Halo: Glasslands

Several reviews have already observed Karen Traviss’ bludgeoning of Halo lore, blatently abandoning Eric Nylund’s foundation of sci-fi military acumen and Joe Staten’s cultural development of the Covenant races, and her failure to compose a decent book in its own right. I echo these frustrations, and considering that other established legends have been treated by Traviss about as lovingly as Dan Brown has represented Catholics, one has to wonder why something this preachy and simply bad was published and then sequelled under the Halo copyright. The sad thing is that Traviss had a really promising debut into the Halo legend with her piece in Evolutions, an exploration of Cortana’s relationship with John, and Dr. Halsey, as the Gravemind nudged her towards rampancy. But this trilogy is a saggy, begrudging wade through politically correct self-righteousness, and [SPOILER WARNING] it ends up glorifying anti-Earth terrorists because child soldiers were used to protect Earth from annihilation – what’s the Sangheili word for “hypocrisy?” Glasslands, and the Kilo-Five trilogy as a whole, suffer from crippling blind spots:

1. Forcing a moral into a story does not make it well-told. Glasslands harps incessantly on the SPARTAN-II project as an abhorrent crime against humanity, misusing tired old tropes to condemn conscription of children based on a 20th Century ethical sensitivity and a naïve view of human history native to the privileged modern Caucasian. And yet the Spartans depicted in this book are lifeless caricatures without personality or dimension. Read The Fall of Reach and Ghosts of Onyx to see the same super-soldiers as true characters, not pretense for a barrage of social commentary on fictional events.

2. The author pounds her message at the expense of her characters. Nothing renders a novel worthy of the supermarket clearance shelf like protagonists who keep narrowly escaping demise in order to brood on the despicable amorality of their cardboard antagonists. That is, sadly, exactly how Traviss uses her “heroes.” CPO Mendez, former training instructor and father figure to the Spartans, is forcefully transformed from a flexible, diligent professional leader into a whiny, bitter old man pathetically incapable of focusing on mission priorities over his personal demons; in any real-world military branch this type of Pharisaical self-pity would never be tolerated in an active duty NCO. The ODSTs could be inserted from any stock action film, except that they take breaks from their ONI wetwork to indulge in painfully artificial discussions, where Traviss can vent some mommy issues on the mean, mean old witch-scientist Halsey. She seems to think that tight POV inside a character’s thoughts masks her prejudice sufficiently behind “unreliable” narrators, but when you insist on kicking the dead horse in every damn chapter, you’ve lost what credibility the “morally ambiguous gritty intrigue drama” motif afforded you. You’re not Ludlum, Clancy nor LeCarre, and your characters and plot can’t drag each other into coherence with this many scavenged stereotypes.

3. Your readers are not idiots; to force-feed us your opinion renders your writing meaningless. Why write novels based on an existing lore universe, if you’re going to disdain your target audience so shamelessly? Traviss has shown her contempt for “fandom” in the past, so apparently she’s appointed herself the mission of educating us uncultured heathen, as if because we enjoy movies and video games we must be historically illiterate. The thing about ignorant stereotypes is that they’re a figment of the bigot’s imagination, so she’s set up for failure regardless.

It may seem overly personal for this review to focus on the author rather than the text, but that’s because the author is conspicuously present in this book. The narrative forces the reader into Traviss’ private crusade, rather than letting the story tell itself, and that’s really the whole point – it does not stand up as a story in its own right, much less an installment in the Halo legendarium. The rest of the trilogy improves slightly in flow, but assumes that the reader must agree with all the writer’s assumptions, and ultimately concludes that Dr. Halsey’s atrocities are unforgiveable while insurrectionists, alien factions and the rest of ONI find easy sympathy from Traviss for their lies, betrayals and murders. This pseudo-moral pluralism renders Glasslands an absurd disappointment, and not worth paying for.

