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Steve Perry
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Earth Hive (Aliens, Book 1) Mass Market Paperback – September 1, 1992

by Steve Perry (Author), Mark Verheiden (Author), Mark A. Nelson (Author)
4.3 4.3 out of 5 stars 88 ratings
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Wilks was a space marine with a near-fatal flaw:  he had a heart.  Billie was a child, the only survivor of a far-flung colony outpost.  Thrown together in the last hellish night of an alien invasion, Billie and Wilks helped each other get out alive.  Thirteen years later Wilks is in prison, and Billie lives in a mental institution, the nightmare memories of the massacre at Rim seared into her mind.  Now the government has tapped Wilks to lead an expedition to the aliens' home planet to bring back a live alien.  But the competition on Earth to develop the aliens as a new weapons system is brutal.  When Wilks's team departs on their mission, a trained assassin trails them.  And what follows is no less than guerrilla warfare on the aliens' planet--and alien conquest on Earth!
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  1. Print length
    278 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Spectra
  4. Publication date
    September 1, 1992
  5. Dimensions
    4.15 x 0.79 x 6.87 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0553561200
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0553561203
  8. See all details
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From the Publisher

Wilks was a space marine with a near-fatal flaw: he had a heart. Billie was a child, the only survivor of a far-flung colony outpost. Thrown together in the last hellish night of an alien invasion, Billie and Wilks helped each other get out alive. Thirteen years later Wilks is in prison, and Billie lives in a mental institution, the nightmare memories of the massacre at Rim seared into her mind. Now the government has tapped Wilks to lead an expedition to the aliens' home planet to bring back a live alien. But the competition on Earth to develop the aliens as a new weapons system is brutal. When Wilks's team departs on their mission, a trained assassin trails them. And what follows is no less than guerrilla warfare on the aliens' planet--and alien conquest on Earth!

From the Inside Flap

Wilks was a space marine with a near-fatal flaw:  he had a heart.  Billie was a child, the only survivor of a far-flung colony outpost.  Thrown together in the last hellish night of an alien invasion, Billie and Wilks helped each other get out alive.  Thirteen years later Wilks is in prison, and Billie lives in a mental institution, the nightmare memories of the massacre at Rim seared into her mind.  Now the government has tapped Wilks to lead an expedition to the aliens' home planet to bring back a live alien.  But the competition on Earth to develop the aliens as a new weapons system is brutal.  When Wilks's team departs on their mission, a trained assassin trails them.  And what follows is no less than guerrilla warfare on the aliens' planet--and alien conquest on Earth!

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Spectra (September 1, 1992)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Mass Market Paperback ‏ : ‎ 278 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0553561200
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0553561203
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 5.6 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 4.15 x 0.79 x 6.87 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.3 4.3 out of 5 stars 88 ratings

About the author

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Steve Perry

Steve Perry

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I'm widowed, got kids, grandkids, dog, cat, all like that. Ex-hippie, long-time martial artist, duffer on the ukulele.

Customer reviews

4.3 out of 5 stars
88 global ratings

Customers say

Customers find the plot good enough and entertaining. They also disagree on the writing quality, with some finding it well-written and others saying it's dreadful.

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PlotReadabilityWriting quality
6 customers mention "Plot"6 positive0 negative

Customers find the plot good enough to gloss over. They also say it's the first book in a good trilogy.

"...Filled with suspense, great characters, and just downright fun! Alien: Earth Hive is great science fiction!..." Read more

"...Having said that, the crisp writing, fast pace, and overall plot are good enough to easily gloss over these little details...." Read more

"it came on time in good condition the story line was ok i read alot of alien books and what makes them not as great as preadtor books, the aliens..." Read more

"Very well-written, I love the interweaving of the stories. Gets a little slow in the end, but overall a good read." Read more

4 customers mention "Readability"4 positive0 negative

Customers find the book entertaining and like chicken soup for the soul.

