The first book in the Mass Effect Trilogy and the first book we read for the Video Game Book Club! This is a prequal novel to the very first Mass Effect game. This book introduces us to David Anderson who is tracking down Kahlee Sanders a scientist who vanished before her based was attacked and her colleagues killed. She becomes sort of the protagonist of this specific book series. The novel also introduces us to Saren Arterius, and what he was doing as a Spectre before the events of Mass Effect.
Elise from the video game book club has this to say about the novel:
“Overall I did like this book, it is hard to jam in 330 pages the world that is Mass Effect and I felt that Karpyshyn did a great job. Things I liked: it moved fairly quickly, the characters were interesting, the plot was easy to follow. Thing I didn’t like: forced romance between the male and female characters, the odd scenes that had something to do with sexual assault, there were too many main characters. The books jumps around with the point of view of certain characters which was interesting to a point but some were not necessary. It felt like Karpyshyn was trying to introduce ALL of the species within the first couple of chapters and in my opinion knowing that there is a huge city in space where there are multiple species the reader can always be introduced to more when their character becomes more important.
I did like how he introduced how humans found out about all of this and were fighting for a seat at the galactic table. I felt there was just too much going on. I would recommend this if you are familiar with the games and the world but not as an introduction to it.”
For full discussion on this novel check out The Video Game Book Club Podcast’s episode on it.
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