Spoilers TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread

[Kertrats47]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

Strip the requirement of "captain," and I think Tom Paris wins. In "Threshold," he was everywhere at the same time...

Oh, right, we don't speak of that one.

 

[Idran]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

Strip the requirement for "Enterprise" captain, and I think you're just left with Kira: Delta quadrant in Gateways, Alpha and Gamma many times on screen, and I assume she's been to the beta quadrant at one point, but I can't think when.

As far as I can tell, she has not. My first thought was "Sound of Her Voice", but I forgot she was part of the B-plot in that episode. I can't even find mentions of her visiting any of the major Federation Beta Quadrant worlds like Vulcan or Andor.

She's at Narendra in The Brave and the Bold.

Ah, I missed that one! Kira beats Picard by a good few years, then, if you drop the "Enterprise" part. Thanks, Nasat.

 

[Defcon]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

My review of the novella is up now: http://unreality-sf.net/2014/10/25/star-trek-q-are-cordially-uninvited-review/

Overall Q Are Cordially Uninvited is the epitome of what I would call a throwaway story. It’s fun enough while you read it to spend half an hour or an hour without thinking you have wasted your money, but ultimately you probably will soon forget that it even exists.

 

[Markonian]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

If we don't drop "captain of the Enterprise", Picards wins, as La Forge was ranked captain but not the CO of the Enterprise.

 

[Enterprise1701]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

Alpha/Beta Quadrant: pre-Encounter at farpoint
Gamma quadrant: Typhon Pact (I forget which one)
Delta: The Price

You would be thinking of Typhon Pact - Plagues of Night and Raise the Dawn.

Also, what about Riker? He visited the Delta Quadrant in "Death Wish". I can't recall about the Gamma Quadrant though.

Nothing listed on Memory Beta at least for Riker visiting the Gamma Quadrant.

Did Worf ever visit the Delta Quadrant? He's served as Captain of the Defiant at least once, and I'm sure he's been Acting Captain on the Enterprise as First Officer at some point by now.

Let's see. I just checked TNG: "The Price". It was only Data and La Forge who traveled to the Delta Quadrant via the Barzan Wormhole in 2366.

Then in Destiny, Titan is already in the Beta Quadrant at New Erigol, Aventine starts at Columbia's crash site (Gamma) and encounters the Children of the Storm (Delta), the Enterprise-E and Aventine run into the Azure Nebula (Beta) and the Hirogen (Delta), and Enterprise reaches another galaxy touched by some temporally-displaced Caeliar.

I think Greater Than the Sum stated that Hugh's group's planet was in the Beta Quadrant. They ran into the Enterprise-E via conventional warp.

So in any case, regardless of captaincy:
Picard, Crusher, and La Forge completed all 4 with Gamma in Typhon Pact - Plagues of Night at the latest.
Worf must have finished all 4 with Delta in Destiny - Mere Mortals.
Kira completed all 4 with Beta in The Brave and the Bold - The Final Artifact at the latest.
Dax definitely completed all 4 with Delta in Destiny - Mere Mortals at the latest.

With this story, Picard is now the first Enterprise captain in TrekLit to have been in all four quadrants of the galaxy. Unless I'm missing something?

So not exactly. Captain Picard got to Delta in Destiny and Gamma in Typhon Pact before the publication of Q Are Cordially Uninvited..., but Q Are Cordially Uninvited moves up his first in-universe visit to Delta.

 

[Paul Weaver]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

I'm amazed that riker has never made it to the gamma quadrant. The E-E was due to in Avatar but that's the closest they got until the typhoon pact.

 

[Thrawn]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

I'm amazed that riker has never made it to the gamma quadrant. The E-E was due to in Avatar but that's the closest they got until the typhoon pact.

Typhon. Not typhoon.

 

[Enterprise1701]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

I'm amazed that riker has never made it to the gamma quadrant. The E-E was due to in Avatar but that's the closest they got until the typhoon pact.

Too bad there's nothing onscreen about the Enterprise-D taking the opportunity to go through the wormhole in "Emissary" or "Birthright". You'd think that Picard would want the Federation flagship to be part of a major historical discovery.

And too bad Sisko was in the wormhole for most of 2376. Otherwise he might have been in Kira's position during the gateways crisis.

 

[Stevil2001]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

I'm amazed that riker has never made it to the gamma quadrant. The E-E was due to in Avatar but that's the closest they got until the typhoon pact.

Too bad there's nothing onscreen about the Enterprise-D taking the opportunity to go through the wormhole in "Emissary" or "Birthright". You'd think that Picard would want the Federation flagship to be part of a major historical discovery.

And too bad Sisko was in the wormhole for most of 2376. Otherwise he might have been in Kira's position during the gateways crisis.

The weird thing that's stuck out to me rewatching DS9 S1 is that Starfleet apparently doesn't send any ships through the wormhole.

 

[Idran]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

I'm amazed that riker has never made it to the gamma quadrant. The E-E was due to in Avatar but that's the closest they got until the typhoon pact.

Too bad there's nothing onscreen about the Enterprise-D taking the opportunity to go through the wormhole in "Emissary" or "Birthright". You'd think that Picard would want the Federation flagship to be part of a major historical discovery.

And too bad Sisko was in the wormhole for most of 2376. Otherwise he might have been in Kira's position during the gateways crisis.

The weird thing that's stuck out to me rewatching DS9 S1 is that Starfleet apparently doesn't send any ships through the wormhole.