"...If you think of the series independently, it makes them a lot more enjoyable. And heck! They are fun readings!..." Read more

"...As a fan of the movie series, this book is like chicken soup for the soul and provides all the little 'fanboy' details that I was desperately..." Read more

"...This novel is a hauntingly fun read. I am now on the hunt for more! And more!! AND MORE!!!" Read more

"Not bad at all. Entertaining read." Read more

4 customers mention "Writing quality"2 positive2 negative

Customers have mixed opinions about the writing quality of the book. Some find it well-written, while others say it's dreadful.

"...Perry does a fine job, however, in weaving a tale that is fairly well-written, and kept at a quick clip and heavy on the suspense...." Read more

"...This book doesn't understand the great writing, character work and all around brilliant nature of the film...." Read more

"Very well-written, I love the interweaving of the stories. Gets a little slow in the end, but overall a good read." Read more

"Dreadful writing...." Read more

Top reviews from the United States

Reviewer R2D2
5.0 out of 5 stars Earth Hive is great science fiction!
Reviewed in the United States on November 25, 2014
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In 1992, Steve Perry wrote the first novels based on the Dark Horse comics Aliens. Somehow, I missed these books as a teen. Although, I was familiar with the comics.

Aliens: Earth Hive is the first exciting, action-packed thriller in the series. The story is unique from the movies, so I won’t compare any in this series to the films. If you think of the series independently, it makes them a lot more enjoyable. And heck! They are fun readings! Although, there are some obvious name changing and story line tampering that deviates from the movies, which drives some readers crazy. As mentioned, don’t compare them to the movies! But for the sake of those who may find an old copy and read this book, do know that Ellen Ripley is replaced by Colonial Marine Wilks, and Newt (from Aliens) is replaced by Billie (still a girl). So, the series does “technically” proceed Aliens.

Wilks and Billie reunite years after Wilks saves her life on LV426. Both are thrown into a desperate mission to recover an alien specimen, so that the American government can compete with Weyland-Yutani as the race to turn the alien species into the ultimate weapon escalates into something cataclysmic. Added to the duo is a young Colonial Marine turned mercenary named Bueller, whose secrets will change Billie forever.

Young love is tested, and the answer to what it means to be human is more important now than ever before.

Filled with suspense, great characters, and just downright fun! Alien: Earth Hive is great science fiction! I look forward to the next in the series, also by Perry, Aliens: Nightmare Asylum.

5/5 stars
**Originally reviewed for SFBook.com
4 people found this helpful
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xaqbazit
5.0 out of 5 stars Good start headed for great - awesome characters
Reviewed in the United States on May 18, 2016
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This took a while to get going but the characters were great stand ins for their Aliens film counterparts Newt and Hicks. The second half of this book and the first half of the next book are probably my favorite of the series. I'm not sure if this is the one where you meet the General but I found him really fascinating especially his relation to the queen and to women in general. The awkward tension of the two lead characters and their relationship with others. Really the characters are what kept me reading and Perry's writing style. The wiki mentions something of the mental link between the queen and Newt never being brought up again, which I believe plays into the finallie of this one or the next but it is a dropped plot thread.
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Ana Mardoll
4.0 out of 5 stars Surprisingly Good
Reviewed in the United States on June 3, 2009
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Aliens Novels: Book 1, Earth Hive / 0-553-56120-0

I'm a die-hard fan of the Aliens movies, so it seemed natural to branch out a bit and check out the novel series that was written based off of the film and comic franchise. "Earth Hive" being the first book, I dived in with relish, fully expecting, however, that the end results would be pretty poor. I was pleasantly surprised to find that was not the case.

Wilks and Billie are the sole survivors of an alien infestation on a remote colonized world, years ago, when Billie was just a child and Wilks was the marine who rescued her. If this sounds familiar, there's a good reason: Wilks and Billie are basically Hicks and Newt from  Aliens . Without getting too deep in the back story, it seems that the original comic writers hadn't initially foreseen that the two would be killed off in  Alien 3 , so when the novel series came out afterward, they just changed the names of our heroes, added a few tantalizing throw-away references to "the others" who survived a similar outbreak and are missing in action (a marine and two civilians - Hicks, Ripley, and Newt), and then moved forward without changing anything else in the story. In a way, I think this is actually a fortuitous change - Hicks and Newt have a lot of emotional baggage attached to them at this point, and it's probably better to start fresh with this new Wilks and Billie, with comfortably similar back stories.

