Customer Reviews

Predator: Forever Midnight

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

This was the first Predator book I had bought in about five years and my expectations were high but the book failed to deliver. The author completely abandons the 'yautja' backstory laid down by Nathan Archer, Steven Perry, Stephani Perry and others. This could have been overlooked if the story had been any good but instead we get a bunch of human and alien characters that aren't developed enough to care about what happens to them and then Predator children using mind control to make humans kill other humans. Does anyone really buy that the Predators that hunted Major Schaefer and Detective Harrigan would send their children to fight in their place?
The Predators aren't portrayed as noble warriors with a different worldview and value system but rather a bunch of nomadic planet-plunderers who enslave other races and steal their technology. Like an organic version of the Borg from Star Trek.
The humans aren't any better, generally being shown as a bunch of brainless, selfish malcontents.
Mr. Shirley goes back and forth between being provocative and preachy regarding religion, government, the environment and the military. It does not contribute to the story and just gets really tiring. Not to mention the poor dialogue.
I usually love anything to do with the Predator but Predator: Forever Midnight was a struggle to finish.

THIS BOOK IS TERRIBLE! I'd never heard of John Shirley before eading this "book". I've been a fan of Predator for as long as I can remember, and this book is worse than having to deal with army of cockroaches on Steroids. The Creatures in this waste of paper are definetly not Predators, Yajuta, or whatever you please to call them. Reasons why they aren't
1.Predators do not change sexes! They are either Male or Female not both.
2.Their cloacking devices are not shields
3.They do not enslave other cultures
4.Predators have an honor code, they don't kill everything they see.
5.Whatever the hell I forgot to list

The book IS NOT a good one. Forever Midnight flat out, is the most horrible book I've ever read. It completely contradicts the ENTIRE francise. Here are some notes over the book I made (without spoiling the plot line):

Apparently, John Shirley never read anything that reffered to the term, "Yautja" because in his book he says the true name of the race is, Hish-Qu-Ten (The People Who Take Territory)

Predator's are now... asexual? Going through cycles of hormonal changes that change deadlock colors and turn the males in females... When the gender shift happens, females carry eggs

Also, they aren't dreadlocked hair, Shirley refers to them as "fleshlocks"

Predators now also use "mindprobes" - and are very submissive to the "O Great Leader" (all of the damn O Great things the leader gets called are annoying as hell, but atleast you get to read from their point of veiw a bit)

Comics and novels before this one sometimes make mention that an unblooded does not hunt, in this book there are younger "spawnlings," around 65 years old... not 100. The Mindcontrol probes allow "spawnlings" to control humans to kill each other, as the book said, "like a videogame"

Predators now have "Kill-Glands" - that is what makes them kill. Cute, aye?

Preds also now hunt on "flying platforms"

They also show no honor in killing/hunting, they only do it for the "Joy of Hunting." Way to contradict even the AVP movie.
If you never read a predator book, I guess this would be good... it's written fantastically, but john Shirley, it seems like... just made a lot of crap up. Perhaps I am too used to the more comic-bookish novels, but man, atleast they stayed somewhat consistant.

...what I wouldn't give for Nathan Archer, or one of the Perry's to have written this.

I never though I could dislike something that had to do with Predator...I WAS DEAD WRONG. Forever Midinght is probably the worst book (and worst installment to the Predator franchise) I have ever read. Usually, Shirley has a pretty good writing style, but even that can't make up for this mess.

For one thing, I guess he's never heard of the Yautja, since he changed the Pred's name to the Hish-Qu-Ten. And another thing, they're gender benders. That's right; boys can change to girls, and girls to boys. He claims he has never read the former books or comics, and he hasn't even seen the second movie. Hmmm, if I were writing a book for a movie/comic franchise, I would at least research my stuff so I wouldn't contradict anything from before.

He also puts a bad twist on Predator technology. In the originals, the Predators are super intelligent aliens who make their own tech. In this, they steal most of it from other races. They also hunt on flying platforms, use mind control, and have some red feral kill gland in their neck...Their innards are green, so why is the gland RED? They also have no honor, which contradicts bits from all three movies PLUS the comics. Their hunting skills have really been degraded in Forever Midnight.

Other than the horrid changes to the Predators, the rest isn't that good either. The dialogue is pretty bad, and the characters are so underdeveloped that it doesn't even faze you when someone important dies. The only tiny good thing about this book is how it has a fast feel to it, but like I said, any small bit of good can easily be overlooked, since the rest of this book is so incredibly bad. Hopefully, Forever Midnight will only stay as a bad footnote on the franchise. I recommend avoiding this one.

John Shirley should be sent to this planet and left there. I have read every Predator book out there and seen all the movies. I have enjoyed them all --- till now. I just wish I could forget I ever picked up this mess. I found the story painful in every aspect. How this author ever earned awards for his writing is unbelievable. I'm going back to read Edgar Rice Burroughs to get the nasty taste out of my mouth and mind.

I had very little expectations when I purchased this book and in fact I only bought it because it was so cheap and because I had liked a few of John Shirley's other books. Maybe it is necessary to establish where I come from in regards to the PREDATOR franchise as well. I love the original John McTiernan film, thought the sequel was dumb fun and consider the AvsP flick to be hilarious trash. This was my first PREDATOR tie-in novel and, come to think of it, probably the first tie-in novel of any kind I ever read. And I enjoyed it a whole lot.

The first thing that any reader will notice is how well written this book is. Even those who critizise the book for contradicting a piece of fan fiction they wrote or an issue of a PREDATOR comic somewhere (something I cannot relate to or comment on further) will have to admit that PREDATOR: FOREVER MIDNIGHT is incredibly solid action writing. In every scene, particularily in every fight scene, you can always easily visualize what is going on. And not a single word is wasted here. It's a quick read and the story never stops moving forward, towards the showdown.

