When I was in elementary school I read the original, The flood and first strike. When I started playing the MCC on PC I decided to pick up the books again. I just finishing ghost of Onyx and I loved it, amazing story!
@@HaloCanon don't forget the voice acting on the audio book. It was so excellent acting and I'll always remember all those characters with those voices. Uhing Mortan I believe.
Here’s a few books for newcomers to the books when starting off with fall of reach Cole protocol First strike Contact harvest New blood (if you haven’t played odst do not read since it spoils the entire game and you wont get the emotional impact and twists)
I read these two books years ago. The Flood might have been the first book to mention ODST’s as many of the marines in Halo: CE are described as ODST’s in the novelization even though they lacked the appearance in the game (I was hoping that 343 would have made the marines in The Truth and Reconciliation appear in Halo 3 ODST armor as I believe they were supposed to be ODST’s in the book. The only major scene I remember from this book (having read it over a decade ago) was a really badass scene with some stealth elites who try to infiltrate a base with marines and ODST’s. I won’t spoil it other than to say ODST’s and marines are badass. Halo First Strike is a very well written book coming from Eric Nylund, The Godfather of Halo. I just remember that it followed blue team primarily on a mission on a large covenant space port and shows how badass Linda is with a sniper. Hope that helps 😁
I was thinking something similar with Silent Storm. As packed as it is with cameos and references to other Halo novels, Silent Storm feels like it was written to be a primer for the Halo EU. The only thing it doesn’t touch on is the Forerunners.
My first proper Halo read was "Halo: Glasslands", though so far my favorite remains "Contact Harvest". Easily my choice, with my favorite giant hula-hoop ass kicking marine !
I'll always say the original books are my favorite especially First Strike I actually have the original copies. Funny part is I like Halo The Fall of Reach and Halo Reach equally the same, whenever people ask how I simply say "I treat them as their own interpretations of Reach, and Halo Canon fixed most if not all of the plot holes extremely well"
I just consider the Eric Nylund book actually canon while the game was Bungie Goodbye fan service. Had a blast playing the game even if the story surrounding it made absolutely no sense (you can’t just land troops on the most heavily defended human planet prior to engaging any of their space forces. Like what?? And the CSO class carrier is like the size of High Charity 😂)
@@TheCelestialvision it was pointed out that smaller ships exploited a gap in Human defenses (as seen in Halo 2 terminals) and set up the spires which were teleportation terminals, these allowed the capitol ship to completely bypass the defenses undetected and used advanced but extremely expensive cloaking technology that kept the ship hidden until a spire was destroyed. The reason these never returned is because the Spires were extremely expensive and complex so few were produced and specifically equipped for CSO carriers. Was it explained properly nope it wasn't but if you listen to Dot and Jorge in Tip of the Spear it mentions teleportation terminals and electromagnetic cloaking so the answer was there, the problem was people never paid attention
DKM Graf Zeppelin I mean, there will always be post-hoc explanations sprouting up for these things the way they do for all the lore breaking things in the Disney Star Wars movies. You’re free to accept whatever explanation for your own head canon. Fact remains, hardly any serious halo lore junkies like the CSO class supercarrier, which essentially just appears as an upscaled CAS Assault Carrier, when we know that you can’t simply upscale something like that, things like hanger space and internal hallways would be wildly inefficient space-wise. Also, there should have been dozens of UNSC Capital ships in orbit responding to the covenant corvettes upon visual identification even if they try to explain that they had low observable radar signatures (also these could have been destroyed easily with a single Mac round from even the smallest UNSC frigate yet the one fight we see between them shows a frigate engaging in a side barrage rather than using any standard attack strategy of UNSC ships. There are dozens of inconsistencies like this which just make it easier to accept that Bungie just wanted to make a fun game as a last goodbye and so picked an era that was already famous from the books and threw in a bunch of experimental features like space flight for mere entertainment value, which is exactly what they did. It’s not a slight on Bungie to say that their intention was to make a fan-service game rather than stay consistent with lore. In fact, the halo reach game story could have been written without even having read the book. It doesn’t, to my knowledge, make reference to really much of anything from the book besides the name of the planet. So ya, it’s fan-service which they are afraid to blatantly call such because they think it might diminish its legitimacy as a Halo game, which it really shouldn’t. It’s still a fun halo game. Not being lore-accurate does not take away from its fun factor. It’s like a DBZ film. Some of my favorite DBZ stories and characters come from the films, even though they are not considered canon with the main series. I too love both the The Fall of Reach book and the Halo Reach game. I just don’t try to fit something that is clearly not consistent with canon into canon based on some arbitrary rule that “if it’s in game form then it must be canon” 😄
TheCelestialvision Actually the Halo Reach story makes perfect sense. Halo Canon already did a video showing how both versions of the Fall of Reach work
Halo: Fall of Reach. As a kid i really wanted halo when o first saw it. I was big into space marines and my dad found the novel and he said if i could read the novel he would buy me an xbox and halo for christmas. I have reread and listened to every novel multiple times on this almost 20 year journey of an addiction to halo. And all that being said.....Ghost of Onyx is best book. But in all honesty every book has brought something new and interesting for me and its really really hard to say which one i like more.
All of Eric Nylunds halo books are great. I happen to have a Eric Nylund signed copy of Ghosts of Onyx from San Diego Comic-Con 2006 where I got to meet him. I was way more excited than meeting any celebrity:)
I remember you told me recently on Reddit that The Fall of Reach actually has extra content and more minor fixes to the book. I recently got the 2019 version and can see its a lot thicker than the 2010 version. Is that the case with First Strike and The Flood too? And could you do a video on the various guide books?
I am actually going through the books right now. I read the Forerunner Trilogy first but then just decided to go in release order. I'm about to start Evolutions today
Man! Haha this video came out right before we were recommending several of these books the next two Friday’s, I won’t spoil what Covnenant Canon and Installation00 ended up recommending, but both of the books they wound up recommending are on your list here haha. GREAT VIDEO!