This book is a direct sequel to the Ghosts of Onyx. It follows those men and women stranded on the Dyson sphere for some of the book but the bulk of it is focused on post-war politics. Sadly, the post-war politics are not very interesting and at times so childish it makes it hard to believe. Here are the basic plot threads without spoilers:

1) ONI sends out a team of people to stir up unrest between two factions within the Sangheili (sp?). Most of what they do is boring but there are interesting revelations and some good dialog. This group provides the only likeable characters in the book. Seems a bit self-centered of Traviss to make every character she didn't create a monster and all of her new characters (some of whom have done and are doing terrible things) funny and caring. This arc takes a back seat about halfway through the book and never develops.

2) We follow one of the Sanheili factions as the plot against the other. Some interesting politics here but like the first thread, it never develops.

3) Halsey, Mendez and company on the Dyson sphere try to figure out what to do there. For most of this plot thread we see Halsey and Chief Mendez act like obnoxious children constantly fighting about who is more terrible. And this is the crux of the problem with this book. Traviss takes a group of established characters from the Halo Universe who all have blood on their hands from the Spartan projects and then makes them all into petty monsters.

They don't come off as angry or bitter or repentant adults coping with what they've done. They come as children. Traviss goes beyond giving these characters flaws and makes them seem like sociopaths.

Maybe one of the more annoying tendencies in this book is that even though these people have all participated in these same terrible acts for some reason Halsey suddenly becomes the bad guy. No one else is on the receiving end of punishment or hatred. This particular conflict is poorly written. It makes no sense and ignores the difficult intricacies required to write this properly and instead opts to take the lazy route just to get the pieces were Traviss wants them to continue the plot. Even the Admiral who signed off on the project and new what was going on is suddenly, irrationally outraged at Halsey's actions. It's not even treated like a political move to get Halsey where she wants here. It just makes no sense.

As others have said, we do leave military sci-fi here but mostly I am okay with that since we are in a post war world now that doesn't follow above the table military operations.

The book moves the pieces on the board and interesting things happen. Unfortunately it moves the pieces by ramming them into place and leaving the drama unbelievable and the political machinations boring.

Halo Glasslands is a book that I honestly can't stand to read. I've been trying to read it as much as i can and yet i cannot find myself being able to read more than a little at a time.

If this was a book that was completely unconnected with the halo series i might have enjoyed it more. But it is a halo book.

As a result one must suffer through the breaking of Canon, the forcing of values, ideals, etc. on a character that did not have them to begin with. It creates a painful experience that has caused a great deal of literal headaches.

Buy this book if you're really a devoted fan, otherwise i suggest finding something to summarize the chapters for you.

I don't know if i'll be buying anymore books from this woman.

*minor spoilers*

This is the only sci-fi series that I've ever become so involved with. I've loved everything about the Halo universe from day one. I'm going to have to retract this book from my memory because it really ruined the experience for me. I didn't appreciate the author using this book as some oportunity to cast quick judgements about humanity over and over for starters. I get the impression that the author took too many pages from Red Vs. Blue's more recent story line. What I mean by that is there's too much talk about feelings, a real lack of action and the females are the center of the story while the men are only there to be emotional suport and lack the ability to think objectively.

The curtains really pull back on author when she delves into discussion on Halsey. She narrates from Halsey's POV as if that somehow justifies leaving her as the scape goat. Since when is Halsey completely incapable of summoning any sort of rebuttal? It's as if Halsey is a rag doll sitting in the corner and the author is shouting furiously at her to gain the approval of her peers

Some of the more subtle aspects really irked me as well. For one, Lucy was never suppose to talk again according to Eric Nylund's novel, but I guess that aspect was inconsequential to this book's author.
Maybe some people will appreciate this new direction, but I feel all the character dynamics and interactions were altered for the worst. I wouldn't be surprised if in the next book a good portion of it was spent describing all the Spartans holding hands in a therapist's office.

