Customer Reviews

Alien: A Novel

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Alien (Film Novelization) / 0-446-82977-3

The film novelization of "Alien" is pleasantly well-written from a technical standpoint; the book possesses correct spelling, grammar, and punctuation, which cannot always be said for film novelizations. The characters are largely true to their counterparts in the movie, and both the expanded dialogue and the internal thoughts of the crew have a ring of the genuine to them.

This novelization was apparently based on an extremely early transcript of the screenplay and there are several noticeable differences between the film and the book, which is slightly disappointing if you read film novelizations as a companion to flesh out the film more fully. Most notably, the dead alien with the chest-burst rib cage is missing - a very jarring omission which had me flipping back and forth, wondering where it had got to - and a great deal of the final plot with Ash's betrayal is different, with Ash deliberately and openly interceding to save the alien from being shot out an airlock.

Even considering the omissions, there is a great deal here for fans of the movie to enjoy. The alien facehugger is described very nicely, with frequent allusions to its 'skeletal hand' appearance. (The final form of the alien is described almost not at all, however, presumably due to vagueness in the written screenplay.) The internal thoughts of the crew are fleshed out nicely, with a particular emphasis on Ripley of course, but with flourishes that greatly humanize Dallas and Parker in particular. There is foreshadowing of Kane's ultimate demise, with a mysterious black 'blotch' on the medical scanner over Kane's lungs, and Ash explains how the Company had known that the alien was there (having picked up and translated the warning via long-range scans), and had substituted Ash for the previous science officer right before the Nostromo's regularly scheduled trip, in the hopes that they would pick up an alien and 'accidentally' bring it back to Earth, bypassing the questions and quarantines that a direct mission would have generated. There is also a very nice included scene that was eventually (and in my opinion, unfortunately) cut from the film, where Ripley discovers a cocooned Brett and Dallas, and is forced to euthanize her former friend.

The most disappointing aspect of this book, however, is that the pacing is excessively slow and dull, particularly in the beginning. Even the first few pages crawl painfully, as Foster "introduces" each cryo-sleeping crew member by describing their dreams and discussing whether they would be candidates for 'professional dreamers' and whether their dreams are restless or ordered, pleasant or painful, hazy or distinct. The writing style is what I would deem 'experimental' and I think it might have even worked well if Foster had felt comfortable including more physical detail, but since he was trying to match a movie that apparently hadn't finished yet, details like the appearance of the crew, the ship, the planet, and the alien are kept to a minimum, leaving only the heavy speculative prose.

If you're a die-hard fan of the series, this book is worth checking out, but just factor in the slow-pacing and don't expect too much. For what it is worth, I am now reading Foster's sequel Aliens, and so far the author seems to have corrected all the writing 'mistakes' in "Alien", indicating either growth on the part of the author, or a more complete screenplay source, or both. So if there's a chance that you might read the entire series of alien film novelizations, I recommend starting with this one and just remembering that they get better.

~ Ana Mardoll

Having never seen the movie in its entirety, I came into this book without having any preconceived notions of what was supposed to happen, as according to the movie. It was an interesting premise, given that the crew was sent to their slaughter to find out why another alien vessel was warning everyone to stay away from the planet, and just what happened to the people that were chosen to host the alien offspring. The most disconcerting thing was that the alien was never fully described, so even though I had an image based off of what little I have seen, I was also able to think up something rather scary to me. All in all a very suspenseful read for me, since I didn't know how it would end.

Novelizing a screenplay is a funny idea in itself. The passive voice/faux eloquence can certainly be laughable, but the real entertainment comes from scenes that deviate so strongly from the film that you end up scratching your head even if you initially sneer. It's worth it for the curiosity factor, but don't expect it to add any weight or depth to the Alien mythos.

