Alien: River of Pain

This won’t be the first review of this book, but I hope you’ll consider it to be the most in-depth as you read mine. I wasn’t sure what to expect from this novel: another simple “in-betweener story” with a few name drops to cash out? It wasn’t; I was surprised. I just finished it and here are some thoughts! Spoilers are marked. Pros/Cons are listed at the bottom, if you want a Sparknotes version of the review, just read that.For starters, this book is the direct prequel to the classic 1986 film, Aliens. In the events of the film, Ellen Ripley wakes up from a 57 year long stasis in deep space after defeating the eponymous creature in Alien, to find her daughter is dead, and the company who employed her wants to throw her back at the wolves by sending her to where the story of Alien began-- LV-426, now populated, colonized, and called "Acheron," (Literally, river of pain) to act as an advisor on a rescue mission. This book is the story that sets the frame for Aliens, quite literally taking place before and during the film.The book details the colonization and founding of the Hadley's Hope settlement there. River of Pain explains that technically, Acheron isn't a planet, but a planetoid, as it falls in the orbit of a sun but is too small to be a planet, and too large to be a comet.The book started out very slow, in my opinion. It starts on the Nostromo, recreating the scene from Alien where Ripley confronts Ash in the med-bay. The book also has a scene that expands the opening of Aliens, where the salvage team finds the Narcissus, with Ripley and Jones aboard. The reader will find that the book has scenes from the first two films in the series (but mostly the second) that are intertwined with the story of Acheron's colonization.The early chapters focused on setting up atmosphere processors and the events that brought the colony to full operation. It wasn't much of a page turner whatsoever-- I often wondered when the book would get interesting. There was an earthquake that swallowed a processor and the engineers seemed to scoff about it, knowing that while it was wasted money, their employer certainly had the funding to cover its replacement, and as such, seemed disinterested in the entire process altogether, only caring for their paycheck (a harsh reality of space frontier work.) One interesting event was the birth of Rebecca Jorden, the first person to be born at Hadley's Hope, leading to a big celebration. Some time after this, a new commanding officer is sent to take over the chain of command over the **SPOILER** Colonial Marines stationed at the settlement for protective services. **SPOILER**The book mainly focuses on the Jorden family: Anne, Russ, Tim, and Rebecca (Newt.) Apart from background stories (again, more on that later) they acted like their film counterparts. Tim seemed like a cardboard character, lacking emotional depth or personality and speaking little during the whole book. Russ only seemed to care about money and his children, projecting opposing traits of greed and love (but the two can be intertwined, it seems.) Anne seemed like her head was in the clouds until later acts but she was strong, if conflicted, and Newt behaved probably closest to her film counterpart-- young and likeable, but intelligent and good-natured. While I didn't try to "read" into the characters much, as I knew this novel would just feature many pointless characters, it did bring back a lot of old faces, namely from the Special Edition of Aliens, and also introducing some new ones. The old faces such as Lydecker and Simpson are there. Ripley, Burke, and Gorman had minor parts in the novel, their inclusion solely for the storytelling element.While adding new faces was necessary to tell the story of Hadley's Hope, I felt at times that, at best, most were forgettable Alien-fodder who would only be recognizable for a few chapters by name only. This proved to be fairly true which didn't disappoint, as it allowed the story to progress, but didn't add to the story in itself.A few noteworthy new faces are Captain Demian Brackett, a member of the United States Colonial Marine Corps, with a decorated history of bravery and an even more interesting past with **SPOILER** Anne Jorden. **SPOILER** Also new are Lieutenant Paris, a witty officer and a marine named Draper. There were plenty of other new faces, such as the science team's staff of doctors, but they didn't really play much of a part until the end, and the other new faces were easily forgettable, gone after a chapter or two.Before this becomes a term paper in length I'll go over what I did, and didn't like.Having not yet read Newt's Tale (though I have a copy on my computer) I was mostly in the dark about the infestation story, but knew that there was one, bottom line. This book expands on that (and draws from Newt's Tale in parts, I have read.) I did enjoy the setting, and how it intertwined with the beginning of Aliens. Hadley's Hope offered great potential for storytelling, totally avoided and missed by recent endeavors such as Aliens: Colonial Marines and by the franchise altogether. It was very neat to read the canon, in-between story (as Alien: Out of the Shadows had been another of the like, taking place solidly in-between the first two films and starring **SPOILER Ripley.