Wergen: The Alien Love War

by Mercurio D. Rivera

The Wergens: a highly sophisticated alien race biochemically infatuated with humans. They crave us, they need us, while we need their technology.

Humanity does what it always does. We exploit them. Until, that is, the Wergens find a way to circumvent their addiction…

From the towering skyscrapers of Earth to the methane lakes of Titan, from the ice-plains of Pluto to distant alien gas giants with steel-crushing gravity, Wergen: The Alien Love War explores personal stories of unrequited love set against the cosmic backdrop of the conflict between the two species.

Mercurio D. Rivera’s Wergen stories have wowed readers and critics alike. Now, for the first time, the full arc of the human/ Wergen relationship is revealed: the conflict, cooperation, love, betrayal, and more.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction

276 pages, Paperback

First published November 9, 2021

Reviews

[Riju Ganguly · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is undoubtedly one of the best scifi books to have come out in recent years.
What's it about?
Humanity makes contact with an alien race named Wergen. They are technologically advanced, peaceful, and helpful. Partnership with them was definitely advantageous for mankind as it allowed them to colonise the Solar System and also the far-flung areas. Only thins that the Wergen wanted in return was human company.
And that's where the issues arose.
This book is a collection of eleven works and an Addendum— stories, memo-s, and reports of incidents that showed us the complexity of cultural differences and how supposed superiority results in disaster.
My favourites were~
One: Longing For Langalana (as per internal chronological sequence, this is the last one);
Four: Tethered (this was a very disturbing tale, dealing with alien biology, that symbolically represented our relationships);
Nine: The Suicide Gene (origin story with myths and genetics— my favourite);
Eleven: The Fading Echoes of Love's Song (the conclusion of the saga, one can say).
Overall, I repeat, this is a truly superlative work.
Highly recommended.

[Jo · Rating 3 out of 5]

I may revise this rating when I actually review. It was pretty solid but not super amazing, and not particularly hard sci fi 🤔 Still baffled by the insanely bad cover/title but I guess as a marketing tactic it worked on me?

[Rob · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bizarre title, atrocious cover (but I kinda like it, reminds me of half-life) but absolutely excellent SF.

[Wendy S. Delmater · Rating 5 out of 5]

With this book, Rivera has carved himself an amazing place in SF&F history. The Love War is a fix-up novel, where graduated short-story beads are strung into the coherent necklace of a novel-sized story arc. And it’s his finest work.

I really don’t want to give the twists and turns away, but I will tell you that it starts out with aliens who are actually more emotional than we are, and their main emotion around humans is an utter slavish devotion. Imagine humanity being followed around by alien emotional adolescents who are constantly professing their undying love for us and wanting to know if there is anything — anything at all! — that they can do for us. Now imagine you have someone who is desperately in love with you who keeps following you around and bugging you constantly to pay attention to them, to let them do anything for you, to let them LOVE YOU. Yeah, annoying as all get out.

The Wergen have tech that we desperately need, but humanity can’t get enough volunteers to put up with these creatures that adore us so much and think we are so beautiful that they feel physical pain when they’re separated from us. Therefore Earth gives incentives to those who will volunteer to have Wergen companions, and assigns Wergens to individual humans. Needless to say, however platonic these lopsided relationships are, actual human/Wergen friendships are rare. But we need their tech, and with their seedships and force fields we can colonize our entire solar system, as well as planets around distant stars.

The interspecies relationship goes sour when the majority of Wergens on their home world decide that humans are a threat to them and synthesize an inhalant to get rid of the biochemicals that cause them to react to us. (You did notice the word “war” in the title of the book, right? Freedom from love!)

There’s so much more to it than that. I don’t wish to give too much away except to say that Rivera is a kick-ass writer who knows exactly what he’s doing and never disappoints. Give it a try.

RECOMMENDED

[Jacqie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Around the Year in 52 Books 2024: 13. A book that is on a Five Books List (Clarke Award nominees)

Probably 3.5 stars. The writing isn't totally smooth; it was the concepts in this book that I enjoyed the most. The idea is that humans encounter aliens (the Wergen) and these aliens are friendly. They are so friendly, in fact, that it makes most humans uncomfortable to be around their fawning. The Wergen seem to have some sort of pheromonal or chemical or emotional (or all of the above) response to humans that is just like the flush of burgeoning love. Each Wergen finds every human they meet radiantly beautiful, charming, and justified in everything they do and the aliens therefore want to help humanity with whatever is asked of them. They provide humans the technology to settle the solar system.

The book is written as a series of vignettes, looking back at the history of the relationship between Wergen and humans. It's episodic and jumps through time.

What I found original about this volume is that while there is a lot written about how humans and aliens might respond to each other technologically, physically and culturally, there isn't a lot about emotion. The Wergens' strong emotional response drives the entire relationship and history of how these two species interact. The author also seems to be questioning the nature of love. Love is chemical, so if the right chemicals are in play, does it matter if you are responding to something artificial or something that your hormones generated naturally? It feels the same, after all.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

I didn’t really know what to expect from this novel; I knew going in that the structure was a little unusual, but the only other thing I had to go on was the cover. I was incredibly pleased to find – especially after the previous Clarke finalist that I’d read – that it’s a phenomenal book. The book flits between Wergen and human perspectives in the stories that are presented, and although I think some of the stories were originally published separately to the novel, it doesn’t read like a clumsy collision of ill-fitting jigsaw pieces but rather more like a well-told epistolary novel.