Based on the 1979 film "Alien", this novel is one of my favorites. It is very interesting, suspensful, and dramatic. A survival story of the crew on the spaceship "Nostromo", who land on an uncharted planet to investigate what they believe to be a distress call, and bring back the most horrifying creature they've ever seen. When I first read it, I was so intrigued, I read the entire book in one sitting. You've never read a Sci-Fi novel until you've read "Alien"! That's my two cents.

In space, no one can hear you scream.

Seven cryogenically frozen dreamers are awakened aboard the interstellar tug Nostromo. As haziness begins to dissipate, Captain Dallas retires to communicate with MOTHER-the ships onboard computer system.

Finding themselves off course and light years away from home, MOTHER informs Dallas that an alien distress signal has been detected and that under company protocol; they are obliged to investigate it.

Landing on the uncharted planet, Lambert, Kane, and Dallas suit up to search for the signal. Finding an enormous derelict spacecraft of unknown origin, they find that the ship has crash landed.

Officer Ripley and Science Officer "Ash" stay aboard the Nostromo to record their findings, but soon lose contact with the Away Team. Ripley deciphers part of the signal and discovers that it is a warning beacon-unfortunately, it's too late.

As the team descends deeper into the belly of the vessel, Kane climbs down a shaft and discovers a chamber filled with thousands of egg pods. Touching one, it opens. Before he can react, a "thing" that looks like a skeletal hand with a serpentine tail lurches at his face and dissolves through his helmet.

Returning to the ship dragging an unconscious Kane, Dallas commands Ripley to open the hatch. She refuses on the basis that Kane must be quarantined. Ash disobeys Ripley and opens the hatch.

Several attempts are made to remove the creature from Kane's face, but the alien has deadly defense mechanisms¯one of which is a corrosive acid that nearly eats through the hull of the ship.

Hours later, Kane is found alive and well in the medical bay. The alien is dead and Ash begins to dissect it. Over dinner, Kane convulses and an alien bursts through his chest. The creature escapes before the doors can be closed to contain it.

The plan is to corner the alien with motion sensors and stun guns, and expel it from the ship. But they soon discover the alien has grown quickly and has a plan of its own! Several miscalculations of the creature's whereabouts in the maze of air ducts cause the deaths of Dallas, Lambert, and Brett.

Ash tries to kill Ripley in an attempt to save the alien and Parker attacks him. They discover that Ash is an android. They salvage Ash's head and he tells them that he was sent to bring the alien back to use as a biological weapon. Realizing her efforts are futile, Ripley decides to abandon ship and blow up the Nostromo.

Author Alan Dean Foster has written the ultimate thriller and has created the most violent creature in sci-fi history! "Alien" keeps your heart pumping until the last second of the final countdown! Very deserving of a five star rating!

THIS BOOK IS CLOSE TO THE WAY THE MOVIE WENT. IT HAS SOME MINOR CHANGES BUT NOTHING EARTH SHAKING. I AGREE WITH ANOTHER REVIEWER WHO MENTIONED THAT NO DETAILED APPEARANCE OF THE ALIEN WAS MENTIONED. WE ARE GIVEN A DESCRIPTION OF THE FACE HUGGER BUT WHEN IT ACHIEVES FULL SIZE THE DESCRIPTION IS FOGGY. ALSO NOTHING IS MENTIONED OF THE HUGE ALIEN IN THE CHAIR WHICH I THOUGHT WAS AN INTERESTING AND CREATIVE IDEA. USUALLY A BOOK IS MORE INTERESTING THAN THE MOVIE BUT THIS IS THE OPPOSITE. ALL IN ALL IF YOU ENJOY THR ALIEN BOOKS AND MOVIES THIS IS A NICE BUT NOTHING GREAT BOOK.

Even if you have seen the un-cut version of the movie, this novelization adds so much more to the story.

This is the review for the novelization of Alien - for some reason, every other review that I've found here has been for the movie.

Alan Dean Foster's novelization of Alien is a stark, somewhat barren re-telling of the story that most of us are familiar with. However, the rather dry, impersonal style used in narrating the story actually adds to the horror and sense of hopelessness.

