This is a single post from deeden.co.uk made during the period May 2002 to April 2009. During a previous grand redesign I decided to make a break with the past and consign the old entries to history. This entry is from January 2006 and lives here forevermore.

Best New Reading of 2005: The Colonisation Series

Colonisation: Second Contact

In my Best of list for a second year in a row is Harry Turtledove; last year he made the list with his WorldWar series, this year it’s with the follow-up series, Colonisation, comprising Second Contact, Down to Earth and Aftershocks.

This series isn’t as good as the original in my opinion. I think it was the fact that there is no war going on at first so the story revolves around the interaction between the various countries and the “settled” aliens. It’s not that I want action, it’s just that I don’t think he writes the non-action portions of the story as well as the action portions. At times the story drags along and even when things move it’s sometimes in fits and starts.

The strength of this series is how well Turtledove brings the aliens to life. It’s easy to like a good number of them which makes the story more interesting as it’s not just a simple story of human vs. alien.

I clearly enjoyed the series, or it wouldn’t have made it onto this list. It just wasn’t up to the standard of the previous series and that disappointed me. I did still buy the last book of the entire series, Homeward Bound, so I haven’t abandoned the series.

Finally, yes I know that this is a series of 3 books. As I’ve said before, it’s my list so I make the rules.