Spoilers ENT: Rise of the Federation: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

Okay, I have to ask exactly when was it established that the Kirk family has a long history in Starfleet? Because outside of Kirk and his father I haven't heard of any other Kirks in Starfleet.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

Well, no, it wasn't established, but it's not an unreasonable conjecture given that Jim Kirk is at least second-generation Starfleet and given that both his parents were in Starfleet. It's something that I've always had the impression was probably the case. And it served my purposes in this particular work to assert that it was the case.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

You're not crazy, I noticed the same thing.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

It's the early days of the Federation, they just didn't have good paper back in those days. Gotta make that prequel feel happen somehow.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

No you're not crazy. I think it's that the paper used is thinner than normal. Just enough to give it that floppy loose feel.

I really loved this book and I can't wait for the next one in the series. This is the best book released this year so far. None of the others can hold a candle to Rise of the Federation in my opinion. Thanks Chris for restoring my faith. I can only hope that next year's schedule will be less TOS heavy because I believe I'm done collecting them after all these years, but I will continue to buy the other series for sure.

Kevin

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

Ordered mine from Amazon UK, can't wait to get my hands on it.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

Yeah, mine's the same. Another recent TrekLit book was similar. Ironically, it may have been Forgotten History, though I'm not sure about that.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

Mine just arrived.

Yes, it's a little different in 'texture'. Neither the cover nor pages seem quite as stiff as recent novels, but there's nothing wrong with it.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

I just checked Forgotten History and it's as floppy as A Choice of Futures . Watching the Clock was floppy but not like these two.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

Maybe they've got a personal grudge against Christopher?

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

Just finished the book this morning. I thought it was great. I know ENT is not many peoples favorite show, but Chris did a great job writing for characters established by the ENT actors I enjoyed the espionage/political conundrums the most. The Orion's were clever antagonists. Looking forward to this series continuation.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

While I liked the flow of the story, and that the characters spread out believably, was one bit that felt a bit off to me: Trip.

Just feels like his character is gone, not sure I get the rationale for it. Obvious retcon for bad TV decision, but you can ALMOST explain away the decision to fake his death, go undercover, and be the engineering expertise that the spy mission required. Had the unique background, etc. From there, his thinking gets a lot fuzzier. Obviously got a 'wife' back home, friends and family, and the reason for faking his death is past. Having a harder and harder time seeing why he's still there.

Is the only sticking point that Riker thought he died for good, so they don't want to bring him back and contradict that? Seems like there's other ways to deal with this, and it's kind of a slow character death here. He now feels 'off' (intentionally), and even the other characters don't like him, aside from when he has mind sex with T'Pol.

I dunno, that one the only one where I don't really care for the direction a character is going, and didn't really like the scenes where he showed up. Why bother to bring him back (going against canon, albeit shitty canon that was easy to rewrite) if it's just going to be a combo of disuse and then mangled personality when they DO use him? Just introduce a new Section 31 operative that has a mixed friend/foe relationship with the crew, seems kinda on the same team as our crew, that's what Trip is being used for.

Side note: were there typos in my book, or were they intentional? Section 31 came up as Section 3I for me, most if not all of the time. Dunno if that was on purpose, and it gets mangled with use over time, or someone fat-fingered it in editing. Doesn't SEEM like it would make sense to be a name drift over time, as the whole point was that it refers to phrasing in the original Charter, so wouldn't make sense for the location of that phrase to change. It was either always Section 3I, or Section 31. And we've heard 31 onscreen...

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

^Sorry Trip's current direction isn't working for you. That decision was out of my hands, though, since previous novels have already established the future path of his life.

Apparently the book uses a font that renders the numeral 1 in a way that resembles a capital I. I noticed something like that in the PDF, but it seemed to go away when I enlarged the text enough, so I thought it was a display glitch. I guess it turned out a little differently when actually printed.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

Heh, always fun actually discussing these things with the author!

Not like I'm blaming you for ruining the character or anything, was just the one bit of the ensemble that really felt out of place, and didn't make a ton of sense to me in-universe either. Think you did a decent job with the spot Trip's character is stuck in, just don't much care for it personally. Reason for him doing it is over, doesn't fit his personality, etc. Reed had some of the security/cloak and dagger type personality traits, Trip just seemed too straight-forward and easy going to make this a permanent career choice.

Maybe I'm glossing over something, but which books called out where his character has to end up? Do we know anything other than "Trip" stays dead as far as history is concerned?

Yeah, kept the capital I in the printed form, or at least how it appeared to me. Wanted to make sure that was a typo/font issue, and not an intentional decision that I was missing the reasoning on. Thanks!

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

Which is why I tried to find a new justification for why he feels he can't go back to his old life.

But that's what's interesting about it. Often the most intriguing place to put a character is the last place he'd ever want to be.

The Romulan War: To Brave the Storm has an epilogue revealing where Trip is in 2186.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

The pro- and epilogue of Last Full Measure establish that he lives to be at least 122 years old and that he never returns to his original life. It's also indicated that he changed personas a lot during that time (there are references to many re-constructional face surgeries). There is nothing that would set in stone his continuous work for Section 31, though.

After rereading those two chapters from LFM he seems far to "goody-two shoes" there to have been serving Section 31 for any length of time. Actually it's already kind of hard to reconcile RotF Tucker with LFM Tucker for me IMO.

ETA: Totally forgot about The Romulan War

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

Yeah it really doesn't make much sense bringing Trip back if he cannot be an active member of the case somewhere. Granted it retros the terrible decision that the powers that be made but that's all. Really Reed going Section 31 given that the character already had a history with them in the show would make more sense than trip

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

I think it would just be more predictable. Sometimes life takes turns that don't make sense, that put people in places they don't naturally belong.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

Hi Christopher,

thank you for another awesome book. I really like the way you write interesting stories with scientific stuff. Just love your books.

 

Re: ENT: A Choice of Futures by C. L. Bennett Review Thread (Spoilers!

I finished the book last night. Overall I enjoyed it, though I didnt think it was great.

I like the galactic politics and stuff, so I definityey enjoyed seeing that aspect. Seeing Reed grow as a captain was good too.

I didnt care for all the recalls to previous Enterprise epsiodes, I can understand why they were there maybe, but I personally coudl have done without most.

I am sure the small universe thing can be justified in universe, and has been, but it was at a level I didnt care for, a Williams, a Paris, a Kirk, a Dax, an alien character that was in like one episode of the series, a good chunk of enterprises crew now being on the Endeavour, when Reed gets his own ship, who does he appoint as first office, well another enterprise crew memeber (one whom I have never seen, in the series or books that followed, deisplay anything that shows he really deserves such a position).

That said, the end of the book said it would continue, so I'll probably buy the next book and see what its like.