens franchise, but sometimes it's not entirely predictable. I think Genocide did a good job of hiding who wasn't on the up and up for the majority of the story, something I definitely appreciated.

Overall, I thought Bischoff did a fine job fleshing out Arcudi's original ideas. I remember a lot of letters at the end of the comics exclaiming Daniel Grant was like Donald Trump, but Bischoff went full tilt on that and made it so much more obvious. I do find this line of work fascinating, because I was probably too young at the time when these comics were made to really understand much of the problems surrounding that real life character, which spawned this kind of disdain. In any event, if you thought Daniel Grant felt unredeemable in the comics, he's amped up and even more odious. There was one scene from the comics that I really liked, but Bischoff changed it. I think Bischoff's change is reasonable given the situation, but I still liked the original rendition in the comic. When Grant first meets Kozlowski in the comic he mistakes Henriksen for her, because his sexism wouldn't allow the thought that a woman would be in charge of the mission. Bischoff made up for this in other ways, but I always liked that particular scene.

Ultimately, I did enjoy this longer form of the original Genocide story. I think Bischoff did a pretty solid job on expanding on Arcudi's original idea and adding more depth to his characters. So, even if you've read the original comics this was a pretty fun rendition of that tale. So, even though we might be switching up authors in future novels, I'm confident Dark Horse will make pretty good choices in picking them.

[Kelly · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not good but not exceptionally bad. Pretty bad but not great. So bad that it's entertaining?

[Shawn Deal · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very good book. Exactly what you want it to be if you are a fan. I loved the idea of the drug use in the novel and series.

[Ryan Price · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't even know where to begin with this one.

I'll start with the fact that is not highbrow literature in any capacity. This is an action movie put to page. Admittedly, it isn't a good action movie but it is an action movie despite itself.

After finishing Aliens: Genocide I'm still not convinced that the author has ever met a woman in real life. I'm serious about this. Every single woman in this book is described in this order: her hair color, body shape, and the size of her chest. Every single woman in this book is also irrevocably horny. Not in a steamy, suggestive, way but in the way an overly caffeinated teenage nerd might describe. It's absolutely jarring, and almost mystifying, how poorly David Bischoff writes women. In other science-fiction novels of this caliber this might just be the status quo, but from a franchise that spawned Ellen Ripley it's even more insulting.

There aren't any character arcs here. Not a single character gets better, worse, has any kind of interesting personality traits or changes in any real, meaningful, way. I could hammer Bischoff for the way he writes women all day long, but he doesn't write men or even the xenomorphs any better. The snide company guy doesn't get his comeuppance, the marines are so cookie-cutter that you could interchange the names halfway through the novel and I'm sure anyone would ever find out.

The plot is ridiculous. It need not even occur. Not a single plot point feels like it makes sense. If you think this is a novel about killing aliens, you'd be dead wrong. The only time you get with the titular aliens is in the first 15 or so pages and then not again until page 221. This novel is 281 pages long. That's 206 pages of dialogue so bad it makes George Lucas look like Steinbeck.

So, what you get is an evil scientist subplot that is dropped completely and never pans out, a corporate espionage subplot that ends a page after it is revealed, and a main plot that goes out of its way to remove any kind of tension or suspense. They go back into orbit, nuke the nest, and go home victorious. End book. What the hell?

So, two stars. Aliens: Genocide only gets the extra star because the opening 15 pages are entertaining and because it is mercifully short.

As an aside, at one point in the story a marine plays the saxophone to a group of aliens outside of an impenetrable forcefield. Later a different marine beats an alien over the head, successfully, with that same saxophone. That's so goofy that I couldn't help but bring it up.

[Gabriel Wallis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Supposedly, I've read "Aliens: Genocide" before... September 1-18, 2000. I have a slight recollection of this, but I don't remember if I liked it then or not. There was no memory of what the story was about or anything. Luckily, I have a book list that tells me if I've read the book or not.

This round of reading "Aliens: Genocide" was higly entertaining for me. I've been wanting to read an Aliens novel for a while now, and decided that "Aliens: Genocide" was the book for me. I also, to get myself in the mood, recently watched "Prometheus". I think it's time to have an Aliens marathon, though. I've only done it once before.

The concept of the book was rather simple. We are out of Alien royal jelly, so let's retreave some from Hiveworld, a planet overrun by Aliens. Alien royal jelly is produced from queen Aliens, and is used by humans to create Xeno-zip, which is also sometimes called Fire. Xeno-zip enhances human performance, whether it's speed, strength, awareness, or whatever else is necessary. The owner of the company that produces Xeno-zip is Daniel Grant, whom the government decides to hire to travel to Hiveworld and retreave the Alien royal jelly. With him, the government sends a Marine detachment lead by Colonel Alexandra Kozlowski, another main character in the story. When they arrive on Hiveworld, they land in the middle of an Alien species war. Their job is to go down into a hive and retreave the Alien royal jelly and return back to Earth in one piece. Can they do it? I guess you'll have to find out for yourself.

