4.0
Halo: Cryptum
ByPublisher Description
The first novel in the Forerunner Saga trilogy by science fiction legend Greg Bear—set in the Halo universe and based on the New York Times bestselling video game series!
One hundred thousand years ago, the galaxy was populated by a great variety of beings.
But one species—eons beyond all others in both technology and knowledge—achieved dominance.
They ruled in peace, but met opposition with quick and brutal effectiveness.
They were the Forerunners—the keepers of the Mantle of Responsibility, the next stage of life in the Universe’s Living Time.
And then they vanished.
This is their story.
One hundred thousand years ago, the galaxy was populated by a great variety of beings.
But one species—eons beyond all others in both technology and knowledge—achieved dominance.
They ruled in peace, but met opposition with quick and brutal effectiveness.
They were the Forerunners—the keepers of the Mantle of Responsibility, the next stage of life in the Universe’s Living Time.
And then they vanished.
This is their story.
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Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communities18 Reviews
4.0
James T
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Drake
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Bree Hatfield
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““On occasion I slept, and my dreams were extraordinary, covering thousands of lives and millions of years cut up and rearranged in a dense tapestry of worldlines. But I forgot them almost immediately upon waking.”
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“Then, [the ring] assumed a form, rising around me like a beautiful building with gleaming, indefinite architecture, not quite seen but definitely sensed, felt, a lightness that carried its own somber joy.”
3.5 stars. This book is both grand and personal with its scale, and both goals are achieved. We get the origin of the Didact, the history of the Flood, the building of the Halo rings, and the sweeping political journeys of the various species of the galaxy, specifically the humans, forerunners, and San’Shyuum. But we also witness these events from a young forerunner who’s learning to come into his own and discover himself. These two goals complement each other relatively well, although there is much more of an emphasis on the grand, world-building side of things, especially toward the end. But the fact that this is only the first in a trilogy allows for room for growth in both areas.
This is a coming-of-age story in which our main character learns to overcome his biases and pretension in order to aid in a journey greater than him. The Forerunner culture is extremely elitist, and Bornstellar grew up thinking he was better than every other species. After befriending a couple of humans, his attitude throughout the book changes. He becomes wiser, and less arrogant.
This is also mirrored in the Didact’s character. Because he’s in exile and completely cut off from the power he used to have, he must work with Bornstellar and the humans to fulfill his journey. He has to overcome a lifetime of superior feelings in order to achieve his goals. This becomes especially important when the original Didact dies and his essence lives on within Bornstellar; their journeys became one, and the lessons they learned combined.
Bear does a really fine job at making the forerunners feel godlike as well as sentient. There’s an amazing quote about slipspace travel where he writes, “The secrets that lay between the streaking particles and waves that make up atoms are said to be vast. From those inner secrets, Forerunners have prodded sufficient power to change the shape of worlds, move stars, and even to contemplate shifting the axes of entire galaxies. We have explored other realities, other spaces … but the vastness between suns is great, and mysterious in a very different way. Our familiarities with these distances has, I think, almost been lost because we cross them so blithely …. We fly over and above, but just barely through all of that.” Here is just a glimpse at the wonder of the forerunners, not even to mention the Halo rings or Shield Worlds.
There are some things I’m confused about, though. What exactly is mutation? Can a forerunner go through a mutation without anyone sharing their essence with them? And why is a forerunner called a “first-form” after their first mutation? Wouldn’t their first form be their form before their first mutation?
Secondly, why are they called forerunners in this book? That was very clearly a name given to them by the Covenant because they were a species who lived and died long before modern times. Bear gives a half-hearted explanation for it, but it doesn’t work; he says that the forerunners anticipated that more species would come after them, so they called themselves forerunners. That’s stupid. How hard would it have been to give them an alien name and preface that in the historian’s note at the beginning? It seems like a 343 decision, though, so I don’t hold it against Bear. But still, it makes no sense.
Overall, it was a solid sci-fi novel and a very good Halo story! I’m interested to see where the rest of the trilogy goes, but this was a fine start.”ELK
Created 4 months agoShare
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“I am intensely biased as a massive Halo fan, and I read this book years ago, but revisiting it with a refreshed and matured palate gave me new appreciation for the thrilling adventure that Bear and 343 Industries crafted in this book. Bear flexes his sci-fi expertise to temper and expand the dense lore of the Halo series with the perspective of our protagonist Bornstellar, whose own tragic journey becomes inextricably linked with the fate of the galaxy. This is a story about identity and the forces that shape us beyond our control; of the folly of those struggling to remain in power; the last days of a nigh-invincible empire; and the generational scars that haunt us from battles long fought.”
About Greg Bear
Greg Bear is the author of Hull Zero Three (Orbit, November 2010), City at the End of Time (Del Rey 2009), Mariposa (Perseus paperback November 2010), Halo: Silentium, Halo: Primordium, and Halo: Cryptum (Tor, January 2013, 2012, and 2011). He's the father of two young writers, Erik and Alexandra. Greg's wife, Astrid Anderson Bear, has sold her first short story to San Diego Noir, in collaboration with Diane Clark.
Other books by Greg Bear
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