I can appreciate the attempt to humanize Spartans, but the degree into which it's done in this book leaves the story line totally inert with some circular arguments to fill the remaining space. Halo 4 keeps a perfect balance at the attempt to humanize John. It doesn't rub your face in all of John's issues and allows room for the audience to draw their own conclusion. It's a difficut task to maintain what makes the Spartans so great while adding personal attributes that gives them uniqueness and she didn't do a good job at that part at all.

The special abilities and the eliteness of the Spartans is the foundation of anything that has to do with Halo. So, I can't understand why this book completely undermines with statements made by Mendez that it's not the elites that win the war and the new Spartan IV program that recruits adults. That's what kills me about this book the most, the slaughter of the Spartan's reputation.

Now to briefly address the discussion about the shameful aspects of the Spartan program. The author was reaching Fox news level with this one. Way to quick to draw a comparison to Hitler. As if the only thing there is to say about history is that everyone failed to react and put a stope to certain atrocities. It's almost insulting to simplify that argument to such a degree. War Is an ugly ugly business and I could not imagine how much uglier a war for the human race would be. I would be remiss to assume that it would so easy to make everything so black and white; that there is no such thing as a moral grey area where you just have to bear the responsibilities of something shameful to accomplish so much more.

Overall the book was well written, however if you read the other books and are expecting the same then you'll be extremely disappointed. Traviss delves into A LOT of different characters thoughts and feelings throughout the book. Not much happens throughout the book given how long it is. Traviss is significantly more descriptive and literary as opposed to Nylund and the other author's more milateristic style. The view is actually somewhat logical **** Spoiler Alert **** given the circumstances that surround the characters. Once the fighting of the war with the Covenant has ceased, it is only natural for those in the government to monday morning quarterback the spartan program and view Halsey as a big time war criminal. It does not require 450 pages to explain all of this in my opinion. With Halsey, Mendez, Fred, Kelly, Linda and the Spartan III's left to their own on the shield world Onyx, it is natural to think that their thoughts would finally turn to something of their past or where they came from. The Fall of Reach actually details the spartans trying to recall their homes and families but it is quickly cut short by their rigorous training or combat expriences. This is the Spartans real first break in the action to actually think about things so I can see where Traviss is trying to go with this. But it is definitely not the direction fans care to see or read. This book doesn't do much to further the story. The depictrion of the Shanghelli and their society is probably the most interesting part of this book and is well written. There are minor inconsistencies with the Elites speaking english but there have been discrepancies throughout the games and such as well.

**** More Spoilers*****

Quick Summary of the book if you don't want to read 450 pages of lengthy, articulate, and emotional writing:

Halsey gets arrested for war crimes of abducting the children for the Spartan II program and is detained by Paragonsky/ONI

Mendez, Kelly, Linda, Fred and the Spartan III's are rescued from the shield world Onyx and the secrets of the Spartan programs/their past are revealed to them (Lucy finally speaks)

A wealth of forerunner technology and the several Huragok (Engineers)are discovered on the shield world Onyx

A team is put together by Paragonsky consisting of a Spartan II Osman 019 who failed augmentation but is now restored, 3 ODST's, a true Spartan II (Naomi) and a civilian named Phillips, to sow discord in the Shangelli society to try and created a civil war.

A peace treaty is made between the humans and Shanghelli (lord admiral hood meets with the arbiter and it is established)

Phillips is left on Shanghellios by invitation of the Arbiter to study the Shanghelli society (he is gathering information for ONI during this time)

The Covenenant has disbanded and their races scattered to make it on their own. They also begin to integrate with the humans and their worlds (except for the Shanghelli and San'Shyum [Prophets])

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This book is not a book that the dedicated and typical Halo fans will appreciate. I simply read it for the sake of understanding where the Halo storyline is going. It will be played off of in Halo 4 so you'll have to accept this as Halo canon whether you like it or not.