To continue, it's ten years after the infestation that scarred Wilks face and haunts Billie's nightmares. Wilks is still a marine, but a washed-up one, addicted to anything that can channel his feelings of rage and despair. Billie has been locked in a mental asylum - and not a particularly nice one - on account of the fact that her dreams and memories don't match the official government version of what happened on the colony and the rest of the world thinks she's a loony.

When the alien home world is discovered (how they discovered it isn't exactly fleshed out), "the government" (this is a bit tricky - we have a "Terran Intelligence Agency", which implies a world government, but there are also "borders" to be closed later, when things go FUBAR, and it's generally unclear who controls what) sends out the marines to collect a few samples. (The theme of alien-as-weapon has been omnipresent in the series and is a huge factor here, but the book does charitably note that there are also medical benefits from learning how the aliens survive in the vacuum of space.) Wilks 'volunteers' for the mission under duress, but finds a certain spring in his step at the idea of facing his old enemy and settling a few scores. He also breaks Billie out of the mental hospital and smuggles her along as an 'alien expert'. Neither really expect to come back alive, and both are pretty much at peace with that. Meanwhile, after they break contact with Earth, the Terran authorities realize with glee and trepidation that there's an alien *here*, on Earth, hatching in the bowels of the science lab of a private corporation, which should give you some idea where the subtitle of the book ("Earth Hive") came from.

As a fan of the movie series, this book is like chicken soup for the soul and provides all the little 'fanboy' details that I was desperately longing for. We discover a little more about the mysterious dead alien we saw in the derelict spacecraft in  Alien  - a space faring race, curious to take samples from the hostile alien home world and falling victim, not unlike our own Earthlings, to their little specimens. We learn more about the aliens' social structure, physiology, and intelligence levels - like the African reed frogs and the  Jurassic Park  raptors, the aliens are capable of changing gender if the situation calls for it, thus each baby alien is capable of growing to a queen in order to propagate the species. The alien drones have no higher intelligence than an Earth dog; the alien queens, on the other hand, are more intelligent than most humans. And, like everything else, they are capable of evolving.

I expected (or at least hoped) this book would be heavy on the fan details, but I also feared that the actual writing would be pretty poor, if only because adaptation series books have a reputation of coasting on their laurels. Perry does a fine job, however, in weaving a tale that is fairly well-written, and kept at a quick clip and heavy on the suspense. Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of details missing here: the government situation on Earth is murky, and it is left to imagination why a derelict freighter orbiting Earth has an alien lurking among the dead crew. It's not clear where the "host" picked up by the corporations came from, nor how he became infected. Worst of all, alien babies born alone only grow into queens when the plot calls for it - aliens babies born on, for example, the ship carrying Wilks and Billie (ok, I'm edging into Book 2 of the series, but it's the same author) grow into drones, for no apparent reason other than that the plot calls for it.

Having said that, the crisp writing, fast pace, and overall plot are good enough to easily gloss over these little details. I do wish that Perry had employed the technique of labeling each location shift with a time/location stamp - a practice I usually dislike, but the shifts in perspective here are harder to follow than usual. After a few paragraphs, the reader can place their new location, but the shifts can be slightly jarring at times. One more thing I want to praise about the book - Perry avoids the lazy "evil corporation" and "evil government" tropes that must have been a temptation while writing. The corporations here *are* greedy, no doubt, but they are equally sane and are willing to destroy their project rather than unleash it accidentally on the Earth. Equally sane is the Terran government who recognizes that the total destruction of their study samples is preferable to their escape into the general population. True, they aren't motivated out of pity but rather self-interest, but it is at least a *sane* self-interest, and not the "I'll risk everything for more power!" insanity that often gets laid on thick in these sorts of novels. The fact that Perry avoided this shows a great deal of skill on his part, I think.

Bottom line, if you're a long-time alien fan and you're desperate for more details on the alien race, this book will definitely whet your appetite. And you might even be surprised to learn that the actual writing isn't half-bad, either.

