I read a few. They weren't stellar but they at least rounded out a few characters that never got any screen time.
Like learning about Fox and gaining new disappointment in the writers of the show....
this post was submitted on 01 Sep 2026
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I'm curious on your second point. Could you elaborate?
If I remember correctly Fox is the first actual character in the show that has a skin tone darker than neon white. And even then he was barely a character. Then in the book they decided that he was blind, antisocial, and telepathic. And to me it felt like just the writers trying to excuse themselves for not having an actual black character until Flint Coal
Technically, Emerald came first, but yeah. Emerald is/was an unrepentant thief and a villain (narratively speaking), Flynt Coal is a bit of a racist caricature, and most of the characters w/ darker skin tones introduced in V3 -- Amber, Arslan, Ciel, etc. -- aren't characters so much as set dressing. And that's purposefully ignoring the White Fang which is basically filled with stuff you'd see from Fox News.
Personally, I 100% believe it was all incompetence rather than intentional, but the fact remains it is there, and a lot of fans don't see it (I wasn't participating in the fandom until RT's shutdown but sadly I too had to have all the bigotry pointed out to me).
I actually listened to the audiobooks for all three novels (After the Fall, Before the Dawn, and Roman Holiday). After the Fall was alright. There are bits that feel like weird inclusions -- the sand crabs or whatever they were called, when we've never seen any fantastical non-Grimm life on Remnant; Fox-is-blind-but-is-basically-Toph-with-his-Semblance is trite; one of the villains has a Semblance functionally identical to Glynda; etc. -- but it was a serviceable plot. Also Carmine Esclados from that novel got official art of her for some reason and she's kinda hot.
Now Before the Dawn is an absolute travesty. They introduce a character (deputy to the headmaster of Shade Academy) with a Semblance so bullshit that they could just end all problems with Salem. They have a character just do their fairy tale inspiration bit without any nuance or new take on it. They -- and I think this was the rest of Team SSSN for this one -- forcibly bully Neptune with his trauma. AND there's some throwaway lines the author clearly didn't think about which places all of Team SSSN at the V5 Haven fight, but not like retconing them into the fight, no no: they were just standing back and watching. Deplorable.
Roman Holiday, though, was pretty fun. Full backstory for Neo and Roman. Takes place before the events of the show so there's nothing that really contradicts canon. Tho it's worth mentioning that the author introduced a bit of a misogynist trope which simultaneously causes a snag with canon: one of the original characters in the novel is a woman whose Semblance is to blend in with her surroundings, just like Ilia, except that it doesn't work on her clothes so she goes around naked all the time. Bleh.
Yeesh, didn't realize Before the Dawn was so shit. Should I even bother reading it? I was looking to official RWBY books for inspiration/understanding how to write RWBY fiction before deciding to just do my own thing after finishing After the Fall.
Also gross. Some of the mainstay writers of RWBY and the side stories are pretty obviously bad people. A long ass video I once watched on YT about RWBY went into it a bit.
Well the bottom line is in terms of technical ability, all three hover around the same level -- so it's not like you'll want to tear your eyeballs out from the prose if you decently enjoyed After the Fall. There's just a lot of plot and characterization issues in Before the Dawn, which will probably invoke rage in any half-invested fan. If it weren't for those, it would probably be more forgettable than After the Fall for how little actually happens in it.
I'm hoping it doesn't end up becoming required reading going into V10, because the V9 epilogue hinted that we're going to see Jax and Jillian joining Salem's team.
Roman Holiday is a more enjoyable read than either of the other books, but it's not great writing, either. I cannot comment on E.C. Meyers character but they seem to be an adequate writer at best, if these are anything to go by. TBH I don't think the majority of the fandom even know they exist.
Now I can't be sure which video you're referring to, as there's been a few of them; there's been more than one infamous incident which revealed how much RT was kind of a toxic cesspit behind closed doors (including using an oblique slur against a trans crew member, on camera).