Spoilers TNG: Hearts and Minds by Dayton Ward Review Thread

[Burning Hearts of Qo'nos]

I'm sorry to necro this post, but this book left me incredibly confused as to the need for secrecy and smoke and mirrors by Akaar. At the beginning, when the coded transmission arrived for Taurik, I was wondering what adventure would be so strange it would require an unorthodox and disruptive mode of communication. Having finished the book, I still don't understand. Was it just a plot device to put Picard in conflict with his officers? Is this just part 1 of a series?

I'm actually not sure why there was all that secrecy either, but the book isn't really fresh in my memory. I think Starfleet wanted to keep everything hush in case there was big retaliation against them? Or perhaps they wanted to see what state the planet was in as shoot for plausible deniability? Anyone else remember?

But what really threw me was that this was completely unrelated to the previous future-information that Taurik found in Armageddon's Arrow.

 

[flandry84]

Nope,couldn't finish it.
Honestly this says more about me than the book and it is happening me a lot with Treklit recently....dunno why.

 

[tomswift2002]

I finished the book last night and I found it alright.

I guess we'll never hear of Admiral Picard.

 

[TheUsualSuspect]

Voted "Average" on this one. I found Ward's writing style less distracting than in some of his other work, but, as others have said, both of the storylines seemed a little weak and ultimately fizzled instead of sparking.

I really enjoyed From History's Shadow, was a little less thrilled with Elusive Salvation, and I was hoping this book would sort of wrap things up as to the 20th and 21st century projects investigating alien presences on earth, and perhaps give us a little more insight into Aegis' project at that time. Instead, the story just sputtered along to a non-conclusion. Perhaps because of the time spent on that storyline, the Enterprise E storyline also seemed lacking. As others have mentioned, we never really learn what all the secrecy about the earlier contacts between Earth and Eizard was about. Even if Starfleet believed that the astronauts had carried out their attack on Eizard, why not simply tell Picard what they know and ask him to proceed with caution? Instead, they almost seem to set him up for conflict with the Eizard authorities.

As for the fallout from Control,

Spoiler: just in case

it looks like there's more to come. I'm hoping for some open hearings, along the lines of South Africa's "Truth and Reconciliatilon" hearings after the end of apartheid. Now that the Federation public knows that other members of Starfleet are tarnished, not just those who were actual agents of 31, the council should get everything out into the open. If this happens, I would hope Picard would be recalled to give testimony, even if a general amnesty is part of the plan.

 

[woodstock]

I don't know how to phrase this without it sounding like a slam on the current leadership of the US, but the Eizand seemed to accept the new evidence about what really happened to their planet quite easily with no questioning of its authenticity. We're talking centuries of believing one thing and now just so easily accepting this new truth (obviously with a lot of questions of how and why) and not calling it "fake news". We're talking a near quasi-religious belief here. Plenty of leaders from around that planet would also probably have a vested interest in continuing the "myth". I felt the same way about the end of Redemption way back in the day as well, when Data uncovered the cloaked Romulan ships and they immediately bail? Not every Klingon was likely to automatically believe the Romulans were involved, especially if the evidence was coming from the Federation.

 

[Christopher]

I don't know how to phrase this without it sounding like a slam on the current leadership of the US, but the Eizand seemed to accept the new evidence about what really happened to their planet quite easily with no questioning of its authenticity. We're talking centuries of believing one thing and now just so easily accepting this new truth (obviously with a lot of questions of how and why) and not calling it "fake news".

That's because the current societal pattern where people just reject any facts they find inconvenient is not normal. It wasn't that long ago that Americans generally agreed on the same fundamental facts and mostly just disagreed over what to do about them. That's how people think and behave in a sane, rationalist society. That's how people in much of the rest of the world still behave, which is why nearly every country except the US is on board with controlling climate change and most of them have universal health care. They accept that reality is what the facts say it is rather than what's most convenient for corporate profits. In times like these, it's important to remember that. We can't let the overwhelming lunacy of current US affairs make us forget that things don't have to be this way.

 

[woodstock]

We can't let the overwhelming lunacy of current US affairs make us forget that things don't have to be this way.

I hope so.

I don't think it wasn't mentioned in the book that the Eizand were actually taught to hate Earth for what happened to their home, but they certainly blamed them, for generations. It would still be hard to let that go easily, accepting the facts or not. It will take more than summit meetings and fact finding committees, it will be an arduous journey of changing the way they think about almost every aspect of their lives and societies. Not unlike what we'll likely have to go through someday.

 

[Enterprise1701]

I hope so.

I don't think it wasn't mentioned in the book that the Eizand were actually taught to hate Earth for what happened to their home, but they certainly blamed them, for generations. It would still be hard to let that go easily, accepting the facts or not. It will take more than summit meetings and fact finding committees, it will be an arduous journey of changing the way they think about almost every aspect of their lives and societies. Not unlike what we'll likely have to go through someday.

Well the Prime Minister certainly held Earth and humankind the most responsible for the disaster of war. She admitted that she was taught the global war was a catastrophic reaction in response to Peacemaker-1's attack.

