5 Books That Left an Impression-Book 5

Halo
Contact Harvest

Joseph Staten

Saved the best for last? Maybe not the best Pulitzer Prize winning book per se. However, this is a list of books that left an impression on me and is highly consequential to my personal tastes and opinions! I chose this book, not necessarily because it is the best book of the series (The Cole Protocol is very good also) but because it is a great book in the story line of the Halo saga and universe. Just about every person on the planet has probably heard about the Halo game series if not played at least a little of it, even if you were a casual gamer. If not, I'm sorry! What most people do not realize is that the games were such a small part of the Halo universe. The first game, Halo: Combat Evolved (2001) was released as the launch title for the original Xbox game system. To say it was a hit is an understatement. I bought the Xbox for Halo: Combat Evolved and for many years afterward, upgraded to newer (and more expensive) Xbox game systems to continue playing each new Halo game release.

Following the smash hit of Halo: Combat Evolved, Microsoft through Bungie Software, whom they acquired in 2000, followed up with novels that added to and tied in all the games. All novels and story lines had to be approved by the Microsoft team to ensure that they stay correct to the cannon. The first books were released as a trilogy and were known as The Original Series which laid the foundation for the expanded Halo universe. They include The Fall of Reach (2001) by Eric Nylund, The Flood (2003) by William C. Deitz (which is basically the story of the game Halo: Combat Evolved in book form) and First Strike (2003) also written by Eric Nylund. The next novel to come out was Ghosts of Onyx, also by Eric Nylund and then the book we are talking about today, Contact Harvest by Joseph Staten.

What impresses me about this story and indeed all the other Halo novels is how each fleshes out and fills in the universe between the games. And the games would take place in the timeline after the last novel written before the new game release. So, when you started the next game, you already knew the complete backstory before playing the first level. The second game in the series, Halo 2, was released in 2004. Three years after the original so there were plenty of novels to fill in the story between the two game releases, like Contact Harvest.

The story is set on a farming planet called Harvest where a large bulk of the food supplied to outer colonies is grown and shipped out. It tells of the first encounter with the villains that are in the video games, the Covenant. And it is where you get a detailed insight into one of the characters of the games, Staff Sergent Avery Johnson (a favorite of mine and my sons). And the Halo universe has only expanded from there. The team decided to visit the canonical history that happened well before (100,000 years to be precise) the timeline of the first game called The Forerunner Saga and enlisted famed science fiction writer Greg Bear (1951 - 2022) to do so. The events in The Forerunner Saga served as a prelude to the Halo 4 game. So far, there have been at least 25 books written in the Halo universe, not including the illustration books, and even an encyclopedia!

If you are a sci-fi fan and want to read a complete series, I would recommend the Halo saga. If you have not played a single game, it would not matter. The books cover the story lines of every game. Let me know if you have read any of the Halo novels from the saga below. And if so, which ones were your favorite?