>>455727509
Fall of Reach and First Strike are the direct prequel/sequel respectively to Halo CE. Puts a lot of perspective onto the setting that was portrayed more in the background in the original game but might leave you feeling cheated at the direction 343 took things. The Flood is just a novelization of the events of Halo CE but includes a lot more of what went on between the missions as well as telling character driven subplots from the perspectives of covenant soldiers and human survivors, great read if you loved the game. Try to find the original versions of the original novel trilogy as 343 edited and retconned the new editions of them when they took over the franchise. I haven't read the new editions so I can't say just how badly they fucked them up and from what I've read of their new books I have no intention to.

>>455731665
Contact Harvest is a great introduction to the human-covenant war and gives the largest view of normal life on the side of both the UNSC and Covenant Empire, but was tied in to the halo 3 release hypetrain so a few things feel crammed in for marketing. Cole Protocol explores the fringes of the conflict and mostly follows a band of Covenant pirate-smugglers and UNSC deep ops, a great exploration of originality and what can be done with the setting. Ghosts of Onyx is likewise exploring the sidelines of the main conflict and to me will always be the canonical end of the Halo series alongside Halo 3. Great read on its own as well but be prepared to despair again at all the potential 343 wasted.
(1/5)




The Forerunner saga is a decent read on their own but be warned it radically alters and retconns the setting's foundations, most notably by stripping away any mystery of the Forerunners and directly contradicting Halo 3's terminal AI ARG. The changes themselves aren't necessarily bad initially but I'd be a lot more forgiving if they didn't end up leading directly into Halo 4 and its laughable ancient evil awakens cartoon villian antagonist. I don't remember if it was presented later in this series or ruined by some other piece published later, but an origin for the flood is implied and then thoroughly wasted by a handwaive of hate powered magic space dust. More wasted potential but a decent enough read on its own.

Avoid the Traviss trilogy (Glasslands, Thursday War, Mortal Dictata). The first book is a decent premise spoiled by some mary sue interjections and a complete disregard for existing lore and fundamental lack of care or understanding for the setting that only gets worse as the trilogy goes on. A mediocre read at best with horribly cliche yet somehow simultaneously utterly unbelievable characters driven by motivations that are straight out of a questionable fanfiction at best.
(2/5)



Halo: Evolutions is a collection of short stories by various authors and this is where the shit is at. Headhunters, The Mona Lisa, Midnight in the Heart of Midlothian, Pariah, The Return, every story here is a gripping and thought-provoking exploration into the setting and each a love letter in their own right. Covenant and Human societies get the most behind the scenes exploration here. Surprisingly Traviss's story Human Weakness isn't awful, but is fairly mediocre and again you can see her imprinting herself over Cortana's character to soapbox her personal (mis)interpretations of the setting. The real exception here is Palace Hotel, and given that it was written by a longtime Bungie artist I can only assume it was included as some kind of inside joke. The story is a literal fanfiction of a level from Halo 2 with one of the unnamed marines magically recognizing the Master Chief as his childhood friend from before he was kidnapped for the SPARTAN program. The story is meaningless, poorly written, goes nowhere, and serves no purpose. The rest of these stories contain the best written works of the setting.
(3/5)



Broken Circle is a mixed bag. On the one hand its an interesting peek into Covenant Society, specifically the Sangheili and thank God there's finally some of that beyond the literal space spaghetti of Traviss's novels. On the other hand it opens fairly weak with a rather bland interpretation of a mix between the newer but deeper covenant lore established in Halo 3 and the absolute horrid mess of 343 canon that was to come. Overall it's a great novel focusing entirely on Covenant society in the immediate post-war, if you can get through the comical dehumanization and stripping away of any character from the prophets and brutes and bland lore retconn spoondfeeding that it opens with. If Contact Harvest gave hope for sympathetic or well-written antagonists within the Covenant then this was the nail in the coffin that cemented 343's nu-canon. The author does tell a compelling conflict among the factions of Sangheili so I strongly suspect the weak opening was specifically requested and he tried the best he could with it. I definitely consider this the weakest of the Halo novels but I do consider it a Halo novel rather than 343 fanfiction because it left me with a glimmer of hope for the franchise that was subsequently snuffed out completely by-
(4/5)



Hunters in the Dark is absolutely horrid, below bad fanfiction tier. It again ignores or retconns the existing material, features characters as lively and likable as wet cardboard (who may as well have been written on such), and centers around an asinine plot that doesn't belong anywhere near the setting that is ultimately overcome by the power of love (not joking). I swear this one must have been a piece of fanfiction for star trek ds9 at some point. I had actually already ordered Last Light but after reading Hunters in the Dark I never bothered to open it and stopped following anything Halo. For me this book and the subsequent release of Halo 4 and 5 killed Halo. It was no longer what it was and any chance of anything I viewed as 'good' coming from its new handlers was gone. Even if you're a diehard 343 fanboy I strongly doubt you'll get any enjoyment out of this book.
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