Favorite has to be either the Kilo-Five Trilogy or Shadow of Intent. My first was Contact Harvest. I have yet to encounter a Halo book that isn't amazing
My first Halo book was New Blood, continuing my trend of getting into my favourite franchises through the most random points. 0:55 If you think that's an issue, try getting into Star Wars Legends (seriously).
I’m told great books but the audiobooks are not the best. Given the popularity of halo they need to get great narrators like the ones from the Warhammer series. Such as the legendary Jonathan Keeble and Toby Longworth. And of course Gareth Armstrong, Timothy Watson, John Banks. So if I could pick it would be Toby Longworth for the UNSC and ODST books. Gareth Armstrong for the Forerunner books. Timothy Watson for covenant books. and Jonathan Keeble for all the Sparten books, plus the Covenant books and the UNSC with the ODST books also have him do the Forerunner books too. just Keeble. just have Jonathan Keeble read all the books and you will see sales go up 300% and done.
My first book was Ghost of Onyx! I had a free audiobook and I gave it a try... after that the rest is history. I listened to the whole Halo collection in audiobook format because of a few reasons. First, it fit my lifestyle as I don’t have much time to sit down and read. I listened while in the gym or long road trips. Second, it was a more immersive experience with the narrators emotions. My favorite titles are hard to pin point but a few to point out are the original Nylund books, the Forerunner trilogy, the Master Chief stories, and the Troy Denning post war Novels. With that said Shadows of Reach could not come any sooner!.... and I’m still waiting on the Greg Bear Ancient Humanity Trilogy 😉
I read up to New Blood before life became really busy. Last year I continued my journey with Silent Storm, and I recently finished Oblivion. I'm on Fractures currently but I think I'll go back and read by release order, meaning Evolutions (I was against anthologies in the past) and then Hunters In the Dark. Good video, cheers! I have original copies of The Fall of Reach and The Flood, and the 2010 First Strike, I would recommend release order based off my experience too.
I was always pretty content with getting my Halo knowledge from Wiki's and youtube, but recently I read 'Smoke and Shadow' and its sequels. Now I have the urge to just sit down and read all the books!
You should explain what other stories beside books that that fans should watch or listen to. Here's some stories I've downloaded to just listen to, this is the order I have them play, it's the best I could do making them chronological. Halo 4 Terminals Halo Legends: The Duel Halo: The Fall of Reach (Movie Adaptation) Halo Wars Trailer Halo Wars (Game Movie) Halo Legends: Prototype Halo: Forward Unto Dawn Halo Legends: The Babysitter Halo Legends: Homecoming Halo Evolutions: Headhunters (Animated Comic) Halo Evolutions: Midnight in the Heart of the Midlothian (Animated Comic) Halo Reach Trailer "Birth of a Spartan" Halo Reach Trailer "Deliver Hope" Halo Reach (Game Movie) Halo: Combat Evolved (Game Movie) Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary Terminals I Love Bees Halo 2 First Announcement Trailer Halo 2 Anniversary Terminals Halo 2 (Game Movie) Halo 3: ODST Live Action Trailer Sadie's Story Halo 3: ODST (Game Movie) Halo: Landfall Halo 3 Trailer "Starry Night" Halo 3 Trailer Campaign "Believe" (1-4) Halo 3 (Game Movie) Halo Legends: Origins 1 Halo Legends: Origins 2 Halo Evolutions: The Return (Animated Comic) Halo Evolutions: The Mona Lisa (Animated Comic) Halo 4 Trailer "Wake Up John" Halo 4 Trailer "Scanned" Halo 4 (Game Movie) Spartan Ops (Cinematic Movie) Halo: Nightfall Hunt the Truth Season 1 Halo MCC Trailer Hunt the Truth Season 2 Halo 5: Guardians (Game Movie) Halo Wars 2 (Game Movie) Halo Infinite Trailer "Discover Hope" I know some of these are actual games, however it takes much longer to play the game than to just listen. Hope you guys enjoy, should take a few days to listen to it all.
I only call The Fall of Reach my absolute favorite because it’s the only book I’ve read more than ten times. You could say my copy of the definitive edition is very well loved, and chock full of sticky flags and pen marks correcting the numerous errors and typos
so, a bit off-topic, but i know that in the extended universe a journalist tired to expose the unethical science (to put it mildly) of the spartan II program, but ONI discredited him completely, the locked him up in midnight facility. so i have a question, have the spartan programs' true origins and dodgy morals been made public? or been exposed by any other journalists?
man microsoft just need to get their thumbs out their asses and make a huge budget halo live-action movie with top of the line CGI. you KNOW it would sell like hotcakes.
This link has all the halo books, graphic novels, animated films, and anything else halo in chronological order. Turn your phone sideways to see the full chart. mythbank.com/halo-timeline-and-chronology/
My first was contact harvest then cole protocol, I haven’t read enough of them to have a definitive favorite but shadows of reach is a great semi self contained blue team story that I heavily enjoy
I was intimidated to start with such a big book so I read battleborn 1 & 2 and now I’m loving shadows of reach and am on track to finish before infinite
My favorite book is definitely Halo: The Cole Protocol cause it’s the first Halo book I read and the action scenes in it are great (and grey team’s armor on the cover is badass)
To this date my favourite Halo book is still Ghosts of Onyx, amazing book and i include it as part of the First 4 to read Reach The flood(though i believe you can skip it) First strike GoO
I read them in chronological order whenever I reread them, but I do it based on chapter not book. For example the Halo Reach mission "Tip of the Spear" is right after a chapter of Fall of Reach with the following chapter taking place a few minutes after Tip of the Spear, so I play that mission between the two chapters. Also if a story is told in the past tense, like in the Admiral Cole short story, then I read it at the point of when it is being told, so December of 2552. If that story was told in a present tense then I would have consistently come back to it between other novels. Unfortunately some chapters and stories never say exactly where they are in the canon so I make an educated guess. Like the Headhunters short story which I currently read around the 2549-2550 time slot. This method is not perfect and as a result every time I reread the books I notice a slight error and I edit my order occurdiling for the next reread. I try to reread the books once every 2-3 years, same goes for the Gears of War books that I have.