~ Ana Mardoll
5 people found this helpful
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Alicia7tommy
5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Read
Reviewed in the United States on February 12, 2012
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I am a big fan of the movies and this one seemed very similar to the second movie Aliens in certain ways. Aliens Earth Hive is my first Aliens book and I enjoyed it allot.
You bounce around between allot of different characters including the main people Billie and Wilks. They both survived a previous alien attack only to end up in prison and mental hospital. Like 10 years later the government needs their help in capturing one of the creatures for study. You follow the story as they travel to the Alien home world and back again only to find earth is in trouble.
It took me a matter of a few days to read this book because I couldn't put it down. I ordered the next book already and can't wait to read it and continue the story.
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JP Fish
5.0 out of 5 stars And the monsters keep coming and coming and coming!
Reviewed in the United States on June 28, 2017
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The scariest series in Sci Fi history, the Aliens arc has become a staple of techno-horror. There seems no end to the possibilities of the evil these monsters inflict and inspire. Mr Perry has a wicked grasp of the darkest depths of space as well as the human soul. This novel is a hauntingly fun read. I am now on the hunt for more! And more!! AND MORE!!!
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Michael B
3.0 out of 5 stars not a good way to start the series, but ok
Reviewed in the United States on September 8, 2008
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i started reading this book with higth expectations, only to be let down. the book drags on and on, and all these characters wich have practicaly nothing to do with the story keep get added to the mix. was it worth the wait for the end? well, kind of. i thought it was smart that it conected to the first alien movie and the sudden rush of energy. one major problem with the book is the large amount of sexual content within its pages. i rate the movie M15+(coarse language, some violence and sex scenes)that is australian movie ratings.
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Borderune
4.0 out of 5 stars Alien, du film au livre
Reviewed in France on February 12, 2016
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Première fois que je lis un livre de la saga Aliens. J'étais réticent, comment peut-on passer des films à un bouquin ? Steve Perry s'en sort très bien. Parfois trop de réminiscences de Aliens le Retour (2ème film), alors que le personnage d'Ellen Ripley a disparu dans ce livre et que le caporal Hicks a changé de nom ! Mais bon. Un bon scenario, des chapitres d'action bien rendus, l'univers d'Aliens bien rendu.
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Russell Peacock
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 12, 2015
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Very pleased.
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rattyratbag
4.0 out of 5 stars KICK ASS BOOK
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 13, 2015
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I bought these books following the reading of the latest alien books that have been published. I am really glad that I did. Yes I agree with certain other people that they have changed the names of Billie and Wilks. However this is a mind blowing concept of what happens when the aliens get to earth and the story of how to get it back.
The scientists who think they can overcome the aliens by study and tame them into our world. Wilks and Billie realise that the only way to rid them is to kill them.
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Dark Knight
3.0 out of 5 stars Only if you are a Alien fan
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 11, 2014
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I really wanted to like this book more. I’ve been fascinated with the Xenomorphs for quite a while now, and I purchased this around the time I finished watching the Alien Quadrilogy. Interestingly enough, the Engineers actually do feature here, although I am unable to discern as yet how everything fits together. That’s tie-in fiction for you. Earth Hive was released in the early 1990s and is book 1 in the Aliens series, but details about Xenomorph behaviour, biology and society is so sparse, and treated so peripherally, that it reads more like a footnote of something much larger. All this novel basically tells you about the Aliens, is that they have heads like bananas. Yes, bananas. Obviously, the assumption is that anybody who is reading this at least knows what the Xenomorphs look like, otherwise this is open to serious misinterpretation. Is the novel scary? No. Is the novel atmospheric? No. In short, it’s not really a novel about Aliens (they don’t feature “on page” nearly enough). It’s a novel about corporations who want to use the Aliens as biological weapons, and that idea is also pretty old by now (or at least, it was already old in the 1990s). At first I wasn’t sure whether the brusque writing style and dialogue should be described as “workmanlike” or “awkward”. In the end I decided on “awkward”. This is only recommended for die-hard Alien fans, although it just left me intrigued enough to consider reading the sequel (Aliens: Nightmare Asylum) at some point.
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Jordan Owen
4.0 out of 5 stars Review of aliens book
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 14, 2013
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This book was really interesting, had a really spooky ending!, I look forward to reading the next 1! Really awesome!
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