Looking forward to reading some more Aliens novels in the future. They've always been entertaining to read.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book years ago and remember enjoying it quite a bit - however it must be said that I love anything to do with the Alien franchise (mostly). I felt like as silly as some of the choices were, the book had a fun, almost whimsical quality to it, which balanced the seriousness nicely. I also thought the plot was quite interesting, having more to do with the corporate slime than the alien slime. Hokey, yes. Entertaining? Very much so.

[Jonathan · Rating 1 out of 5]

One of my goals in life is to be a published author. Whenever I feel down I just remember how poorly written this book was, and my confidence grows. Worthy of a Mystery Science Theater send-up, this book is comedic gold and scifi-suspense failure.

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cool story but the alien threat just isn't a threat anymore, the humans tech matches them so its a bit boring now

[Quiet · Rating 2 out of 5]

As is so often the case with series like this, there comes a point where the initial threat is so overwhelmingly conquered that the core focus of the series has to change. In this case, Aliens: Genocide represents where the Xenomorphs, the grotesque, hyper-powerful space monsters, are effectively neutered, and are replaced instead with the paranoia of Corporatism, otherwise known as the most (amateurishly) applied conflict in Sci-Fi stories. As with so many other sci-fi books, Alien: Genocide presents this new conflict with the same trope-ridden humanitarianism you would expect; the super-capitalist without a heart takes front-and-center, and it's a bore.

I have a big problem with demasculating the Xenomorphs as well. This book introduces Anti-Acid armor, with the aliens' acid blood being a critical component of why their character is unique and threatening--- so now what? The Aliens are basically tigers in the large numbers of bugs; fast, powerful and dangerous. But that's not interesting; it certainly isn't "alien" anymore. It's just a dangerous force that has to be dealt with, here through the exaggerated numbers of ultra powerful automatic weapons.

That said; I did enjoy the book. These books fit perfectly into what I call "Beer and Pretzels" literature; they're heavy on the action, have very obvious but sturdy plots, just enough characterization, and, indeed, fun sci-fi stuff like spaceships, force fields and lasers. I currently read these books during downtime at my overnight job, and the fact that I can pop in and out three times on the same page and still be compelled and, indeed, have fun reading the book shows how fun and accessible it is.

So Genocide is a turning point for the series, one which is further removing the story from the aliens and instead focusing more on the Human Society component, and that's a bit of a shame. The earlier novels [novelizations, really; these books were originally graphic novels] by Steve Perry maintained the danger element of the aliens but also had the sweeping action of the Aliens film, but that's not the case here in Genocide, which does effectively dismiss the power of the xenomorphs. No less, the writing is still simple, fun and the kind that you can pop in and out of without missing a beat. So whether you're reading this during downtime like I am, or maybe while nodding off from your 8th beer while lazing in the armchair, this is a good book to kill an evening with.

[Alan · Rating 2 out of 5]

While the previous books in this series have been from being considered literature, they were at least reasonably written, enjoyable stories that felt like they could easily belong in an expanded Aliens universe. Genocide, however, didn't even warrant being given that mild praise. For one thing, the writing felt like it was done by some gung-ho Colonial Marine with no experience writing, but throwing down every bit of jargon and nicknames said marines might use. The narrative was rife with way outdated chauvinism - a lot of attention is brought to how buxom the women were, and the playboy millionaire behind the mission is always trying to get the women on the ship into bed - as well as just trite and contrived thoughts and descriptions. And the plot has a bad cadence to it. There's a brief introduction near the beginning, first, explaining how there are two colonies of xenomorphs on the "Hiveworld" (where they're supposed to originate from, or at least did for the previous Alien war) then we meet one of the main characters, a leader of a Colonial Marine squad who is trying to eradicate the remaining aliens on Earth. After that, we get way too much of the playboy funding a trip to Hiveworld in order to collect Queen Mother jelly to manufacture a morally questionable pill back on Earth. Nothing much happens for a long time until they reach the Hiveworld. When they do, there's some discussion of the two warring factions, and bunches of aliens attack the marines and are killed, but take out a few marines with them. Then the survivors of this relatively quick encounter get what they came for and it's book over. Really disappointing, especially since this book jumps several years into the future from the war, and starts over with brand new characters. Definitely the weakest of this series so far.

[Hodgey · Rating 3 out of 5]

This novel was pure Aliens flavoured schlock and I kinda liked it. It's not without some major problems. The writing has its ups and downs. What Bischoff added to the plot by developing Grant and Kozlowski was great. Kozlowski was way more interesting than she was in the comic but the flirtation between her and Grant was incredibly juvenile and often inappropriate for what was happening around the characters. Most of the novel is spent with the characters getting to Hive World (Female War flashbacks intensify). In Female War there was a lot more riding on the plot and the characters were desperate and broken, Bischoff's characters are living in a world rebuilding from the Earth War so the Aliens aren't this cosmic threat they once were. That's fine but it does downgrade the perfect organism to dumb "bugs". Last thing to say is this novel has the most typos I ever read. It makes me wonder if Bischoff had a tight deadline and needed to race to the finish or if Bantam didn't bother to hire an editor. If you want an easy, breezy, entertaining Alien story and don't care about schlock this is a good read.