That’s awesome! I just did a chronological run of every Star Wars new canon piece of media... films, comics, books, shows, games, and short stories. I did the same thing where I would stop certain stories and come back to them to make the timeline fit the best I could. It was pretty incredible. I was thinking about doing Halo or Assassin’s Creed next.
Evolutions also tells my personal favorite Flood story, the Mona Lisa. When a group of Marines investigate a prison ship that turns out to be an experimental facility for ONI who use the prisoners, both human and the covenant as test subjects to study the Flood. A horror short story that really captures the horrific nature of the Flood and the extremely shady dark side of ONI. This short story certainly shares Aliens (1986) vibes.
Personally, I feel my favorites were the forerunner trilogy. There was just something about that trilogy that grasped my attention and made me fall in love with it. I had already really liked the Didact as a villain before reading them, and now I feel he’s the best villain in all of the games, it’s a shame he was misused between 4 and 5 in the comics
Omg, I had to scroll through comments so much to find someone praising this! I know these books can be difficult to read but they are literally the origins of humans! I love the fact that it mentions that ancient humans had many different "races" like florians, hamunune etc and we are actually finding their remains in latest excavations!
I finished Ghosts of Onyx today and I felt every second of it. It was the first one I read since The Fall of Reach as one of my book reports in high school
I have tried reading a couple times, but listening to new blood/bad blood on audible has been good for me. They feel very close to the games without having too much expanded lore which is quite nice
If you manage to get through the oldest stories and find that Ghosts of Onyx was your favorite, I will recommend a series that he didn't mention: the Kilo-Five Trilogy. This consists of Glasslands, The Thursday War, and Mortal Dictata and is a sort of branching path between the events of Ghosts of Onyx and Halo 4/5.
I love that this video popped up I really want to get into the books. Its been less than a year since I bought the MCC blinded without playing any games beside reach and I just love everything about the lore and games
My first, of two, book for the Halo extended universe was actually last light. I heavily enjoyed it, and the cameos that were throughout the book were rather interesting when I actually learned who they were at a later date. At the time I honestly wasn't into halo as much as I am now, and channels like this helped me learn half of the small jokes and references throughout the book. Also the other halo book I read was Hunters in the dark, tho it wasn't as good in my opinion, it still was written excellently.
Halo Canon Maybe I was reading too fast and not paying enough attention to detail, but I felt I was confused at times during events and that I had a hard time of understanding what was going on.
I think people should read them in published order EXCEPT, FROM CONTACT HARVEST. I heavly recomend read Contact Harvest before The Fall Of Reach, and read Protocole Cole just after de first engagement with the Covenant in The Fall (So you get more into Captain Keyes character).
Perfect video for today. I actually just got my package from amazon of the 8 Halo books I didn't yet own (ok well one of them was the newer version of The Flood because my original is so beat up I'm afraid to use it)
This video was very helpful. I myself prefer the chronological approach, and your detailed picture of all the books in chronological order has helped immensely. Not to mention that I learned about new books that I was not aware existed. Great video.
Thanks for this. I'm a fan of some of the other popular military Sci-fi franchises (Star Wars, Mass Effect, Warhammer 40K) and I've been meaning to check out Halo for a while. This will definitely make it easier.
My first halo books were the forerunner trilogy and i love them the most. However, last light and Retribution are also in the running for my favorites.
Fantastic as a fellow halo law nerd I think you did a fantastic job I would have recommended exactly the same things you said, thiers one graphic novel that’s hard to get but other then that I think my fave to start with is harvest, but new blood was my absolute fave, but I first started with fall of reach
THIS is what I love about Halo and why it's become my favorite series, even after barely getting into the games with the PC release of MCC! I then got Audible and started listening to the books at work starting with Fall of Reach! Now Halo is my all time favorite series!
My first was, the flood, epic read, but honestly after reading contact harvest, I had wished I had saved my reader cherry for that one. Extremely worth the dough and time invested in my eye.
HALO the fall of reach was the first novel I ever read and it holds a special place in my heart especially since I had to use the original audiobook to help me finish it due to the fact that I have dyslexia. That book started me down this rabbit hole and from that point forward I just got better and better at reading all the way up to the point where I had a high school reading level in middle school. Unfortunately I can’t read as much as I used to but I can personally vouch for audible because when I went to school to get my bachelors in game art and design I always had audiobooks on in the background while I was working on my 3-D projects.
Just pick a book and read it man, I straight up decided I wanted to read the halo books so I spent like 50 bucks on Amazon on abt ten of em, read all of em, and did it again, it matters not at all where or how you start, it's fuckin halo guy.
If you’re a fan of the games and just want to know what happened between games, here’s how I got started -Fall of Reach -Fistful of Arrows (UnOffical Graphic Novel) -Ghost of Onyx -First Strike -Halo Uprising (Grapic Novel) Ghost of Onyx was my first, I loved the origins of the Spartan llls and Kurt became one of my favorite characters in all of Halo.
If you like your book shelf to have a sense of uniformality take it from me: CHECK THE PUBLISHER BEFORE BUYING. Gallery books are larger from their Titan counterparts. Unfortunately Broken Circle doesn't come in Titan format and the Tor books have differing sizes the third book of the Kilo 5 trilogy offers a larger format. Schoolastic (Battle born) published books are the same size as the Gallery Print books. So go Gallery publishing books Smaller format for Tor I don't believe the Schoolastic offer any other sizes Congratulations, you now have a bookshelf that conforms with your OCD
So how does Titan Books relate to all this? The 3 main publishers were Del Rey, Tor and now Gallery. For the encyclopedia-ish books the main publisher was Titan. But, it seems that Titan also publishes the novels. Perhaps mainly for a UK audience? Which seems strange to me since English is English (minor a few differences between British and US-English). Why would they publish their owns “versions/editions”? I have books from Gallery, Tor and Titan, all novels. The only main difference I have found is the quality of the cover which is far superior in Titan’s releases. Do you have any idea what the deal is?
