Noah has lived his entire life devoted to the great and wise ‘Mites. Now that he has reached fifteen years old, it is time for him to earn his ultimate place in the Hive. After passing the trials with flying colors, he is assigned the highest and most secretive honor that a human can achieve: Queen’s Service. But serving the Queen isn’t what he expected. Queen’s Service is a death sentence. … Horrified, Noah is paralyzed and left to watch as the Queen’s eggs hatch and feed on his flesh.
In the underground tunnels of the Hive, a sense of unrest grows. The Hive is dying. The Queen has used her human slaves to stay in control for too long, and a new Queen larva must reach adulthood in order for the Hive to survive.
All seems lost for Noah and the Hive until the unthinkable happens. Some of the ‘Mites betray their queen and rescue Noah, carrying him off into the Forbidden Zone.
The Hive is too strong to fight, but if Noah can destroy the Queen and replace her with one friendly to humans, there just might be a way to survive. But the old Queen is not ready to surrender her power. She won’t go down without a fight.
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This was one truly entertaining reads. Everything is switched around in a world where bugs are the rulers and humans the slaves. This is a hive mentality and both human and bug are subjected to it. As the story unfolds it becomes quite a good read.
Horizon Beta is the latest entry in D. W. Vogel’s excellent series of space-faring humans and their adventures on far-flung worlds. The main character, Noah, is a young man who descended from the original colonists, but his planet is overrun with giant insects called “Mites. He’s content to serve the ‘Mites as a slave until he discovers some terrible truths. The story is smart, intriguing, with sharply-drawn characters. The interactions–and battles–with the bugs are extremely well done. Highly recommended.
One of the things I really loved about this book was the change in direction without sacrificing anything in the quality of the storytelling. Whole new planet with a different ark and of course, a new main character. In the case of this ship, the colonists were attacked by a race of giant, sentient insects upon landing and driven into slavery over the next 70 or so years. When the story starts, Noah and most of the humans, have no idea of where they came from. They serve the Masters. They are unworthy low forms and are lucky to be given the honor.
Vogel always blows me away. This book has a ton of worldbuilding interspersed in the competition that Noah goes through to become a servant to the Queen at the outset of the book. Yet, it’s done in a way that doesn’t take anything away from the storytelling or pace. And speaking of pace, there is nothing whatsoever slow about this story. It seems to crash along like an out of control elephant-sized Mexican cockroach. They’re fast right? I heard they were fast. Anyway, there is little room for breath taking by any of the characters from start to finish. Especially Noah, he spends a fair amount of time underwater.
*** SPOILERS***
I also love Noah as a main character. He shows so much growth given the fact that he starts out as a brainwashed big-bug fanboy and finishes up as one of the saviors of the colony. Some of that, of course, is the pheromones, but he really does have a much different feel throughout the course of the book and there are legitimate reasons for his evolution. That’s something that tends to be sadly lacking in much of the MG/YA books I read.
The Queen and her hive are a great source of conflict. It makes for a great man against nature plot even if the Queen is going somewhat against how nature is supposed to work on her planet. The bugs also provide for a more centralized (group) antagonist than the ‘saurs from the Horizon Alpha series. The fact that some of them were on the side of the humans also helped to make them both alien and relatable at the same time.
There wasn’t much about the book that I didn’t care for. I debate whether the section with Miguel’s death was necessary although it did help to set up the path for Noah to sneak back into the hive later to rescue Blue. Other than that, I could have only wanted more of this wild and crazy world so different, but still in the same vein as the first three books.