Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

THE SERIES -- with 8 books and growing, you'll need some info about the series to make a decision about the first one, which is good but in many ways not representative. The author uses limited multiple points of view (MPV) in the first one, just a teaser from the Alien point of view then mostly Telisa and just a few other short points of view. In later books he gets lazy and writes each point of view to a mini cliffhanger which I do not like. I've been known to read books out of order on account of that annoyance, but these have too many switches. A xenoarchaeologist who becomes a relic smuggler sounds like an interesting personal story, but over several novels the series becomes a major "save civilization" type of plot and the characters' personal stories are largely disregarded. In fact, McCloskey kills almost all of them off. There is a hint of this in the first book as a couple of guys we've known for a few chapters are summarily exploded. In the series he dangles characters along for several novels, getting to know them really well, before destroying them abruptly. Why then bother to get to know them and get involved in their hopes and goals in life? The author is very creative at making up aliens and their environments. Too good, and he keeps dismissing environments (sometimes destroying them too) and making up new stuff, sometimes with no relation to the plot. Sometimes major episodes do not further the plot. by the end of the 8th book I was just skimming to find how it ended as none of the writing seemed relevant or interesting. A final flaw is a personal preference regarding LitRPG (combination of literature and role playing games). I despise LitRPG and will not read it. But it is apparent (only in retrospect) this series amounts to LitRPG, and the author seems to intend to make it explicitly so. By about the 6th novel we no longer have ANY of the characters we started out with, including the xenoarchaeologist! OK, we actually have a copy of her, an enhanced copy. The original may or may not be in stasis somewhere and may or may not re-integrate any of these memories and might be off having entirely separate adventures for all we know. Her boyfriend is a copy which is definitely missing some memories. And how can anyone argue these copies are substantively the same consciousness or soul? It's not credible. Each time new characters are introduced to replace ones that have been killed, the series gets much less interesting. The last introduction of the hacker guy who is into RPGs is just dumb. He does very little (wins one battle). McCloskey toys with a lot of conceptual ideas, like how aliens might differ in how they switch between competition and cooperation. I thought maybe he had a point to make, but after 8 books I realize he just flirts with big ideas and doesn't really have anything to say about them. At that point, my take on the series went negative, I wished I'd never started it, and I edited this review to describe and rate the series, since readers need to know before they start. JUST THIS BOOK - If you can read this book and stop, it's fairly interesting. The author is very clever with alien environments and creatures. And in this first book they do not become tedious or irrelevant to the plot (later they do). On character development, there is only mild progress. Do not become too attached as some of them are abruptly blown away (even more so in later books). I was frustrated by this, and the general carelessness with which humans approach both aliens and advanced technology. And carelessness of the aliens for that matter. The technology is absurdly over the top. It is tempting to think the author is going to deliver some grand message, a sort of revision of the fate of the Krell in Forbidden Planet or something, but after reading 8 books I realize he is just wandering.