"how and where to get the books" look dude, I bought my books through walmart, from an external site that took a bit to get to me but I got the first 4 Books FOR LESS THAN THE COST OF ONE (they are like 17$ Each, I got them for 4$ each) honestly, just google search, there are TONS of sites that will give you info, and then google shopping gave me sweet deals, OFC you cannot trust all the sites, but this one site, I will return to them, that was a good price for these Books.
I read the Forerunner trilogy, Broken Circle, Fall of Reach but only up till 2525. Contact Harvest, Silent Storm, Oblivion, Cole Protocol and now finishing Fall of Reach. In between I've readcomics and short stories in the order they took place. I decided to go all in and commit, have a word doc to follow so I know the order lol
Does your code still work.? Cause I’ve been wanting to get into the halo lore for the books cause I’ve read all the Percy Jackson books and the prequels with the romans and lotr and Harry Potter books quite abit already
I was hooked on the halo games right when CE originally came out for xbox. I was in middle school and when the first books released I gobbled those things up. So I have a soft spot for Fall of Reach, The Flood, and First Strike. I still have my copies of the original release of those books
This might but a dumb question, but do you need to have played the games to understand what’s going on in these books? I’m a very casual fan- mostly sticking to the multiplayer- so I don’t know much about the lore
So I'm an audible "reader" and want to do release order, but I think they have them labeled in chronological order but then they have different numbers in different places so it's hard to tell. I will save this video and refer to your image. I am into fall of reach right now and I guess Flood is next though some people say Contact harvest should be next. My understanding is that is a Johnson stand alone story though and some people have it further down, but definitely in the top 10. I am really interested in the Covenant POV too but I guess that will be nowhere in the first group of books I'm guessing? Now I will watch the rest of the video and find out I guess.
The first two Halo novels I read were Ghosts of Onyx and Cole Protocol. I have to say first TWO instead of just first because I got them both so close together that I can't actually remember at this point which of them I read first. Either way, loved them both.
I'm trying to figure out where to go because I'm about to finish the forerunner trilogy all cuz I stumbled across Cryptum's free audio book on UA-cam and got hooked. Anyone have any advice on what go move onto next.
I like to think they commisioned a reprint of Fall of Reach just to give a good cover instead of five in game models standing in front of a blurry city background
If you're an action reader like me rather than a cerebral reader, start with fall of reach and just plug the books in where they go with the games. Loved kilo 5 trilogy. Hated bear trilogy despite its history.
I have been reading from release order and I am a slow reader so it is taking a long time. I am midway through the Kilo Five trilogy right now and next up is Broken Circle. I cant wait to read a singular book rather than a massive trilogy, as reading two trilogies back to back can start to feel very slow.
Just finished the original star wars expanded universe and was looking for something new to read, saw that a whole bunch of my favourite star wars authors wrote halo books so I thought I'd look into these, at least the bear Travis's and denning ones
Ghosts of Onyx is easily my favorite Halo book of all time.
That makes two of us...
Gabriel DeMaria breaks my heart that book but what a read
I remember when I bought it I was a kid in elementary school, the first Sci-fi book I've ever read, boy it is a fantastic story!!
I just bought it and tge fall of reach for a dime at a yard sale i cant wait to read them
When I was in elementary school I read the original, The flood and first strike. When I started playing the MCC on PC I decided to pick up the books again. I just finishing ghost of Onyx and I loved it, amazing story!
As Timmy Turner would say, "Ummm, the Internet."
And he says it over and over and over and over again.
My favorite Halo book is Halo: Silentium. That book brings so many things of the Halo universe together and is a great emotional roller coaster.
Couldn't agree more! Silentium is an absolute masterpiece!
@@HaloCanon don't forget the voice acting on the audio book. It was so excellent acting and I'll always remember all those characters with those voices. Uhing Mortan I believe.
@@elipsorange I literally just used my free credit on the flood book. Might have to buy this one if it's getting this much praise
@@MRN0ob29 it's amazing man, the didacts voice will be forever engrained into the lore.
greg bear did the forerunners justice in this trilogy. Wonderful stuff.
Here’s a few books for newcomers to the books when starting off with
fall of reach
Cole protocol
First strike
Contact harvest
New blood (if you haven’t played odst do not read since it spoils the entire game and you wont get the emotional impact and twists)
You mean New Blood, not First Blood.
Realm thanks for the correction mate
Is that the order of the games?
@@SkanDogVids no they are books
@@qwnspf lol i know that but which ones are during the games
Still waiting on that review of Halo The Flood and First Strike
Along with Retribution and Legacy of Onyx.
I read these two books years ago. The Flood might have been the first book to mention ODST’s as many of the marines in Halo: CE are described as ODST’s in the novelization even though they lacked the appearance in the game (I was hoping that 343 would have made the marines in The Truth and Reconciliation appear in Halo 3 ODST armor as I believe they were supposed to be ODST’s in the book.
The only major scene I remember from this book (having read it over a decade ago) was a really badass scene with some stealth elites who try to infiltrate a base with marines and ODST’s. I won’t spoil it other than to say ODST’s and marines are badass.
Halo First Strike is a very well written book coming from Eric Nylund, The Godfather of Halo. I just remember that it followed blue team primarily on a mission on a large covenant space port and shows how badass Linda is with a sniper.
Hope that helps 😁
I was thinking something similar with Silent Storm. As packed as it is with cameos and references to other Halo novels, Silent Storm feels like it was written to be a primer for the Halo EU. The only thing it doesn’t touch on is the Forerunners.
