The Legacy of Heorot by Larry Niven
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The first time I read this, years ago, I thought it was a middling colonist-survival novel with a fairly interesting beastie tearing them up. Not bad, not brilliant.

I had a sneaking suspicion that I may have given it a bad rap, so I decided to revisit it and read through the later novels since there were a few I never got around to. I mean, what could go wrong? I've always been a pretty solid fan of Larry Niven.

So, the really good: if you're a fan of Beowulf, you'll like all the references. The action setup and further sequences are pretty first-rate. We even get to enjoy the beastie's PoV, and I really like that glimpse into their psychology.

The meh: mostly it's the casual acceptance of misogyny. But to be fair, it's not so much bad as its 'EH?' Consenting adults, etc, so, whatever.

Interestingly enough, I'm a fan of comparing this, fairly favorably, against any number of modern SF reliant on colonies and beasties. It more than holds its own, so if any of you peeps just want something pretty light and full of alien action on an isolated planet, then there's much worse you could choose. :)

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