**SPOILER**)The book had some great fight scenes, and some plot twists leading the reader further down the rabbit hole. This is a gory book, fully capitalizing on the Alien’s acid blood. It had an admittedly slow start, but once it picked up the pace and got out of first gear, I found myself unable to put down the book, not only out of interest for the ending, but, unfortunately, to rid myself of some of the things that didn't make sense. The bulk of the story was enjoyable, thrilling, and a page-turner. While having the whole story in one place was great to have, I do have a fair share of nitpicks and ambivalent thoughts towards the novel.To start, I feel as though once Russ Jorden was brought back to the colony with the facehugger attached, the entirety of the story after his death was ret-conned into the movie canon with subtle references and the like. We know he dies and all hell breaks loose, leaving it at just that would have been fine, as a life-long fan of the series. The mystery of Hadley’s Hope added to the greatness of the film counterpart, and in some ways I felt like the book was a cop-out. It had a homogenized, "Star Wars Holiday Special" feel to it, as if it was "just there" solely for the place of existing to tell an unnecessary story for the interested parties.I was definitely interested in the book, and the story leading up to Aliens, but in places, the plot fell short, while in others, compensated for its weaknesses, which I commend the author for, but the wishy-washy pacing was overbearing at times. Also, while I did enjoy the multiple plotlines changing between major players like Anne and Brackett, and the occasional Ripley chapter, sometimes it just got plain confusing. Another thing I felt totally unnecessary was the addition of the romantic history between Anne and Brackett—and the inclusion of Colonial Marines on site in general. As I mentioned earlier, it carried an overbearing weight of the word “ret-con” with every page. There was also a lot of senseless running about the complex, akin to a marathon, but with Aliens chasing, and no finish line or clear-cut goal, apart from survival.In addition, the entire story just seemed like an orgy of minor characters “existing” and the major roles “surviving.” To be fair, the writer did an excellent job on the book, all in all, but some of the characters felt totally out of place; unnecessary. Deleting them might have fared better for the plot on the whole. Some of them just seemed plain stupid, acting only because they had a brain, but not using it.While I wanted to avoid talking about the ending until, well, the end of my review, it appears the time has come to speak of it. The ending had a cheesy, 80’s B-movie quality to it, and while being a multi-faceted ending, the first felt totally cheap and in a surprise move, saw the survival of a few major characters (the ones I liked anyway,) and ended with their pledge to expose Weyland-Yutani’s evils to the universe. The second, and final ending, was somewhat fitting, but ended abruptly—again harkening back to the tropes of 80’s flicks. No surprise there.In summary, adding points where needed:PROS:-Tells the story of the Hadley’s Hope infestation in great detail.-Features a cast of familiar faces, such as Newt.-Plenty of well-worded action sequences and great surprises.-Great rising action and climax.-Played on the “evil corporation” themes, humans vs. humanity, etc.-A few quotes from the book echo those from the films.-Expanded on the Derelict.-All in all, an authentic Aliens adventure and worth reading at least once.CONS:-While the story stayed true to its source material for the most part, I was absolutely taken aback that the story had no mention whatsoever of John J. Marachek (who as some Aliens fans might remember, was the patient who died during a botched removal attempt of a facehugger,) instead replacing him with some forgettable placeholder who died from acid spray of a deceased Alien as doctors hastily attempted to remove the facehugger from his face. Really?-More on the difference from movie canon to book canon, the book makes absolutely no mention of how the facehuggers came to be in the glass jars, only that one was displayed in one.-Plot holes riddled this story unfortunately, making an otherwise awesome novel an “ehhh” one.-River of Pain features a detachment of Colonial Marines stationed on Hadley’s Hope. This was totally unnecessary in my opinion and the book made little mention of why they were there apart from obvious reasons. It just set up a scenario that was mutually exclusive from the movie that distanced it further from what I felt was true canon.-Love triangle between Brackett, Anne, and Russ. Again, totally unnecessary. While Brackett was a likeable, strong character, his place and motivation in the story seemed only fueled by his past love for Anne, making me wonder if he was acting out of honor and duty or really just out of love, and question how the story would differ was he totally unrelated to her.-The story was filled with flat, faceless characters that died on their knees, and not fighting. While historically some characters in the film have fallen to this fate, I know the bulk of them would fight to the death.-There were a lot of things that didn’t make sense to me, such as sending marines and volunteers back to the Derelict, only for them to come back facehugged, a few of the later plot elements I won’t spoil, and in general, the last half of the book being just an aimless slaughterhouse/marathon combo.-The first ending was cheesy, and the second was abrupt. Oh well.-All in all a solid read but didn’t offer much new for fans who’ve read Newt’s Tale or seen the Aliens Special Edition.In closing, this was a solid read (and I stress that) but wasn’t excellent. Given what little elbow room the author had to formulate a totally new story, I would say he did well, but this book didn’t quite match what I’d hoped it to be, leading me to believe this book had lots of potential to be greater than it was, only to unfortunately fall short of that greatness. I wasn’t sure to rate this 3 or 4 stars, so I will settle on 4 purely for effort, but only because I can’t quite give it the 6.5 or 7/10 rating I’d like to give (and fractions is hard.) If you are a fan of the films I would suggest this book to better solidify the story of Aliens. If you don’t like the films too much, I would sway you from the book, as the novelty seems to hold for fans only. I enjoyed this book for what it was and how little the author had to work with, but I don’t think I would re-read it for a second helping. Thanks for reading!