My first proper Halo read was "Halo: Glasslands", though so far my favorite remains "Contact Harvest". Easily my choice, with my favorite giant hula-hoop ass kicking marine !
RIP Dadap.
@@damienmaymdien6367 F
I'll always say the original books are my favorite especially First Strike I actually have the original copies. Funny part is I like Halo The Fall of Reach and Halo Reach equally the same, whenever people ask how I simply say "I treat them as their own interpretations of Reach, and Halo Canon fixed most if not all of the plot holes extremely well"
DKM Graf Zeppelin I agree with you 100%
I just consider the Eric Nylund book actually canon while the game was Bungie Goodbye fan service. Had a blast playing the game even if the story surrounding it made absolutely no sense (you can’t just land troops on the most heavily defended human planet prior to engaging any of their space forces. Like what?? And the CSO class carrier is like the size of High Charity 😂)
@@TheCelestialvision it was pointed out that smaller ships exploited a gap in Human defenses (as seen in Halo 2 terminals) and set up the spires which were teleportation terminals, these allowed the capitol ship to completely bypass the defenses undetected and used advanced but extremely expensive cloaking technology that kept the ship hidden until a spire was destroyed. The reason these never returned is because the Spires were extremely expensive and complex so few were produced and specifically equipped for CSO carriers. Was it explained properly nope it wasn't but if you listen to Dot and Jorge in Tip of the Spear it mentions teleportation terminals and electromagnetic cloaking so the answer was there, the problem was people never paid attention
DKM Graf Zeppelin I mean, there will always be post-hoc explanations sprouting up for these things the way they do for all the lore breaking things in the Disney Star Wars movies. You’re free to accept whatever explanation for your own head canon.
Fact remains, hardly any serious halo lore junkies like the CSO class supercarrier, which essentially just appears as an upscaled CAS Assault Carrier, when we know that you can’t simply upscale something like that, things like hanger space and internal hallways would be wildly inefficient space-wise.
Also, there should have been dozens of UNSC Capital ships in orbit responding to the covenant corvettes upon visual identification even if they try to explain that they had low observable radar signatures (also these could have been destroyed easily with a single Mac round from even the smallest UNSC frigate yet the one fight we see between them shows a frigate engaging in a side barrage rather than using any standard attack strategy of UNSC ships.
There are dozens of inconsistencies like this which just make it easier to accept that Bungie just wanted to make a fun game as a last goodbye and so picked an era that was already famous from the books and threw in a bunch of experimental features like space flight for mere entertainment value, which is exactly what they did. It’s not a slight on Bungie to say that their intention was to make a fan-service game rather than stay consistent with lore. In fact, the halo reach game story could have been written without even having read the book. It doesn’t, to my knowledge, make reference to really much of anything from the book besides the name of the planet.
So ya, it’s fan-service which they are afraid to blatantly call such because they think it might diminish its legitimacy as a Halo game, which it really shouldn’t. It’s still a fun halo game. Not being lore-accurate does not take away from its fun factor. It’s like a DBZ film. Some of my favorite DBZ stories and characters come from the films, even though they are not considered canon with the main series.
I too love both the The Fall of Reach book and the Halo Reach game. I just don’t try to fit something that is clearly not consistent with canon into canon based on some arbitrary rule that “if it’s in game form then it must be canon” 😄
TheCelestialvision Actually the Halo Reach story makes perfect sense. Halo Canon already did a video showing how both versions of the Fall of Reach work
Halo: Fall of Reach. As a kid i really wanted halo when o first saw it. I was big into space marines and my dad found the novel and he said if i could read the novel he would buy me an xbox and halo for christmas. I have reread and listened to every novel multiple times on this almost 20 year journey of an addiction to halo. And all that being said.....Ghost of Onyx is best book. But in all honesty every book has brought something new and interesting for me and its really really hard to say which one i like more.
All of Eric Nylunds halo books are great. I happen to have a Eric Nylund signed copy of Ghosts of Onyx from San Diego Comic-Con 2006 where I got to meet him. I was way more excited than meeting any celebrity:)
Jokes on him, *you learned the lore!*
I remember you told me recently on Reddit that The Fall of Reach actually has extra content and more minor fixes to the book. I recently got the 2019 version and can see its a lot thicker than the 2010 version. Is that the case with First Strike and The Flood too? And could you do a video on the various guide books?
@sly dankass the mark of a great youtuber
The Forerunner Saga will always be my all time favourite 😭😭😭
Personally,my first book was Glasslands and I proceeded to read the Kilo-Five trilogy. I worked around those afterwards.
I am actually going through the books right now. I read the Forerunner Trilogy first but then just decided to go in release order. I'm about to start Evolutions today
Man! Haha this video came out right before we were recommending several of these books the next two Friday’s, I won’t spoil what Covnenant Canon and Installation00 ended up recommending, but both of the books they wound up recommending are on your list here haha. GREAT VIDEO!
Favorite has to be either the Kilo-Five Trilogy or Shadow of Intent. My first was Contact Harvest. I have yet to encounter a Halo book that isn't amazing
My first Halo book was New Blood, continuing my trend of getting into my favourite franchises through the most random points.
0:55 If you think that's an issue, try getting into Star Wars Legends (seriously).
Agreed. Trying to Start with the Thrawn trilogy and make it to the New jedi Order.
I just bought the fall of reach not knowing the order of them i was surprised at how many different books there are
What an incredible idea for a video! Didn’t know I needed it until I saw it, great stuff
First strike was my first Halo book and stands as my favourite. The Flood being a close second.
I’m told great books but the audiobooks are not the best. Given the popularity of halo they need to get great narrators like the ones from the Warhammer series. Such as the legendary Jonathan Keeble and Toby Longworth. And of course Gareth Armstrong, Timothy Watson, John Banks.
So if I could pick it would be Toby Longworth for the UNSC and ODST books.
Gareth Armstrong for the Forerunner books.
