Currently Reading: Typhon Pact: Rough Beasts of Empire by David R. George III Star Trek V: The Final Frontier novelization by J. M. Dillard Killing Lincoln by Bill O'Reilly Since my past post, I've completed: Typhon Pact: Seize the Fire by Michael Martin Bloodletter (DS9 #3) by K. W. Jeter Double, Double (TOS #45) by Michael Jan Friedman Strike Zone (TNG #5) by Peter David Power Hungry (TNG #6) by Howard Weinstein and Reunion by Micheal Jan Friedman
Latest review is up! This one is for the first book in Kevin Ryan's Errand of Fury series, Seeds of Rage. Just finishing up Only Superhuman by Christopher L. Bennett, and moving on to Divergent by Veronica Roth shortly.
Finished Star Trek TNG:Resistance yesterday, enjoyed the first few chapters and Wolf's story was enjoyable throughout but the book took a major nosedive in quality at the midway point for me. Just started the Andor half of Worlds of DS9 Volume One. Heather Jarman has been by far the my favourite contributor to the DS9 relaunch so far.
Because people have been mentioning how much they enjoyed James Swallow's Cast No Shadow, i've decided to pick it up again and finish it. I have no idea why i didn't finish it originally, but i'm jumping back in at the 200 page mark. Hopefully it grabs me more this time
Finished Star Trek: Voyager: Distant Shores today. Nice touch that the people-of-the-week Equinox survivors appeared again. Resumed Star Trek: Invasion! #1: First Strike. The demonic aliens don't appear to be evil, after all. Nice this book manages to surprise me. Looking forward to finish it soon to continue with the series.
Invasion was the series that started Pocket's "summer crossover" tradition, and it remains one of my favorites. Of the four books, only the TNG entry is lackluster. The DS9 one doesn't deal much with the Furies directly and so almost feels a bit disconnected, but it's still a really good novel. First Strike is overall my favorite of the four, but then I'm a Diane Carey fan from way back, so I admit I'm biased.
Finished my first Star Wars book Heir to the Empire. Now back to Trek and the recommended Planet of Judgment, by Joe Haldeman.
Started thumbing through some of the novelizations to get them off of my unread shelf. Started with Voyager's Equinox. My god, Diane Carey just can't make characters sound like they do on the show even when she's doing a novelization. And leave it to her to throw in gratuitous and inappropriate navel references. "Katherine Janeway, Master & Commander" on the bridge plaque? Are you kidding me? And the Seven of Twelve reference? Yeah, Carey really follows the newer shows. The next one on my list is Flashback. Since this one is a single episode instead of a 2 parter there's going to be a ton of new content and since we've got Sulu it's all going to be about how TOS was the real Star Trek.
Flashback isn't bad, honestly. It was a decent novelization/expansion. As for Equinox, Broken Bow and the others? Nah, as much as I love her writing, it never really works for anything but TOS. The editors kept assigning novelizations to Carey because she could do them quickly. However, to this day, Final Frontier remains my favorite Trek novel.
I think the Flashback novelization is a considerable improvement on the episode. It gives it a stronger, more character-driven climax rather than just the "Doctor techs a virus to death" climax of the episode, and it adds a strong Kes B-plot as well as a Paris C-plot.
I just finished reading Cold Equations Book 2. I've really enjoyed reading this miniseries.I also finished readins an old Tos novel Perry's Planet.I'm reading the latest novel by Ben Bova.
Finished the Cold Equations trilogy by David Mack. Now trying to finally finish Confidence Men: Washington, Wall Street, and the Education of a President by Ron Suskind before moving on to re-start and finally finish The Spy Who Came in From the Cold by John le Carre.
I finished up ST:TNG Indistinguishable from Magic last night. I posted my thoughts over in the book specific review thread.
Finished Invasion! Book 1: First Strike. I'm neither much of a TOS nor Diane Carey fan but I like the novel very much. I had expected the Furies to be dumb 'demons in space'. Instead, Carey made them likable. In the battles between Feds, Klingons and Furies, there was no black/white, each group carried some sympathy and the almost-peace with the Furies adds a delicious bittersweet note overall. The next book on schedule is Invasion! Book 2: The Soldiers of Fear. In addition, I've begun reading Beowulf and Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales as part of my university studies.
About halfway through Plagues of Night at the moment. Indistinguishable from Magic was, unfortunately, indistinguishable from fanfic.
Because of the small universe syndrome (the crew, the son finding his mother's fate), or was there anything else, too? Just curious.
I didn't mind the overall plot at all, and I like most, if not all of the characters involved. I can deal with small universe syndrome. It's a Trek staple, after all. But this went beyond that into full-fledged continuity porn territory. But still, I could've dealt with all that, if the characters had been, well, in character. Their voices were almost all wrong, all the time. The dialogue wasn't good at all, and the prose was quite awkward in a lot of places. I say all this in comparison to the standards of writing established by the average Trek novel of the recent years. It was decidedly amateurish. Still and all, it was at least a little better than anything that, say, Susan Wright ever committed to text. Her books made my eyes bleed.