I had heard a lot of good things about this book, so I was excited. I wouldn't say that I was blown away, but it was a good read.
The prose is simple, but as the book is heavier on the action, it works to the book's advantage. It makes for a fast and gripping read that keeps you engaged from the first to the last page.
The characters are likable enough, but they do feel a bit flat. There's enough there for you to root for them, but I wouldn't have minded seeing a little bit more development for them.
If there is a weak spot in the character roster, it's Sheriff Ashley Collins, the female lead and eventual love interest. I can't fault Robinson for wanting to make a capable female character, but he really overcompensated.
She excels at just about everything. I can see her holding her own in a fight (she is a cop after all) but she goes toe to toe with a highly trained ninja assassin and is even able to hold her own against a deranged army general who has been turned into a monstrous hybrid as a result of the experiments that created the titular "Nemesis" monster even though it was established that said hybrid was impervious to just about everything. Her back story justifies some of it, but it still strained credulity. The term "Mary Sue" wouldn't be an out of place descriptor in this case.
One unique thing that the book does is tell parts of the story from the perspective of the monster. It's an interesting concept and I really would have liked to see more of that. The monster had an interesting psychology and delving into that would have been fascinating to read.
I remember when "Cloverfield" came out, the producers talked about how the monster was supposed to be a lost baby looking for its mother. While I liked the movie, we're not given any hint that this is the creature's thought process. It looks like a rampaging monster, which is OK as it's a movie about a rampaging monster, but if you're going to throw out a character hook like that, it would be nice to see some evidence of it.
This medium, however, is able to better convey the thoughts of the monster and give us an idea of how it perceives the events that are unfolding around it. It works out rather well and puts a nice twist on the genre.
We do get an origin story of sorts of how this monster came about. I don't want to go into too many spoilers, but it involves an ancient alien creature and a young girl.
It makes for a tragic back story which gives the monster a bit of pathos. One thing I would have tweaked was to have the origins of the girl revealed at the end. I can understand wanting to tell the story chronologically, but I think it would have packed more weight for the reader to discover what happened along with the characters. Knowing the origin ahead of time also telegraphs the monster's motive to a certain extent.
On the flip side, I kind of wanted to learn more about the original alien. We're given enough information to get by, but I would be interested to learn more about where this thing came from and why it came to Earth. I guess it just makes more fodder for sequels, but I am curious about it.
I'm torn on the ending. After all of the action, just having the monster walk off seems anti-climactic. It does make for a sequel hook (and there is a sequel called "Project Maigo" so really the creature's survival was all but guaranteed) and plenty of kaiju movies do end with the monster retreating to a lair of some kind, but it may throw some readers off.
It may be the literary equivalent to a popcorn flick, but that doesn't mean it isn't entertaining. It's fast paced, is chock full of action, and adds a bit of humor to the mix. It isn't without its flaws, but the pros outweigh the cons. If you're a fan of the genre, this is certainly worth a read.
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