I can imagine you could at least in part explain that by the Federation still remembering how they were burned on the Barzan Wormhole situation, and wanting to be extremely certain that this one is in fact stable, and won't leave anyone stranded 70,000 ly away unexpectedly? Even with Trek-level technology, I could imagine it taking a while to verify beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Bajoran Wormhole is in fact stable, and not just seemingly so.

 

[Paul Weaver]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

Typhon. Not typhoon.

Autocorrect

The weird thing that's stuck out to me rewatching DS9 S1 is that Starfleet apparently doesn't send any ships through the wormhole.

Well they had runabouts, what more do you want.

O'BRIEN: Keiko, there's a whole new quadrant on the other side of the wormhole, full of new plant life to explore.
KEIKO: And ships going to explore it and I'm not on any of them.
O'BRIEN: We'll be sending runabouts through the wormhole. I'll see to it you get to go.

There were constant referrals to merchants going through, but with the exception of Dukat's Galor class ship in Emissary, do we have any direct evidence of any large ships going through before The Odyssey? It's been 20 years since I read the first few DS9 novels, but looking at Memory Beta the first one was "The wormhole is closed", the fourth was "Poker night". I suppose that was the original complaints about DS9, it was fixed in one place, not only was there no exploration, but the unknown was tantalisingly close! I can see why people shared Keiko's feelings.

Once the White Star joined though, we got to do some proper exploration. For a season and a bit. Then it was back to the Alpha Quadrant until Vaughn's little trip.

 

[Stevil2001]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

From "Vortex" and "Move Along Home," among others, we know that there are Federation civilian ships exploring the other side, though. If it is unsafe to send Starfleet vessels through, how much worse to let civilians go through unescorted!

 

[Christopher]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

Just because we don't hear about Starfleet ships going through, that doesn't mean they aren't there. We only get to see about 18.2 hours' worth of the crew's experiences out of any given year (26 episodes running about 42 minutes each), which is about a fifth of a percent of the whole. So we're missing a whole lot of stuff. There could've been a bunch of Starfleet ships going through the wormhole during the otherwise uneventful days between episodes, or during stories that focused on events off-station.

 

[Daddy Todd]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

Below average. From the very first sentence I was unimpressed. I got about a third of the way into it, but can't work up the enthusiasm to finish. Sorry, Rudy!

If that's Below Average, I'm curious what a book has to do for you to rate it Poor.

I tend to be a tough audience, so I grade on a curve to try and bring my reactions into line with how other people react.

Basically, it has to be "The Price/Fate of the Phoenix" to get a public "Poor" from me. (In my heart of hearts, Marshak/Culbreath books rate "Steaming Pile of Cat Puke" but that's not a choice on the survey.)

...if that makes any sense

 

[Enterprise1701]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

Just because we don't hear about Starfleet ships going through, that doesn't mean they aren't there. We only get to see about 18.2 hours' worth of the crew's experiences out of any given year (26 episodes running about 42 minutes each), which is about a fifth of a percent of the whole. So we're missing a whole lot of stuff. There could've been a bunch of Starfleet ships going through the wormhole during the otherwise uneventful days between episodes, or during stories that focused on events off-station.

Random question. Do you know why it is that the covers of Raise the Dawn and Revelation and Dust have unnamed Excelsior class starships on them? The stories don't even have any Excelsior class ships. Do Pocket Books artists love the Excelsior class or something?

 

[Christopher]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

^I'm not involved in the cover design process. You'd have to ask the artist.

 

[Daddy Todd]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

Below average. From the very first sentence I was unimpressed. I got about a third of the way into it, but can't work up the enthusiasm to finish. Sorry, Rudy!

Finally forced myself to finish this. Stuff happens. Picard is bitchy at Q. Q is wearisomely "impish". I revise my grade down to poor. This is just... boring.

 

[Markonian]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

Below average. From the very first sentence I was unimpressed. I got about a third of the way into it, but can't work up the enthusiasm to finish. Sorry, Rudy!

Finally forced myself to finish this. Stuff happens. Picard is bitchy at Q. Q is wearisomely "impish". I revise my grade down to poor. This is just... boring.

What bothers me is how Picard and the other TNG characters keep bitching Q. After all, isn't it time after all these years to become friends? They could take enjoyment out of their interactions with him, or ask him politely for small favors. He's a joker but ultimately he's more helpful than villainous.

 

[Deranged Nasat]

Re: TNG: Q Are Cordially Uninvited by Rudy Josephs Review Thread (Splr

Below average. From the very first sentence I was unimpressed. I got about a third of the way into it, but can't work up the enthusiasm to finish. Sorry, Rudy!

Finally forced myself to finish this. Stuff happens. Picard is bitchy at Q. Q is wearisomely "impish". I revise my grade down to poor. This is just... boring.

What bothers me is how Picard and the other TNG characters keep bitching Q. After all, isn't it time after all these years to become friends? They could take enjoyment out of their interactions with him, or ask him politely for small favors. He's a joker but ultimately he's more helpful than villainous.

One of the reasons I love Beyer's The Eternal Tide is that it presents the Q and the Federation characters as friends (to the extent that such different lifeforms at vastly different levels of power can be friends). Your final line there is pretty much exactly what Janeway says in the Qs' defence, and I found it a genuinely moving moment.

 

[Mizrach]

A slim ebook novella, max 2 hours reading.
The final scene save it from being a mere "average" work. An Indiana Jones type of book, it isn't memorable or anything, but I liked it. Nice idea the pirates/collectors extinct people. Have they appeared in flesh in others books or in the series?