The central conceit of the book – Wergens are physiologically compelled to love humans, and that causes humans negative emotions on a sliding scale from vague discomfort to cripping depression – is used well to cast humans as the abusive partner in a dysfunctional relationship. However, this relationship isn’t limited to two people, but two entire species. If I have one criticism it’s that a plot point in the final story – the conclusion of humanity’s relationship with the Eremites – feels very convenient for the plot. But it’s a minor criticism of a book I really enjoyed, and which I never would have read were it not for the Clarke.

[Stuart · Rating 3 out of 5]

Argh – that cover! Even the title! But putting them aside, the book is built around short stories, a so-called “fix-up” novel, where short-story threads are strung together into a novel-sized story. Some characters from one chapter will reappear in later ones, but it’s hard to remember which characters these are sometimes.
The Wergen are an alien race who are attracted to human beings, whether they like it or not, and offer to help them, Wergen technology being mush superior. But humans, inevitably, choose to exploit the Wergens’ devotion.
Some Wergens don’t want to be subject to desires they can’t control and resist, by creating a chemical that nullifies the love effect, and fight back. Thus the “Love War”.
Another alien race enters the picture later on, and humanity flirts with them – their tech is even better – but results are not ideal….
As for the book as a whole, I found I had to force myself to go back and read it once I put it down. It was OK, but I didn’t like the bittiness of the short story format. And it had some serious inconsistencies – if the Wergen knew that they would becoming devoted to humans, why did they seek them out in the first place?

[Ian · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most entertaining s/f novels I've read in ages, a book which questions what love is and why it affects us. The Wergen are an advanced alien species, technologically superior to mankind, but blinded by a deep infatuation with us. They agree to share their secrets if we allow them to spend time with us, wallowing and fawning in adoration. Predictably humanity takes advantage of them, until a rebellious section of their society develop a drug which suppresses their emotions. It's a fabulous read, spread over several decades, with a wide range of interesting and recurring characters, a real page turner which asks a lot of moral questions. Rivera ia an author I plan to keep track of.

[jzthompson · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 - being generous on the round up. I mostly read this one because of the pleasingly awful cover and the rumours that it was actually pretty good, even nominated for an Arthur C. Clarke award. Very old school SF of ideas that could have easily fitted in to the genre's 60s/70s heyday and held up it's head. Probably ultimately unable to escape it's origins as a series of short stories linked together into an overarching narrative, felt a bit disjointed at times. The emotional pay off in the appendix could have meaningfully become a through line for a properly impactful novel.

[A · Rating 5 out of 5]

The cover is really hideous - I ignored it and read it anyways, and I'm glad I did. It's a great book of short stories - and they all interweave in a really satisfying way. The stories are from all angles and it lets you really understand the cultural differences from each side.

It's sad and heart breaking at times. Each story brings out both empathy and repulsion.

[Becky · Rating 5 out of 5]

I absolutely loved this book, a collection of interconnected stories about the relationship between humans and the Wergens, aliens who are irresistibly chemically infatuated with humans. So full of emotion and twisty explorations of collaboration and clashing objectives, I loved Rivera's worldbuilding and ethical inquiries. I even cried a little. New favorite author!

[Martin Mullen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought the title and cover art were pretty off-putting, but the book itself is excellent. Each chapter is a self-contained story, but they fit together and interact wonderfully in the end. It's really worth giving this one a try.

[Ruggero Bettinardi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd suggest it. Tiggers interesting reflections on love and affection, well written and likeable stories, nice plot, cool characterization. The cover art in of this book edition is so, so terribly terribly ugly and ridiculous that, in the end, I came to like it XD

[Ben · Rating 5 out of 5]

This has everything a hard sf novel should have and more.

We are asked to question the true nature of emotions and free will. If love is involuntary is it open to abuse?

We are taken to awe inspiring planetary settings that would crush/broil/freeze.

We encountered creatures with odd biology, indeed on a planetary scale.

Characters and emotions are not neglected providing essential fulcrums for the plot.

I was slightly dubious when I heard that this was a fix up of many short stories that the author had previously published. The last story cleverly explains all the previous ones in an unexpected way.

The title of the book is terrible!! Almost any quotation from shakespeares sonnets or something from “midsummer nights dream” would have been superior.

[Gautam Bhatia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Clarke Award 2022 shortlist reading.

[Roy Kenagy]

2022 Clarke shortlist KINDLE $5.99

[3sm3 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Why is the title and cover so bad? The book is great first contact stuff.

[Readelf · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dreadful title, worse cover. I am going to spend the next week picking the nuance out of this clever collection of interconnected novellas.

Neveryon meets Beggars in Spain. Weird and smart.

[Adam · Rating 5 out of 5]

No-one is more surprised than myself to be writing such a positive review for Wergen: the Alien Love War. I did not have high hopes for this book, given the unusual title and a piece of cover art that leaves plenty to be desired. In the process of reading the Arthur C. Clarke 2022 nominees and having now read it from cover to cover, I offer my humblest apologies to Mercurio D. Rivera for my first impression. This book is, quite simply, an astounding piece of hard science fiction. The multiple narratives from different characters in the midst and on the sidelines of the Love War, successfully and comprehensively deconstruct the concept of love itself.
The Wergens are a species of alien who, due to their chemical makeup, find themselves irresistibly infatuated with the human race. Unwilling to pass up the opportunity of the Wergen's vastly superior technology, mankind exploits the Wergens and takes advantage everything they have to offer to serve their own needs. When the Wergens find a way to prevent the infatuation to cloud their thoughts though, the relationship between themselves and humanity starts to fray. This novel has all the elements of science fiction that make it my favourite genre; a creative and believable setting, combined with a fascinating element of social commentary that really gets you thinking. It's also served as a re-reminder for me to stop judging books by their covers!