This third of what I think of as the "between novels" taking place in the Alien universe between the original ALIEN and its sequel ALIENS. I assumed River of Pain would be a tough one, because it basically tells the story of what happened to the colonists on LV-426 after Carter Burke sends Newt's family out to find the derelict spaceship. If you've seen ALIENS, you know how this story, basically, will turn out, which makes Golden's sharp characterizations of the colonists and small crew of Marines stationed there all the more effective when the acid hits the fan.Golden, i think wisely, spends the first half of the book telling the backstories and interplay between a number of characters prior to the discovery of the ship, specifically Newt's family (her brother, mother and father), and a newly-assigned CO of the small Marine force who also happens to have a history with Newt's mother. Because we live and breathe with the people in the first half of the book when the alien invasion begins, the fear factor is ratcheted up a LOT.This one is for fans of the early ALIEN series, no question, answering a question perhaps very few of us wondered - what horrors overcame the residents of Hadley's Hope before James Cameron's camera crew arrived. Like it or not, read this book and you'll be thrown into the middle of the terror. Nice job with this one.

SpoilersWith this being the conclusion to the trilogy (Shadow and Sea being the first two installments) I’m happy it was last, as this was the weakest of the three.I felt like this book at a lot of potential, especially with it centering around the fall of Hadleys Hope on LV-426/Acheron. Instead the first 200 pages wasted time on characters and stories that had no outcome or little to no involvement with the final product. Case in point, Captain Brackett and Draper. There was hinted at a possible power struggle and the two barely had any interaction. Why put this at all when the two are never together until the end and accomplished nothing?The love story of newts parents, Anne and Russ, with Brackett being a past lover of Anne, was completely unnecessary and the story could’ve continued without it. Plus I feel it was only added to the story to somehow sympathize with how he feels with the end result.It’s briefly mentioned about the state of the planet being unstable a few years prior to the events happening at Hadleys Hope. Why? I don’t know and confused as to how it was never was brought up again. There was a whole chapter of how the ground was splitting one of the processors....and then nothing, rather confusing. Out of all the books I’ve been reading of Aliens, this one by far takes the cake on the weakest written chest bursting scene regarding Russ’ character. I think it was, “He screamed in agony. Pain. Thing runs off.” I had to reread the two sentences and roll my eyes.This one probably bothered me the most. So, Russ comes back with the FH attached and they send people out to secure the ship. Instead of that, several people return with FHs attached, like 5 people. Now, Anne informed them what had happened but yet the people were stupid enough to go to the eggs anyway? Its a hard stretch for me. Annnddd when the aliens burst out from the colonists back at the med lab, they continue to let the aliens run off after coming out! Wtf!?The little tie-ins to Aliens is nice though. Like why the marines weren’t with Anne and Russ when they went to the location of the craft, I was wondering how the author was going to do that once I knew there would be marines at the colony.I also liked how the aliens would “spit” on the humans faces to paralyze them so they could be moved easily. I hadn’t thought of them needing to do anything like that but it makes sense and adds to it being even more intrusive.Finally, the ending...now that I’ve read the trilogy and all three are open ended, what the hell happens...? Are any ever mentioned again? I mean, the ending to this was left with survivors...The last 3/4s of the book was pretty good so it wasn’t a complete eye roll. Overall I feel like the author did a swing and miss with this. Like I said in the beginning, it could’ve been so much greater, with the scale, fighting and outcome. Sadly it was mild when it should’ve been hot.