There are also a few things that the casual reader might miss. Like how all the names of the soldiers in one of the first chapters are actually well known science fiction writers. Which is kind of hilarious, considering what Shirley does to them. While the book is certainly not a comedy by any means, there were still a number of scenes that made me chuckle. That's not something Shirley usually does or aims for with his "regular" books and it was a pleasant surprise. Actually, that's how I can sum up the whole experience of reading PREDATOR: FOREVER MIDNIGHT. It was a very pleasant surprise. I will definitely try another of Shirley's tie-in books now.

I regret buying this book. It was a terrible waste of my time and my money. The thing that I believe was the worst thing in this book was that the auther portrayed the Predators as changing their sex. I could have spent my money on a book of higher quality. I did however like all the plants and creatures in this book. The auther did manage to do an aceptible job on that, but I would not buy the book for that reason. If you are intrested in that I would sujest that you look at Allan Dean Fosters work for that. But this is just my opinion.

I confess I gave up on this book half-way. This is saying a lot because I read all the other predator books in one sitting.
If you are at all familiar with the pre-existing Predator lore (in which case you are probably one up on the author) then you should hate this. The predators have been effectively re-imagined, and not in a good way. Forget about the honourable, macho-man's macho-man, hunters. Instead what you have are fawning transsexual (yes Shirley has the preds change gender during their life spans. And yes he pulled that out his ear - I know.)sycophants who say things like (and this is an actual quote) "May a cool breeze blow across your reproductive organs."
Even putting aside the fact that Predators don't fancy cool breezes, no self-respecting predator is ever going to say gay-sounding junk like that. The Preds are the kind of guys who will sharpen blades around the fire while regaling their colleagues with tales of dangerous and exciting hunts, formidable prey, cool weapons and (of course) Pred chicks. Any Male Predator who actually acted like Shirley's' versions would have his skull crushed and his remains repeatedly blasted by the combined plasma-castor fire of every other Predator in the vicinity.
Take my advice and ignore this one. Rather read AVP: Prey and AVP:Hunters' Planet (predate the movies) and Predator: South China Sea.

Despite 15+ comments already posted on this book, I felt compelled to add my voice about what I consider an insulting rip off of the Predator series and its fans.

Mr. Shirley admits to not having done any background research on the Predator series (besides viewing the first film)and it shows. Like other fans I expect new installments to the series to respect and maintain the continuity of the basic Predator mythos already established (see authors Steve & Stehanie Perry, Nathan Archer, etc). Fundamental premises such as personal "honor" in the kill, military-like self-discipline, high tech skills and intelligence of Predators (highlighting the fallacy of prejudices based on appearances)were left unexamined on the shelf along with all the preceding Predator books. I have no qualms about authors building on an established series, adding to the storyline with their own creativity, but not CHANGING an entire genre in the process! Can you imagine sequels for say, "Gone with the Wind" that make Scarlet an ex-prostitute before she met Rhett, completely destroying her southern belle naivete and spoiled childlike ways inherent to her original character? This is in essence what Mr. Shirley's has done with his "contribution" to the Predator series.

Instead, Mr. Shirley imposes his own mythos that Predators are unisex creatures(interchangeably male and female according to their "cycle"), a clear rip off of the film "Enemy Mine" with Louis Gossett Jr.'s portrayal of a gender/sex shifting alien. His Predators are bloodthirsty to the point of mindlessness, will even kill each other in a frenzy without medication to control their "kill gland", and have no regard for sportsmanship, character building from "hunting" or seemingly any particular rules of engagement - just indiscriminate slaughter of whatever they can get their hands on. To add insult to injury, Shirley inflicts us with juvenile attempts at humor, stilted dialogue, and writing that tells rather than shows - a death knell to reader interest. I had to force myself to finish this book amidst all of its violations.

I agree with other commentors that generally speaking, the Predator series needs to expand beyond the one-by-one-kill-off-victims scenario, as that storyline is becoming stagnant. Therein lies a vast array of possibilities and scenarios left unmined for future authors wishing to contribute to this series!!

John Shirley has apparently won a Bram Stoker award for his horror short story collection in "Black Butterflies," and has done work on screenplays - maybe this explains the "telling" rather than showing writing style; writing a treatment is a world away from sustaining a novel. In any event, I suggest Mr. Shirley stick to horror - and we treat this Predator installment like a UFO - and pretend we never saw it.

I'm a big fan of the Predator franchise. I really enjoyed the AvP books by the Perrys and Bischoff, I have many of the Predator graphic novels, as well as the Nathan Archer Predator novels. John Shirley's Forever Midnight was dismal if you have any of the aforementioned collection. Basically, Shirley rewrote the whole Predators background and history with no regards to any of the former authors. Before, the Predators were honorable Hunters. Sure they hunted humans but it's like humans hunting bears, get rid of the guns and go fight a bear with a knife for a more equal fight. Now, Shirley has them as scavengers, heartless killers, and slavers.

As for the story, it's more like a first person shooter video game than a comprehensive novel. It was painful to read and I had to force myself through the book. The interaction of the predators amongst themselves was just so vastly annoying it made them look like whimpering idiots. And surely the humans of the future (set in 2117AD) would have their own name for the Predators other than "Predator", scientists love naming things, they wouldn't name an alien race something so obvious. The planet itself was all right and I liked the "local" Atavite humans but the story was just so blah that I couldn't get into it. I couldn't stand any of the characters and the age of Derry seems to change throughout the book.

Overall, someone new to the franchise will like this book, as for a long term fan and collector of Predator franchise items, this book was severely lacking and shows no respect to the previous history set forth by previous writers (as permitted by the copyright owners, mind you).