Timothy Watson for covenant books.
and Jonathan Keeble for all the Sparten books, plus the Covenant books and the UNSC with the ODST books also have him do the Forerunner books too. just Keeble. just have Jonathan Keeble read all the books and you will see sales go up 300% and done.
Personally Halo cryptum was an amazing book plus it's free on youtube amazing hearing a story from some forerunners point of view.
My first book was Ghost of Onyx! I had a free audiobook and I gave it a try... after that the rest is history. I listened to the whole Halo collection in audiobook format because of a few reasons. First, it fit my lifestyle as I don’t have much time to sit down and read. I listened while in the gym or long road trips. Second, it was a more immersive experience with the narrators emotions.
My favorite titles are hard to pin point but a few to point out are the original Nylund books, the Forerunner trilogy, the Master Chief stories, and the Troy Denning post war Novels.
With that said Shadows of Reach could not come any sooner!.... and I’m still waiting on the Greg Bear Ancient Humanity Trilogy 😉
I read up to New Blood before life became really busy. Last year I continued my journey with Silent Storm, and I recently finished Oblivion. I'm on Fractures currently but I think I'll go back and read by release order, meaning Evolutions (I was against anthologies in the past) and then Hunters In the Dark. Good video, cheers! I have original copies of The Fall of Reach and The Flood, and the 2010 First Strike, I would recommend release order based off my experience too.
I was always pretty content with getting my Halo knowledge from Wiki's and youtube, but recently I read 'Smoke and Shadow' and its sequels. Now I have the urge to just sit down and read all the books!
You should explain what other stories beside books that that fans should watch or listen to.
Here's some stories I've downloaded to just listen to, this is the order I have them play, it's the best I could do making them chronological.
Halo 4 Terminals
Halo Legends: The Duel
Halo: The Fall of Reach (Movie Adaptation)
Halo Wars Trailer
Halo Wars (Game Movie)
Halo Legends: Prototype
Halo: Forward Unto Dawn
Halo Legends: The Babysitter
Halo Legends: Homecoming
Halo Evolutions: Headhunters (Animated Comic)
Halo Evolutions: Midnight in the Heart of the Midlothian (Animated Comic)
Halo Reach Trailer "Birth of a Spartan"
Halo Reach Trailer "Deliver Hope"
Halo Reach (Game Movie)
Halo: Combat Evolved (Game Movie)
Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary Terminals
I Love Bees
Halo 2 First Announcement Trailer
Halo 2 Anniversary Terminals
Halo 2 (Game Movie)
Halo 3: ODST Live Action Trailer
Sadie's Story
Halo 3: ODST (Game Movie)
Halo: Landfall
Halo 3 Trailer "Starry Night"
Halo 3 Trailer Campaign "Believe" (1-4)
Halo 3 (Game Movie)
Halo Legends: Origins 1
Halo Legends: Origins 2
Halo Evolutions: The Return (Animated Comic)
Halo Evolutions: The Mona Lisa (Animated Comic)
Halo 4 Trailer "Wake Up John"
Halo 4 Trailer "Scanned"
Halo 4 (Game Movie)
Spartan Ops (Cinematic Movie)
Halo: Nightfall
Hunt the Truth Season 1
Halo MCC Trailer
Hunt the Truth Season 2
Halo 5: Guardians (Game Movie)
Halo Wars 2 (Game Movie)
Halo Infinite Trailer "Discover Hope"
I know some of these are actual games, however it takes much longer to play the game than to just listen.
Hope you guys enjoy, should take a few days to listen to it all.
I only call The Fall of Reach my absolute favorite because it’s the only book I’ve read more than ten times. You could say my copy of the definitive edition is very well loved, and chock full of sticky flags and pen marks correcting the numerous errors and typos
A great video man! I love your recommendation. I personally go with chronological order, but Fall of Reach is a great place to begin reading!
so, a bit off-topic, but i know that in the extended universe a journalist tired to expose the unethical science (to put it mildly) of the spartan II program, but ONI discredited him completely, the locked him up in midnight facility. so i have a question, have the spartan programs' true origins and dodgy morals been made public? or been exposed by any other journalists?
My first halo book was Evolutions. I appreciate that it’s an anthology and bounces around the timeline, giving little snippets across the millennium.
man microsoft just need to get their thumbs out their asses and make a huge budget halo live-action movie with top of the line CGI. you KNOW it would sell like hotcakes.
This link has all the halo books, graphic novels, animated films, and anything else halo in chronological order. Turn your phone sideways to see the full chart.
mythbank.com/halo-timeline-and-chronology/
What pissed me off most is the producer who made the show of Halo. Didn't play the games or read the books at all. I want to take her job, and fix it.
My first was contact harvest then cole protocol, I haven’t read enough of them to have a definitive favorite but shadows of reach is a great semi self contained blue team story that I heavily enjoy
I was intimidated to start with such a big book so I read battleborn 1 & 2 and now I’m loving shadows of reach and am on track to finish before infinite
My favorite bookseries is definetly the Kilo 5 trilogy
definetly advice you to read it.
My favorite book is definitely Halo: The Cole Protocol cause it’s the first Halo book I read and the action scenes in it are great (and grey team’s armor on the cover is badass)
For those who want to read Ghosts of Onyx, keep in mind that it’s the third of a trilogy; read Fall of Reach and First Strike first.
To this date my favourite Halo book is still Ghosts of Onyx, amazing book and i include it as part of the First 4 to read
Reach
The flood(though i believe you can skip it)
First strike
GoO
Glasslands, Thursday War and Mortal Dictata are amazing! Such a good read (or listen)
Just picked up my first halo books, fall of reach and contact harvest.
I read them in chronological order whenever I reread them, but I do it based on chapter not book. For example the Halo Reach mission "Tip of the Spear" is right after a chapter of Fall of Reach with the following chapter taking place a few minutes after Tip of the Spear, so I play that mission between the two chapters. Also if a story is told in the past tense, like in the Admiral Cole short story, then I read it at the point of when it is being told, so December of 2552. If that story was told in a present tense then I would have consistently come back to it between other novels. Unfortunately some chapters and stories never say exactly where they are in the canon so I make an educated guess. Like the Headhunters short story which I currently read around the 2549-2550 time slot. This method is not perfect and as a result every time I reread the books I notice a slight error and I edit my order occurdiling for the next reread.