[The Honest Book Reviewer · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had high expectations for this book, seeing the plot centres around a return to the Hiveworld that Ripley and her crew traveled to in the previous Aliens novel. However, my expectations were not completely met, as the majority of the novel was taken up by some story building on Earth, and then the voyage to the Hiveworld. There are a few tense moments during the journey, but not overwhelming.

I didn't mind the main characters in the novel - they had clear drivers and goals. It certainly felt like the novel was written like a movie script, it had that feel to it. I liked the different elements to the characters, they knew when to be serious, and also could have fun. I thought shifting the focus into the future was a great idea - to see Earth rebuilding. As a sci-fi novel, it works - I just wish the Xenomorphs had a larger role.

One main thing bugged me - the gravity on the world changed. In the previous novel the gravity was stronger than earth, in this novel it was slightly weaker. Somebody should have picked that up in editing.

[Bo · Rating 2 out of 5]

As a book in the Aliens franchise, this isn't very good, the tone is way too cheerful and even comedic at times.

As a sequel to the previous three books in the series, this is downright bad. It makes a lot of references to the events in book 3, The Female War. And it even returns the action to the same planet they visited in that book... but nothing matches up. Clearly this writer hadn't read the finished version of the previous entry. For example, the planet is described nothing like it was previously, and it's gone from a high gravity planet to a low gravity planet.

However, I really enjoyed some of the chapters, in fact I seemed to enjoy them more the more comedic they were. So while this author was the wrong choice for this franchise, I'm sure I'd enjoy his other works better if I ever stumble across them.

[Ewa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I get attached to characters in books relatively quickly so when the previous trilogy ended, I was sure I was going to miss Wilks and Billie. I wasn’t wrong in my assessment. The new protagonists lack a certain background, and a bit of depth perhaps. Mind you, this is the Alien series, none of the higher literature features to be expected:) For me, it read worse then Perry’s creations, the idea was acceptable, and the execution correct. Nothing more to say about something that should be a film rather than a book. On the other hand, I did read it in under 2 days… :)

[J.L. Perish · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think too mamy people are going into these books expecting movie-caliber stories. They're meant to be fluff reading that slightly expand the Aliens universe without disrupting the movies. The book itself is fine. I thought it was really fun until the last third and they shoehorned in a twist that was telegraphed from a mile away, but it was a fun ride. Other than some truly cringeworthy dialog, it gets the job done.

[Andrew Johnson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad! Bischoff’s writing ranges from decent to pretty terrible, but I like how there isn’t much xenomorph action until the last act. I find all of the corporate espionage and character building far more interesting. This is more of a slow build in the vein of Alien rather than an Aliens-style shoot-em-up, which also allows for some different types of horror. It didn’t blow me away, but it’s fun.

[Lisa]

I don’t expect these books to be well written, but holy moly was the writing bad. I hated all the characters and everything they did contradicted everything we’re told or shown about them. It just ends up feeling like all the characters are one person. The writing was so horrible I expected to read about how boobly a woman’s boobs are as she descends the stairs. I love the alien universe but after halfway through this book I had to put it down. DNF.

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bombastic and incredibly ridiculous. There were some decent bits of character writing, but it wasn't exactly dealt with a deft hand.

The comic has the weakness of its main character having a rather sudden shift in perspective and the novel adaptation gives that some room to breath, just a lot more sleaze.

Fun although truly none of the bantam Alien books contain the depth of the current stuff.

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Decent enough premise just maybe not executed as well as i had hoped.
its somewhat Aliens lite but i have no problem with that I was more intrigued with the idea of a superdrug distilled from Alien DNA..How woukd that turn out?
Well maybe thats something for another book as it wasnt really explored here...instead its a more explore..fight..win..kind of Aliens book..so the usual really.
no continuation from the first three so as a standalone its ok.

[Kristian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maybe I'm blinded by nostalga as I used to read these books when I was younger. But Even now, as an adult, I still enjoy what they are, and what they are honest about being. A movie about humans, and killer aliens, going to war. Its candy, its fluff, its not going to be a classic, but its good in what it does. Entertain, and make you want to keep reading.

[Zane Brumley · Rating 3 out of 5]

A standard Aliens story. I like the idea of warring hives, though the idea of humanity knowing what planet the aliens come from isn't my favorite. Mr. Grant, the billionaire protagonist, is interesting because he has a real change of heart about how he's a servant to greed. I don't think the arc is super effective, but I'll award points for trying.

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Id only ever read the comic version of this before, the story is basically identical with a few minor tweaks to pad out the novel but otherwise its the same. A fun Aliens romp set after the female war trilogy in the non-canon Aliens EU.

Good read for those that love the series.