This honestly should have been the movie. Or had it split into two parts. Such a good book. Even though you know the outcome if you've seen aliens, the ride to get to that point was a wild one and I'm super glad I read these 3 books. Fire for sure.

ALIEN: RIVER OF PAIN is the third book in the new Titan Books trilogy billed as canonical companion pieces to the movies. Written by Christopher Golden, a dab hand at the ol’ franchise tie-ins, it tells the story of the fall of LV-426 (aka Acheron aka Hadley’s Hope). For those a little rusty with the franchise, that’s the moon where we first met a facehugger back in 1979′s ALIEN and then, 57 in-movie (and 7 actual) years later in ALIENS, it was the terraforming colony upon which Ripley and the Colonial Marines dropshipped their asses after receiving a distress call. Of course, they were too late. Acheron had already fallen, its people, save one little girl called Newt, either dead or impregnated with chestbusters-in-waiting. RIVER OF PAIN tells the story of what went down.It’s not the first attempt to fill in this blank. Back in the 90s, Dark Horse Comics released a GN entitled NEWT’sTALE and, like that book, Golden tells his story partly from the POV of Newt. But there are other characters, too, including the science team, the colonial marines employed to protect them, and the everyday colonists – the men, women and children who have made this place their home.For the most part, it’s a solid story, very much maintaining the feel of the second movie. Golden has been careful to reference events through a series of flashbacks to the movies, in order to correspond with the timeline established within the ALIEN franchise. It makes the book feel all the more genuine in terms of continuity. If I have any criticism, it’s perhaps the leisurely pace employed. Golden invests a lot of time in developing the characters, most of whom, it’s fair to say, quickly devolve to “red shirts” when we get to the business end of this book. When things do heat up, the pace becomes frenetic with all the blood and acid and plasma fire you would expect from an Alien book but, for the less patient reader, it may not come soon enough.That said, as a fan of the movies, I did find this book hugely enjoyable and, like its predecessor, ALIEN: SEA OF SORROWS, it feels a lot more true to the movies than some of the earlier tie-in novels. What more can you ask for?

The best of a good trilogy this takes us up to the events of Aliens. It's well written and doesn't let up. If you ever wondered what happened at Hadleys Hope before Aliens this is as good a treatment as you are likely to get. As a story its better than the AVP films and its good enough to be adapted in my view. Fat chance of that happening but the book is worth your time and money.If you like the films you should read this series its that simple. I liked how elements of the start of Aliens were worked into the story.

When I heard tell this book was set pre-Aliens I was a bit apprehensive; after all how much story could possibly be told? However of the Trilogy that I have read this has by far been the best and superior read. Christopher Golden the author is a wonderful wordsmith and he really helps to suck you in to this dark and hopeless world.The characters of Anne Jorden (Newt's mother) and soldier Brackett whom Anne has a previous history with are shining examples of great characterisation, however in this entire piece there is not one weak link. Every character no matter how unimportant or evil is given different layers, and by the end you will be left gobsmacked. So enamoured with the characters was I that I found myself hoping against hope the characters would pull through. Any fan who has seen Alien however knows how this story ends for the colony on Acheron. That being said it is worth your time if your a fan of the series. There's enough twists and turns throughout to keep you guessing, and there are some moments that genuinely pull at the heart strings.What I loved about the book though is how similar it is to Alien. I didn't realise but there is not an Alien to be seen at all until the last third of the book, the author instead choosing to focus on building up the characters and their relationships; humanizing the Alien fodder so to speak rather than immediately throwing them to the wolves. It's something that works. When characters begin to be abducted by the Xenomorphs, you actually care.It's also a great companion to read before Aliens.This is a must have for any Alien fan!

very good link to the film series, perhaps this rather than the crap that was the other prequels should have been the film. you can guess whats going to happen to most of the characters but that does not stop it being an entertaining read. i couldn't put it down once it got to the death throes of the colony. the other two books in the series while not bad dont really fit in as well as this but are still worth a read.

There were a few negative reviews about this book which initially put me off, however after reading the first two books I couldn't refuse. I enjoyed reading this book, yes you don't see the aliens until about 60% into it and there are a few to many scenes from the films however its still a good read. I enjoyed seeing how the colony began and how it got to the state it was in at the beginning of aliens. The book is finished off brilliantly by tying in an action scene with the entrance scene from aliens, it was good to see the connection. I thoroughly enjoyed it.