I try to reread the books once every 2-3 years, same goes for the Gears of War books that I have.
That’s awesome! I just did a chronological run of every Star Wars new canon piece of media... films, comics, books, shows, games, and short stories. I did the same thing where I would stop certain stories and come back to them to make the timeline fit the best I could. It was pretty incredible. I was thinking about doing Halo or Assassin’s Creed next.
Evolutions also tells my personal favorite Flood story, the Mona Lisa. When a group of Marines investigate a prison ship that turns out to be an experimental facility for ONI who use the prisoners, both human and the covenant as test subjects to study the Flood. A horror short story that really captures the horrific nature of the Flood and the extremely shady dark side of ONI. This short story certainly shares Aliens (1986) vibes.
You can't forget about Renegades! Its my new favorite novel by far!
What about comics? Like rise of atriox and escalation
I just started and I’m glade I started with the fall of reach
Personally, I feel my favorites were the forerunner trilogy. There was just something about that trilogy that grasped my attention and made me fall in love with it. I had already really liked the Didact as a villain before reading them, and now I feel he’s the best villain in all of the games, it’s a shame he was misused between 4 and 5 in the comics
Omg, I had to scroll through comments so much to find someone praising this! I know these books can be difficult to read but they are literally the origins of humans!
I love the fact that it mentions that ancient humans had many different "races" like florians, hamunune etc and we are actually finding their remains in latest excavations!
I personally just listened to them on my downtime at work. You can also easily download them for free if you are broke like me lol
I finished Ghosts of Onyx today and I felt every second of it. It was the first one I read since The Fall of Reach as one of my book reports in high school
I started with halos the flood This list really helps me
I have tried reading a couple times, but listening to new blood/bad blood on audible has been good for me. They feel very close to the games without having too much expanded lore which is quite nice
I started with New Blood a few months ago and immediately got Bad Blood when I finished, good books man.
The first book for me was the og halo the flood
If you manage to get through the oldest stories and find that Ghosts of Onyx was your favorite, I will recommend a series that he didn't mention: the Kilo-Five Trilogy. This consists of Glasslands, The Thursday War, and Mortal Dictata and is a sort of branching path between the events of Ghosts of Onyx and Halo 4/5.
This is EXACTLY the video I needed! After knowing Shadow of Reach's exciting plot, I want to read through every novel.
I love that this video popped up I really want to get into the books. Its been less than a year since I bought the MCC blinded without playing any games beside reach and I just love everything about the lore and games
My first, of two, book for the Halo extended universe was actually last light. I heavily enjoyed it, and the cameos that were throughout the book were rather interesting when I actually learned who they were at a later date. At the time I honestly wasn't into halo as much as I am now, and channels like this helped me learn half of the small jokes and references throughout the book. Also the other halo book I read was Hunters in the dark, tho it wasn't as good in my opinion, it still was written excellently.
Question to all: Is it just me or are Silent Storm and Oblivion kinda hard to follow? First book was The Fall of Reach, favorite is Ghosts of Onyx.
Hard to follow in what way?
Halo Canon Maybe I was reading too fast and not paying enough attention to detail, but I felt I was confused at times during events and that I had a hard time of understanding what was going on.
Thanks for the response, btw.
perfect video for Corona virus time!
Excellent video! This makes it much easier to go through my collection of novels I've not read yet. Thanks!
Glad to hear it, happy reading!
I’ve literally only ever read Fall of Reach because the rest are all over the place in the timeline
Please do one for the comics
I think people should read them in published order EXCEPT, FROM CONTACT HARVEST. I heavly recomend read Contact Harvest before The Fall Of Reach, and read Protocole Cole just after de first engagement with the Covenant in The Fall (So you get more into Captain Keyes character).
Perfect video for today. I actually just got my package from amazon of the 8 Halo books I didn't yet own (ok well one of them was the newer version of The Flood because my original is so beat up I'm afraid to use it)
I loved evolutions. 7th grade me reading The Mona Lisa scared the shit out of me.
This video was very helpful. I myself prefer the chronological approach, and your detailed picture of all the books in chronological order has helped immensely. Not to mention that I learned about new books that I was not aware existed. Great video.
Thanks for this. I'm a fan of some of the other popular military Sci-fi franchises (Star Wars, Mass Effect, Warhammer 40K) and I've been meaning to check out Halo for a while. This will definitely make it easier.
My first halo books were the forerunner trilogy and i love them the most. However, last light and Retribution are also in the running for my favorites.
I just finished the kilo 5 trilogy. Loved it. Don't know where to go from here. (Writing this just after starting your video)
Fantastic as a fellow halo law nerd I think you did a fantastic job I would have recommended exactly the same things you said, thiers one graphic novel that’s hard to get but other then that I think my fave to start with is harvest, but new blood was my absolute fave, but I first started with fall of reach
THIS is what I love about Halo and why it's become my favorite series, even after barely getting into the games with the PC release of MCC! I then got Audible and started listening to the books at work starting with Fall of Reach! Now Halo is my all time favorite series!
My first halo book was Halo New Blood because I’m such a big fan of Halo 3: ODST
My first was, the flood, epic read, but honestly after reading contact harvest, I had wished I had saved my reader cherry for that one. Extremely worth the dough and time invested in my eye.
And here I was expecting this to be a fifteen minute Audible ad :p
I mean, it ultimately was, just in a more round-about way :P
Halo Canon
If you wanted to troll, you could’ve recommended that Mortal Dictata be the one free audiobook thing.