This book is boring! Karen Traviss takes forever to get to the point and in the end the point usually isn't even that good.
Spoilers:

She breaks the normalized canon constantly. Even though this is after Halo 2 and the great schism she thinks some Brutes sided with the Elites and are their servants. Honestly replace any mention of Brutes with Jackle and it works out fine.
Dr Halsey comes off as a completely terrible human being and everyone hates her in the Dyson sphere. She did do horrible things, but she always managed to keep a glint of humanity to her.
The Kilo 5 team is unrealistic and such a jumble of mostly uninteresting characters that its painful to track their progress.

This book has such a good premise but falls way short. Judging by what other people say about karen Traviss other books, it's all her fault.
If you're a completist you'll read it, but otherwise skip over it.

Don't get on the bad side of ONI.
I got this for my best friend along with the other two books.

To start, I am a huge fan of both the Halo games and the previous novels (Fall of Reach, the Flood, First Strike, and Ghosts of Onyx). I have read the other books multiple times.. This book will not be reread. This book that follows the Ghosts of Onyx had a good premise to start and had plenty of set up to have a really interesting story and some of the story elements aren't that bad in the book. However, Karen Traviss and her writing completely ruin this book, and her following books. I won't get into the other books she wrote, but they are even worse than this one and will review them separately. Essentially it is just one giant book trying to make Dr. Halsey the most evil person who ever lived. Through her own thoughts in the book, what other characters think about her, to just them straight up calling her a b**** half the time, that is how I would summarize it. The aftermath of the covenant falling takes an entire back seat to this crucification of Dr. Halsey. It is exhausting to constantly hear how terrible she is for creating the Spartans (who saved all of humanity). What could have been a good devil's advocate story about justifying a means to and end with the Spartans creation (which was terrible) for them going on to save all of humanity would have been interesting... if the author didn't ruin it by being completely one sided in the most annoying fashion.

She essentially ruined what could have been a great trilogy that take place during/after the games. Now we will never get more stories from this era of the Halo Universe. And don't bother reading her subsequent Halo books, they are worse. Just reread the ones that came before or find something else. I wish I would have.

First let me say that I agree 100% with N. Stallman's review which is the primary review being previewed for the book, so I don't want to rewrite what Stallman has already said. In fact, I have very little to add to his review, so I won't try. Please read Stallman's review. Second, some of my review will pertain to the CD AUDIOBOOK version which is what I have.

Regarding the Story:
1. Politics. That's pretty much it. If you want action, its not in this book. This is all about politics.
2. The author doesn't even know the difference between a rifle CLIP and a MAGAZINE. This causes me to have zero faith in her ability to effectively understand and write about war...which is why it is entirely about politics.

Regarding the CD Audio Book:
3. I have the CD Audio Book for my long drive to work. The CD's are housed in a pair of odd fold out booklets that are difficult to manage while driving. Its better to transfer them to a CD case with regular sleeves.
4. There are zero musical transitions at the start or end of the CD's so you have no idea that the end of the CD has just occurred until you realize that it has just started the disc over at track one. You might listen for a few minutes and think "didn't we already go through this?" Oh...it started over...ok.
5. Voice work is done well. Accents and specific voices all work well within the story, even when the male reader is doing the female characters.

In the end, I crave more of the Halo Universe, but I somehow doubt that I will care enough to read the other two novels in this particular branch of the series.

The other Halo books by other authors were full of action. I read this book a few years ago so I don't remember the details, but I remember that it was difficult to get through, filled with conversations about how bad Dr. Halsey was.

While I do think it would be inhumane to take children away from their parents and then replace them with clones (what if they took orphans?), and while I get that the survival of the human race is at stake, the book focuses too much on the emotions of Dr. Halsey, and the morality of her actions. I'm not opposed to reading about morality in science fiction novels, like when I read "Shadow of the Hegemon" and "Xenocide" from the "Ender's Game" series, which were filled with moral dilemmas. This book focused too much on the personality of Dr. Halsey and didn't have enough action. There was too much information, too much character development, of Dr. Halsey, in a way that changes tack compared to all the other Halo books.