 

[Garrovick]

It's been a long long time since I've posted on this board but after finishing this book today (yes, I'm behind, and yes, I'm getting caught up) I had to drop in and say that I thought this book was great! I have enjoyed all of Dayton Ward's Trek novels, but especially his work since From History's Shadow. I very much hope to read more Trek work from him soon!

 

[thribs]

So I’ve finally hit the wall with the TNG novels. I enjoyed it somewhat but I never expected 9/11 to me mentioned in a Trek book.
Speaking of which, I’m always weary when they add real world events to the Trek lore. With things like Eugenic Wars etc. I find it hard to believe things like the Shuttle accident and 9/11 wouldn’t happen in the same way. I prefer the approach that everything up to 1966 is canon and then it’s all up in the air.

 

[JD]

The intention has always been that Trek was our future, so there will always be references to real world events in Trek stories. Things just have to continually adjusted as we catch up to the future things referred to on the shows, either by moving them around, tweaking them to fit real world history, or just forgetting about them.

 

[thribs]

I just prefer the approach that everything before 1966 is canon and then it’s up in the air. Space Show Discovery has taken the other approach and it just looks jarring.

 

[Dayton Ward]

So far as canon is concerned, the September 11th attacks occurred in the Trek timeline, at least per brief footage seen in "Storm Front, Part II."

As for its reference in TrekLit, that started way back in the early 2000s during the Star Trek: S.C.E. series. The reference in this book is actually a nod to a Strange New Worlds story, "Assignment: One" by Kevin Lauderdale.

 

[thribs]

That is true that it was shown in Enterprise but I assumed it happened during the Eugenics Wars or something related to that.

 

[Mage]

That is true that it was shown in Enterprise but I assumed it happened during the Eugenics Wars or something related to that.

Fans always asumed that the Eugenics War were a huge global thing. Wars in scifi always are. In Watching The Clock, Chistopher Bennett has an interesting passage about a woman from the 1990's who know lives in the 24th century, and how big parts of what happened during her time on a global scale went past her, either because US newsreporting didn't care enough about it, or she didn't care enough. Appereantly, if I recall correctly, the Eugenics War was one of those events.

And don't we still see things like this today? Big civil wars in African countries are hardly or never mentioned in Western news. 4 people die in a fire and it's reported everywhere, but over a 100 die in a bombing in Pakistan and it's a a 'few lines on the 5th page' mentioning.
There are dictators in African countries that you and I probably never heard of unless we start looking for it or start following more local new sources from said country.

So, yeah, suddenly waking up in the 24th century and reading in history books that a war was going you never heard of doesn't sound so weird when you look at it like that.

 

[Christopher]

And don't we still see things like this today? Big civil wars in African countries are hardly or never mentioned in Western news. 4 people die in a fire and it's reported everywhere, but over a 100 die in a bombing in Pakistan and it's a a 'few lines on the 5th page' mentioning.
There are dictators in African countries that you and I probably never heard of unless we start looking for it or start following more local new sources from said country.

So, yeah, suddenly waking up in the 24th century and reading in history books that a war was going you never heard of doesn't sound so weird when you look at it like that.

Yes, exactly. American news media have a bad habit of ignoring world events that aren't about us. That made it plausible that the Eugenics Wars could've gone unnoticed by Americans, at least, although there are events in Greg's novels that couldn't have been hidden from everyone in the world -- for instance, all those billions of people in India and Southeast Asia must've been aware that Khan was their ruler, even if they didn't know he was an Augment.

Plus, the root causes of events often don't become clear until historians study them after the fact, so what seemed like various random, isolated events at the time may be described by the history books as the consequences of a single larger process. Most things look different in retrospect than they do when we're living through them, because we construct narratives after the fact to try to make sense of them.

 

[David cgc]

Plus, the root causes of events often don't become clear until historians study them after the fact, so what seemed like various random, isolated events at the time may be described by the history books as the consequences of a single larger process. Most things look different in retrospect than they do when we're living through them, because we construct narratives after the fact to try to make sense of them.

We've been doing a U.S. history class at work, and something I picked up on that never really sunk in before was the way we elide things together. People keep talking about how everything's happening so slowly, and when are people going to take some action about whatever, and then I see, "Such-and-such had an immediate, explosive effect. Within seven months, the issues raised were the center of debate at the Continental Congress." Things a thousand miles and years apart can be put in adjoining sentences in a history text and make it seem like the whole progression was simple, swift, and direct.

 

[thribs]

I've just got to that bit in DTI and I don't buy it. Genetically enhancing people so that they're stronger and smarter than normal humans and the war that leads from it is too juicy of a story for the news media to ignore. Even Fox news would cover it.
I can even imagine Wolf Blitzer's emotionless depiction of the events from it.

 

[JD]

Have you read the Eugenics Wars books?

 

[thribs]

No. I didn’t know they existed. Is Wolf Blitzer in those?
Are there any World War III Ones?