TNG: The Persistence of Memory by David Mack Review Thread (Spoilers!)

[Christopher]

Paper Moon wrote:

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Lyndsay Ballard, Yareena, Vantika.

Okay. I'll grant the first and third, but Yareena doesn't really count, since she was only dead by the standards of Ligonian medicine; she was easily revivable by the standards of Federation medicine. Plenty of people today in real life can be revived within minutes of clinical death, so it doesn't count as something extraordinary or science-fictional. Resuscitation is not resurrection.

But really, Spock, Data and Janeway are in a category of their own in terms of returns (the latter two in particular), due to the extraordinary circumstances involved. Data's case is unique in-universe; basically no one else had a back-up set of memories around, along with the ability to transfer them to a new body.

But isn't that essentially what Spock did in TWOK? Transfer a backup of his consciousness into McCoy?

Not to mention Voyager's EMH; we saw in "Living Witness" that he has a sentient backup, though the absence of another backup in later episodes is hard to reconcile.

[RPJOB]

Thrawn wrote:

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I don't actually disagree with anything you're saying, but in these particular stories I don't actually think any of those complaints apply.

Data is obviously a special case, if Spock was then Data certainly must be, and

Janeway is resurrected by characters that obviously have that ability, because *they* think that she's more worthy. The book doesn't present that as necessarily true, either.

Again, weird for me because I generally agree with you, I just think these two particular stories were really nicely handled.

And as for my point about Before Dishonor and Nemesis, you'd mentioned that it removes emotional impact from death if it's later reversed, and mentioned the shocking and profoundly affecting death of Duffy as your example. Which, again, I agree with. But I didn't feel any emotional impact from Data's death or Janeway's, in their particular works. So I don't think their resurrection is in any way making Nemesis or Before Dishonor worse. Really, BD was a preposterous comic book romp; I don't think anyone was getting to the end with a tear in their eye!

Full Circle does a much better job at making Janeway's death Really Mean Something, but I've got enough faith in Kirsten MF Beyer to believe that all of that character growth won't be reversed just because she's back again. I could analyze that more deeply if you like but I don't think it'd make much sense if you hadn't read the story to see what I'm talking about. (Again not a judgement! Not trying to be snarky! Feel free to skip any book you don't want to read, it just makes it harder to talk about the specifics...)

The point is, regardless off the "quality" of someone's death, when it is later reversed it chips away at the emotional impact of the other character deaths that follow, particularly for the "hero" characters. Why should I care if Picard or Kira or Paris or Hoshi die when it's more than likely that they;ll be back in a book or two or six? And when you stop caring about what happens to the main characters it just makes it that much easier to brush off something like Destiny. Really, when you compare the number or resurrections among the canon characters you'd think that there'd have to be a few thousand if not millions of people coming back from that.

Strangely, it's sort of the reverse of a disagreement I had with the latest DTI novel by CRB where it's revealed that...

The Enterprise-Nil was uniquely suited for time travel because of what happened in The Naked Time. Seeing the ease of time travel we've been presented with (even Quark time travelled totally by accident and managed to get back) it's making these characters (including the ship) as drastically different from everyone else.

[JD]

Christopher wrote:

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It would help make it more credible if we got occasional resurrections for the Third Redshirt on the Left or somebody -- if methods of cheating death were just established to be something that's part of the universe and can happen to anybody, rather than something reserved only for the core cast. (Although Mr. Leslie seems to have been resurrected at least once, since he was declared dead in "Obsession" but was fine the next week.)

I guess I can see what you're saying there.

[ronny]

Sort of conflicted here. I'm really not into resurrections and we've had 2 in a 3 month span but each one was handled so well I'm not objecting as much as I normally would. And I don't think there's anyone else to bring back so I guess we're good.

The death of Choudhury was by far the biggest shock in the book. I had to re-read that paragraph to make sure I read it correctly. Then when Data came back for a minute I was thinking with Choudury dead was Worf going back to security and Data going to be 1st officer, so we're almost back to the TV series, how much of a reset was this going to be? Only that didn't happen. I'm really glad David Mack has better ideas than me. The Breen also continue to be my favorite Typhone Pact race to read about.

I'm so looking forward to where this story is going to lead to I've already started the next book.

[Christopher]

"Typhone?" Is that what Typhon Pact members call their communicators?

[ICW]

Just finished this novel and...wow.

I have never teared up when reading a Star Trek novel BUT, I have to admit, I did so with this one. I could not put the novel down for a second. I found the Noonien Soong part of the book so fascinating and entertaining. It was so fascinating to see how he reacted to Lore's "death" and, eventually, to Data's. His character was explored so deeply and profoundly...just great stuff.

I voted "outstanding." Might even be my favorite Star Trek novel ever, definitely in my top 5.

[Therin of Andor]

Dammit. Just wrote a review - and it vanished!

Thoroughly enjoyed this great follow-up to Jeff Lang's excellent "Immortal Coil", looping in lots of elements I would have suggested myself! It's been my in-flight reading for my still-ongoing US trip. Thanks David!

And now... Book 2!

[datalogan]

Christopher wrote:

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Leslie seems to have been resurrected at least once, since he was declared dead in "Obsession" but was fine the next week.

And Galloway was vaporized in "The Omega Glory", but still showed up again in "Turnabout Intruder".

[Christopher]

datalogan wrote:

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And Galloway was vaporized in "The Omega Glory", but still showed up again in "Turnabout Intruder".

Only according to the credits. He was never actually named in dialogue, so I choose to believe that was Mr. Johnson from "Day of the Dove" instead.

[Therin of Andor]

Christopher wrote:

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Only according to the credits. He was never actually named in dialogue, so I choose to believe that was Mr. Johnson from "Day of the Dove" instead.

Same here. I was very pleased when I noted that. Would have been a fun thing for them to fix when they were doing the HD/Blu-Ray set.

[Enterprise is Great]

I just finished it...great read.

[Defcon]

Only now realized when I planned to post the link to my The Body Electric review that I hadn't linked to my reviews of the first two.

http://unreality-sf.net/2013/02/01/s...memory-review/

Persistence of Memory was my favorite novel in this trilogy mainly because of the Noonien Soong part.

[Sakrysta]

I need to learn not to try to read the whole review thread before posting. I get bogged down in all the opposing points of view and end up no longer wanting to comment.

Opening the doors to the warehouse and realizing what was inside - "Hoo boy. I think we might be in trouble..."

Jasminder's demise - I literally closed my Kindle app for a few seconds and mentally screamed, "MAAAAAAAACK!!!!!" And then I shook my mental fist at the sky. David dude, you are evil sometimes.

"Data"'s return - I'm excited to see where he goes from here, what he decides to do with his new lease on life and his new self.

I was thrilled to see Lal being remembered and treated with such respect. I can't think of any character in Trek that made a more indellible impression on me in just one episode. Others perhaps equalled, but none exceeded.

I have to say I was sad to see Julianna end up with Vaslovik. That creeped me out for some reason.

Looking forward to reading the next installment. As usual, Mr. Mack may provoke me to exclamations of despair, but it's always so good when he does.

[kirk55555]

I loved this book from beginning to end. It was great (and so is the whole CE trilogy, which I finished a few weeks ago). This was the best of the three, and easily one of the best ST books I've read in awhile. I might even put it in my top 10.

[USS Firefly]

Just finished the book and it was great, tonight I hope to start with part 2.
And poor Worf, perhaps he can better try it with dating men

But I think that Data will be a Starfleet officer on the bridge at the end.