Some interesting tidbits which were either added to the story by Foster or which were in the original script and ended up on the cutting room floor are:

1) Ripley sensing something odd about Ash and asking Lambert if she had ever slept with him (the answer is: no - Lambert goes on to say that she never even got the sense that Ash was interested).

2) Lambert suggesting an "alternative" to hunting down the Alien...suicide...she holds up a bunch of suicide pills and states that this is a pretty painless alternative to getting ripped to pieces by the Alien. For me, this added to the almost depressing sense of hopelessness of the story - the situation of the crew was so dismal that some of them began to consider suicide as an 'option'.

3) The crew discovers the Alien has escaped into the air ducts after they burst into a supply room and flame the contents - which happen to be canned food, etc. - the Alien didn't grow that big before killing Brett by just metabolizing air.

4) Ash, when he tells the crew that they can not kill the Alien, states that the crew of the derelict space ship in which the eggs were found were, no doubt, larger/stronger and more intelligent than humans...and even they were overcome.

5) Ripley, before she abandons ship, discovers the bodies of Brett and Dallas. They have both been cacooned by the Alien and impregnated by a parasite. The life cycle of the Alien as conceived in this version is much different from that of the social insect analog as pictured in Aliens - in fact, Ash compares the Alien to certain species of parasitic wasps which lay their eggs in unsuspecting spiders which go about their lives while the wasp larvae eat/kill them alive. This scene was actually filmed and can be seen in certain cuts of the film but I was disappointed...the scene, as conveyed in the novelization, was pretty macabre...the actual filmed scene was not very convincing (which was probably one of the reasons - outside of pacing - it was cut from the final theatrical cut).

6) As mentioned above, Ash hypthesizes that the life cycle of the Alien is similar to certain parasitic wasps on Earth. The Alien was envisioned as being more of a solitary animal rather than the social insect analog seen in the sequels. Essentially, the facehugger implants the embryo, the embryo bursts out, grows, captures prey, cacoons them, implants them with an egg. etc. This was a more satisfying hypothetical life cycle for me since the whole 'parasite-social insect' angle doesn't really seem too convincing to me.

7) Passing mention is made of Ripley's home town - a little village somewhere in El Salvador.

In my experience, most novelizations of movies tend to be "lacking"...they're either bare bones, providing nothing more than a threadbare summary of the narrative of the movie itself or they go off the deep end, providing a lot of "extra" information that often fails to mesh with the original narrative. Alien is one of the few movie novelizations that I've read which actually seems to work and has merit as an entity separate from the movie itself. It would be difficult for any novelization to capture the sense of disgust and fascination that H. Geiger's design of the Alien evoked in many viewers and Foster doesn't (wisely) even try - instead, he concentrates on the feeling of hopelessness on the part of the crew as they attempt to deal with an entity that always seemes to be one step ahead of them and whose goal is nothing more than a metaphorical rape and forced pregnancy (and eventual, horribly painful childbirth) of its victims.

A crew of spaceship Nostromo is suddenly woken up from a cryogenic sleep because of mysterious signals coming from an unknown planet and received by a ship computer. The astronauts land on the planet surface and go to investigate an alien spaceship where one of them is attacked by an alien which fasten itself on his face. When the crew returns to their ship and abandon the planet, nobody forefeels that the real horror will begin very soon ...

This novel is one of the first books I purchased on Amazon.com and one of the best sci-fi horrors I ever read. The strongest feature is not only the storyline but also the detailed and sophisticated characters of the heroes. It does not matter if you watched the movie first and then read the book or if you read the book first. Both treatments are made precisely and Mr. Foster deserves the highest rank.

This was a really well-written book, not like most awful movie and TV novelizations these days. I'm guessing it was written before that turned into mass market industry.

Alan Dean Foster is actually a real writer, with real talent, so this book is worth reading even if you've seen the movie- In fact it will tell you a lot more stuff not told, or only briefly mentioned in the movie, and you get to know the other characters better, besides Ripley.