A review by verkisto
Aliens: Steel Egg by John Shirley
2.0
So, Steel Egg isn't as bad as the two Diane Carey novels that preceded it, but it's not a whole heck of a lot better, either. There's a foreword to the book where Shirley writes about telling a story the precedes the first Alien movie, about giving a reason why Weyland-Yutani knew to set up its ships to be ready to respond to distress calls in the hopes of finding the xenomorphs. What follows is a novel that, for the first half, is just a retelling of Alien in a different environment, and for the second half is just a wacked-out space adventure that doesn't have a whole lot to say about it, other than the fact that we encounter an alien who calls itself Larry.
Larry the alien.
No, this isn't a satire or a parody.
I had higher hopes for this book, since Shirley is considered a legend in science fiction circles, but I was surprised to find that his style is tell-y, his characters were a bit cliched, and he approaches the story with the subtlety of a dozen xenomorphs chasing down its prey in a dark ship corridor. It's not outright bad, but it's not really worthy of recommending, either. I have two more of these books to go to finish out the first two attempts at telling new Aliens stories, and I think I'll be glad to be finished. I don't expect them to be literature, but I expect more than what I've read.
Larry the alien.
No, this isn't a satire or a parody.
I had higher hopes for this book, since Shirley is considered a legend in science fiction circles, but I was surprised to find that his style is tell-y, his characters were a bit cliched, and he approaches the story with the subtlety of a dozen xenomorphs chasing down its prey in a dark ship corridor. It's not outright bad, but it's not really worthy of recommending, either. I have two more of these books to go to finish out the first two attempts at telling new Aliens stories, and I think I'll be glad to be finished. I don't expect them to be literature, but I expect more than what I've read.