HALO the fall of reach was the first novel I ever read and it holds a special place in my heart especially since I had to use the original audiobook to help me finish it due to the fact that I have dyslexia. That book started me down this rabbit hole and from that point forward I just got better and better at reading all the way up to the point where I had a high school reading level in middle school. Unfortunately I can’t read as much as I used to but I can personally vouch for audible because when I went to school to get my bachelors in game art and design I always had audiobooks on in the background while I was working on my 3-D projects.
Just pick a book and read it man, I straight up decided I wanted to read the halo books so I spent like 50 bucks on Amazon on abt ten of em, read all of em, and did it again, it matters not at all where or how you start, it's fuckin halo guy.
If you’re a fan of the games and just want to know what happened between games, here’s how I got started
-Fall of Reach
-Fistful of Arrows (UnOffical Graphic Novel)
-Ghost of Onyx
-First Strike
-Halo Uprising (Grapic Novel)
Ghost of Onyx was my first, I loved the origins of the Spartan llls and Kurt became one of my favorite characters in all of Halo.
If you like your book shelf to have a sense of uniformality take it from me: CHECK THE PUBLISHER BEFORE BUYING. Gallery books are larger from their Titan counterparts. Unfortunately Broken Circle doesn't come in Titan format and the Tor books have differing sizes the third book of the Kilo 5 trilogy offers a larger format. Schoolastic (Battle born) published books are the same size as the Gallery Print books.
So go Gallery publishing books
Smaller format for Tor
I don't believe the Schoolastic offer any other sizes
Congratulations, you now have a bookshelf that conforms with your OCD
So how does Titan Books relate to all this? The 3 main publishers were Del Rey, Tor and now Gallery. For the encyclopedia-ish books the main publisher was Titan. But, it seems that Titan also publishes the novels. Perhaps mainly for a UK audience? Which seems strange to me since English is English (minor a few differences between British and US-English). Why would they publish their owns “versions/editions”? I have books from Gallery, Tor and Titan, all novels. The only main difference I have found is the quality of the cover which is far superior in Titan’s releases. Do you have any idea what the deal is?
Read Fall of Reach, First Strike, COntact Harvest first, and then completely skip the Forunner trilogy.
Just saying, I just purchased Halo Evolutions Vol I on eBay for $7 including shipping. Check eBay out if you're looking!
"how and where to get the books"
look dude, I bought my books through walmart, from an external site
that took a bit to get to me
but I got the first 4 Books FOR LESS THAN THE COST OF ONE (they are like 17$ Each, I got them for 4$ each)
honestly, just google search, there are TONS of sites that will give you info, and then google shopping gave me sweet deals, OFC you cannot trust all the sites, but this one site, I will return to them, that was a good price for these Books.
Kindle format and audible halo books are not available in my country. Fckin annoying.
I read the Forerunner trilogy, Broken Circle, Fall of Reach but only up till 2525. Contact Harvest, Silent Storm, Oblivion, Cole Protocol and now finishing Fall of Reach. In between I've readcomics and short stories in the order they took place. I decided to go all in and commit, have a word doc to follow so I know the order lol
Does your code still work.? Cause I’ve been wanting to get into the halo lore for the books cause I’ve read all the Percy Jackson books and the prequels with the romans and lotr and Harry Potter books quite abit already
I was hooked on the halo games right when CE originally came out for xbox. I was in middle school and when the first books released I gobbled those things up. So I have a soft spot for Fall of Reach, The Flood, and First Strike. I still have my copies of the original release of those books
This might but a dumb question, but do you need to have played the games to understand what’s going on in these books? I’m a very casual fan- mostly sticking to the multiplayer- so I don’t know much about the lore
So I'm an audible "reader" and want to do release order, but I think they have them labeled in chronological order but then they have different numbers in different places so it's hard to tell. I will save this video and refer to your image. I am into fall of reach right now and I guess Flood is next though some people say Contact harvest should be next. My understanding is that is a Johnson stand alone story though and some people have it further down, but definitely in the top 10.
I am really interested in the Covenant POV too but I guess that will be nowhere in the first group of books I'm guessing? Now I will watch the rest of the video and find out I guess.
The first two Halo novels I read were Ghosts of Onyx and Cole Protocol. I have to say first TWO instead of just first because I got them both so close together that I can't actually remember at this point which of them I read first. Either way, loved them both.
I'm trying to figure out where to go because I'm about to finish the forerunner trilogy all cuz I stumbled across Cryptum's free audio book on UA-cam and got hooked. Anyone have any advice on what go move onto next.
Im interested in only the Canon books started at Reach to CE and beyond which books are those?
All the books are cannon
@@dabrody2406 oh.. lol good 2K
Shadow of reach (blueteam) and envoy (grey team rogue) are my2 favorite books.
I highly recommend Halo the Flood
If you love Combat Evolved you'll love this book
The first Halo books I got into was the forrunner saga.....oh boy that was confusing.
Just finished reading the Forerunner Saga. Very crazy.
It certainly is!
Halo Canon also, while you’re here, I unwittingly read Bad Blood before New Blood, is that gonna be a detriment to my enjoyment of New Blood?
I like to think they commisioned a reprint of Fall of Reach just to give a good cover instead of five in game models standing in front of a blurry city background
If you're an action reader like me rather than a cerebral reader, start with fall of reach and just plug the books in where they go with the games. Loved kilo 5 trilogy. Hated bear trilogy despite its history.
First audio book was Fall of Reach. Favourite is between The Flood and New Blood.
I always say start by watching lore videos on youtube....
I don't know bro.
I have been reading from release order and I am a slow reader so it is taking a long time. I am midway through the Kilo Five trilogy right now and next up is Broken Circle. I cant wait to read a singular book rather than a massive trilogy, as reading two trilogies back to back can start to feel very slow.
Just finished the original star wars expanded universe and was looking for something new to read, saw that a whole bunch of my favourite star wars authors wrote halo books so I thought I'd look into these, at least the bear Travis's and denning ones
My favorite and first Halo book was Halo: Shadow of Intent