Servicable and somewhat original.

I wasn't a huge fan of Cold Forge, which I found to be a little one-note in terms of a certain villain (fun at first, but outstayed his welcome around the halfway mark) - and I never really connected with any of the characters. That said, it was decent in terms of building atmosphere and the setting was novel.

As for Into Charybdis - I think it's pretty clear that it suffers from being too long without what I would consider narrative justification. There just isn't that much to the plot that needs such verbosity - and while I appreciate the amount of characters that have something to do in the tale, I must admit I struggled to empathize with - or care about most of them. They pretty much all lack the kind of interesting arc that I prefer for characters in a very long story, and they're all somewhat stereotypical in their roles. Not all of them, mind you - but most of them, including both the main antagonist and most of the protagonists.

Once again, there's a very one-note villain - and while featured less prominently, it's a similarly tiring character for me. Obviously, that's highly subjective - but I like my villains to be a little more nuanced and not quite so.... over-the-top.

Also, I must say that a certain character which serves as a call-back to the previous novel, did NOT work well for me. In fact, I found it downright silly and working against the tension and horror that's appropriate for the setting and the Xenos. If these novels are ever made into movies, this is one character that would never work without it becoming something of a comedy, which would probably demonstrate my point better than my words here.

That said, I must praise the book for having more than a few surprises in there. I appreciate not being able to predict what will happen, and - in particular - what will happen to what character, and when. I definitely couldn't predict that for many of them, including all the leads.

The most praise I will lavish upon the setting itself. I found it compelling and quite detailed. While I have zero knowledge of that sort of structure, theoretical or otherwise, it certainly seemed more plausible than it might otherwise have, with less effort and research.

It's clear that the author spent some time with the right people to establish some of the facts, which is always nice.

Anyway, I would probably rate Cold Forge a 6/10 - and this is more like 5/10 - overall. I can't bring myself to round it down to 2 stars - as it did have enough quality elements to go beyond that low a score, so I'm rounding up instead.

But note that I'm probably an outlier - in that I dislike some of the more popular Alien novels, like Phalanx (which I found utterly terrible).

So, keep in mind that tastes differ and all that.

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alien

fantastically amazingly greatest so far.
Good dialogue. all good. said alls I need to say thanks

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Excellent writing and performance.

Apart from - perhaps- the fanciful Marcellus arc this was terrific throughout with a particularly memorable bad guy leader. Writing and performance top notch, one of the best of the Alien novelizations.

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Complex story line, difficult to follow

After listening to the amazing Cold Forge (CF), which featured a fantastic narrator, I had very high hopes for Charybdis (C). I was also compelled to listen to C after hearing Alex White's interview on Alien Theory - far and away the very best alien universe (and other) channel I have come across. I absolutely appreciated that White wanted to explore different elements with C, wanted to keep the narrative fresh and exciting and it is... in places. But ultimately from the concept of Charybdis itself, which felt hard to picture in detail to the convoluted plot for which the necessary suspension of disbelief became increasingly untenable; there was just too much going on. As such I have to say it fell several notches below CF.

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Very ok

Ambles along, for an alien story the tense, overwhelmed, no escape atmosphere doesn’t feel like it’s quite there. I still wanted to listen to the whole thing even with the oddities and sometimes slow pacing in the story. I don’t want to spoil it having read some reviews after I completed it I wasn’t the only one who felt this way about the characters etc.

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A quirky take on Aliens that is a bit like marmite

The biggest flaw right off the bat is the lackluster narration. Most of the characters sound the same which made for awkward listening. It was difficult to tell who was speaking to who in certain sections. Why are 95% of the Americans from Texas? A stark contrast to its predecessor, The Cold Forge, which had excellent narration throughout.

Spoilers ahead:

The story was interesting and put a new spin on the classic formula, but I have a feeling some people will love what they did with Blue being an Alien, while some will hate it. I was very disappointed with the main character death of Chy half way through which knocked points off for me. I get going for shock factor but it sucks following a character for that many hours just to have them offed in a pretty lame way. What's worse is that the doctor doesn't even ask about her upon reuniting with the Americans in the bunker. If anything I feel like the author killed off too many of the key characters, often in unsatisfactory ways. Also, what the hell happened to the Bishop synth? They pack him up and he's never heard from again. Seems like he would have been useful during the final hive assault, no?

It's still an enjoyable story, but don't go into it expecting greatness.

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No protagonist?

This one just confused me. I am listening to these books while doing other things, so I'll gladly admit to being preoccupied, but this is the first one in the series where after 3 hours I still can't make heads or tails of who anyone is. The perspective changes constantly and there seems to be no main protagonist(s). I can't keep tabs on all these people without concentrating, and I'm in the fiction section to relax. Skipping to the next one.

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Swearing breaks my immersion

Swearing is not edgy it's just a bit low tier sci fi. Make up swear words is more creative. Some interesting elements. Smoking is also a bit naff. Vaping or something hi tech would fit the genre better. A bit more non lethal combat between humans would be good. A bit more depth to android characters would also be an improvement.

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THIS TIME - ITS WAR! White has done it again!

One of my biggest grievances with the Alien franchise is how one of it's best assets, the colonial marines, have over the years been reduced to a rinsed and repeated troupe: Same cast of gruff roughnecks, same situation, same outcome...then in comes White, throwing convention to the wind in favour of a risky new angle, one which has -

Managed to make the marines interesting again!

About bloody time!

Furthermore, White has picked up and actually done something with a variety of promising aspects that were introduced into the series only to be dropped, or used in underwhelming ways. I'll leave the specifics as a surprise!

Much like The Cold Forge, Charybdis succeeds by taking risks and straying from the beaten path. Anything familiar crops up in organic ways and never feels like forced fan service. Although I can see a few people being unhappy with certain directions taken in this novel, I personally loved them. But, most importantly, this isn't just a fantastic Alien novel, its a fantastic Horror/sci-fi story in its own right. One with disturbing parallels to real-world atrocities...

I totally recommend it!

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Missed opportunity

I'm a huge fan of the Alien series, but this book didn't hit the mark, for me anyway. I don't normally post negative reviews, but I can't remember a group of characters that I hated so much. If I was meant to feel sorry for any of them, it failed massively. From overly aggressive to outright annoying, they just irritated. If these characters reflect the human race, we are all terrible. Apart from that, it took a long time to get going and lacked the terror that Aliens are meant to inspire.

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