The Saga of Seven Suns: Veiled Alliances (Hardcover)

by Kevin J. Anderson (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Anderson has written bestselling Star Wars and Star Trek books and coauthored the expanded Dune series, so he's adept at handling big settings and complicated plots. Now, he's created a space opera saga, with the first three novels either published or about to be published. This book, billed as a prequel to that series, pictures a situation rich in tantalizing hints of intrigue. After an exhausted Earth launches a swarm of spaceships in the desperate hope of finding new resources, the explorers are rescued by humanoid and apparently benevolent aliens, who divulge the secret of FTL (faster than light) travel and give humans the chance to colonize uninhabited planets. Some of this book's episodes take place aboard the spaceships or on different planets; they involve human interaction with vegetable intelligence, ancient robots and beings who live deep in the atmosphere of a giant gas planet. Other episodes occur on Earth, where the leader is actually a pawn of the Hanseatic League's unscrupulous chairman. There are many possibilities waiting to be developedâ€"perhaps too many to do justice to in this relatively short comic. As it is, Anderson's script feels more like the rushed synopsis of a story than the story itself. The book stands out, however, for its superlative art. Teranishi's rendering of characters, machines and alien planets is stunning, but Fouts-Broome deserves special credit for her wonderful coloring. The drawings flex and glow on the page, like a mixture of Frank Frazetta and Maxfield Parrish, providing the freshness and wonder that the sketchy script doesn't.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

From Booklist
Eleven exploratory ships carrying people who don't want their descendants to have to live on what they see Earth becoming have now been discovered by another, more advanced, space-faring civilization, the Ildaran Empire. The empire helps the refugees--by now the several-generations-later offspring of the original voyagers--settle in suitable situations and sends diplomats with a few of them to Earth to establish commerce and other connections. This book nimbly skips between one or another of the refugees' various new homes and Earth. Some emigres get in dire straits, others go native in their new environments with wondrous results. Meanwhile, both Earth and Ildaran authorities bring hidden agendas to their first-contact discussions. Anderson opts for comics as the vehicle for the prequel to his prose-novel series, the Saga of Seven Suns (Hidden Empire [2002], A Forest of Stars [2003], and Horizon Storms, forthcoming), and primary artist Robert Teranishi makes it look like the several million bucks it would cost as a movie. This is Star Wars stuff, maybe a little smarter. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 96 pages
• Publisher: DC Comics (February 1, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1563899019
• ISBN-13: 978-1563899010
• Product Dimensions: 10.5 x 6.9 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #515,985 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

42 of 50 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Failed Alliances, February 19, 2005

By	Jason - See all my reviews

This is a comic book. Unfortunately I did not discover this until after I had placed my order, for this product but thought "Hey it's still SoSS of it's bound to be good right?"
Wrong. Or rather, it was OK but nothing more than that. The drawings are good, but the story is nowhere to be found. If this work is designed to draw readers into the series, I fear it has failed. Not only does it offer HUGE spoilers but it fails to bring out the most basic intrigues and plots that make the series great. Words cannot express my extreme dissapointment when I read a $12.00 comic book that offered me nothing that I hadn't alreadr read in the novels.

If you like pretty pictures this product is for you.
To the rest of the SoSS fans, skip it. And to you who haven't read SoSS, go pick up a copy of Hidden Empire today!

19 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars GREAT!-IF YOU'VE ALREADY READ BOOKS ONE AND TWO, February 6, 2004

By A Customer

As a fan of both comic books and of Kevin J. Anderson , (Star Wars, Dune and now Saga of Seven Suns), this was pure heaven for me. So why did i give it only three stars?

If you have already read the books: You will find that you already know most of the story. Most of it was given as backround informaition in the books it is quite predictible. But still will be understandable, and worth your time, Some of the art is truely incredible.

If You have yet to read the books: I know that this is a prequil, and your probably thinking it's just the thing to get you into the siries. Unfortoneatly it contains NUMEROUS SPOILERS that will seriously increase the perdictsbillity of the books which by the way contains some great plot twists. I would recomend the first book Hidden Empire, ehich starts off slow but really kicks it off the siries well, and will have you ichicng for Horriozon Storms (book three) in no time.

-Even though it has its fualts i think this is a valuable entry into the Saga of Seven Suns universe. As i said befor some of the art is great, and it really fleshes out the beginings of the story well-

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars 4.5 Stars, November 29, 2007

By	Jem (MD, USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

This review is from: Saga of Seven Suns, The: Veiled Alliances (The Saga of Seven Suns) (Paperback)

Anderson's Saga of the Seven Suns is a rich and sprawling science fiction epic. This gorgeously rendered graphic novel provides background information for the series - a prequel. Most of the story conatined here can be gleaned from the first two novels of the series. However, this is an alternative format, with beautiful and well drawn art work, that is a nice companion to the series. The plot is limited but clearly revealed and leads directly into the series. Full color throughout, glossy pages. A worthwhile addition to the "Saga," especially for fans of graphic novels.