That makes 16 Halo books read. I heard that New Blood had a couple plot threads that came out of no where. I just about disagree. To me, New Blood was a very unique novel. We hadn’t had a book written in the first person, much less about an ODST-turned Spartan IV. I loved the change of pace.
Overall, I think Matt Forbeck did an outstanding job fleshing out Edward Buck’s character, his backstory, and his love interest. I thought the scene from the end of ODST, where Veronica kisses him, was useless and pointless. I take that thought back. Forbeck gave Veronica some good backstory too, but I’d have liked more about her years growing up and why she became an ONI spook. How Forbeck threaded their stories together as ODSTs, through their relationship, and how they fell in love was a great part of the story many places of Halo lore lack.
The ODSTs from Alpha 9 were great to read about, but the one thing that irritates me is why did Mickey do what he did? I won’t spoil it for those that have yet to read it. IT seemed so out of character.
Now I have to wait 3 and a half months to get Halo: Fractures. 
There has not been a single Halo book I have not enjoyed (yes I liked the Kilo-5 trilogy… quite a bit too) , so this next book, or anthology book, better not disappoint!
As for why Mickey may have done what he did:
Could have been disillusionment. He helped humanity survive against the Covenant, but then went right on back to fighting humans who were rebels. This results in the Rookie being killed in a manner that could have have been seen as senseless to Mickey. Perhaps this led to him to view the UNSC as ill-equipped to handle anything moving forward. I can’t say why he’d join a rebel group, but he’d certainly be easy prey to a skilled manipulator in his broken state.
I agree, to an extent, that what Mickey did did seem out of character from what was shown in the book. In saying that, I think if the book had been focused on Mickey and not Buck, then his motivations would have been a lot clearer and fleshed out. As such, we have to infer that
the Rookie’s death in the book affected him a lot more than shown.
Imagine if they had run with the theme of disillusioned Spartans, having to kill Humans again, in H5…
I really enjoyed that aspect, far better handled than in crappy Escalation with Scruggs.
Also the fight between Buck and Mickey, it sounded so Titanic, like a clash of Titans, 343 should have read that before they did the sluggish and underwhelming Locke/MC fight.
> 2533274794866970;4:
> Imagine if they had run with the theme of disillusioned Spartans, having to kill Humans again, in H5…
>
> I really enjoyed that aspect, far better handled than in crappy Escalation with Scruggs.
>
> Also the fight between Buck and Mickey, it sounded so Titanic, like a clash of Titans, 343 should have read that before they did the sluggish and underwhelming Locke/MC fight.
I think the Locke versus Chief fight wasn’t intense because this:Chief was easily able to subdue him. But, there was no reason for him to beat Locke to a pulp. He merely defended himself. That makes the fight make sense, and it was cool to see anyhow.
> 2535421460898210;3:
> I agree, to an extent, that what Mickey did did seem out of character from what was shown in the book. In saying that, I think if the book had been focused on Mickey and not Buck, then his motivations would have been a lot clearer and fleshed out. As such, we have to infer that
> the Rookie’s
> death in the book affected him a lot more than shown.
Good point.
> 2533274812652989;2:
> As for why Mickey may have done what he did:
>
>
> Could have been disillusionment. He helped humanity survive against the Covenant, but then went right on back to fighting humans who were rebels. This results in the Rookie being killed in a manner that could have have been seen as senseless to Mickey. Perhaps this led to him to view the UNSC as ill-equipped to handle anything moving forward. I can’t say why he’d join a rebel group, but he’d certainly be easy prey to a skilled manipulator in his broken state.
That makes sense. I agree. What did you think of the book?