The thing I felt was strangest about that story was that it just completely passed over the far-easier-to-get-around "penance" from "Sacrifice of Angels," that "Sisko is of Bajor, but he will find no rest there." That seems like it would've been a much easier way to inject drama into Ben's happily-ever-after without completely invalidating it, rather than doubling-down on, then double-talking around, the prophecy about them getting married. And I understand the circumstances that led to it, but I really think waiting, what, almost a decade to finish filling out what happened during the Great DS9 Time-Skip (even though, God help me, the way it was finally done almost feels like it was intended from the start) was a massive misstep, and they would've been better served doing what the Voyager novels did and just having one big book that covers several years as a bridge (I know, everyone thinks that, but, still). Even seeing it dramatized, it still feels unlikely that the family man of Star Trek would abandon his family, but having to accept second-hand that he was driven away because he thought he was bad luck was completely unconvincing. I can't remember if this was the height of it or if that's still to come, but I definitely noticed DRG3 getting very recap-happy, spending a couple of pages reiterating what happened three or four scenes earlier. I think his last couple books didn't have that issue, though.
Even covering it seems like it would have been unsatisfying, because where it all ends up isn't very interesting to me. George has almost completely broken up the characters of the DS9 relaunch, but not replaced them with anyone. No Kira, no Shar, no Vaughn, no Taran'atar. And the ones who are left all feel isolated; Bashir and Ro don't interact much with anyone outside of themselves. I don't see what storytelling possibilities are gained here.
Great review Stevil - and it seems we are on the same page about much of it. DRG3's choices with the DS9 stories have often been controversial, and I have tried my best to go with it and not complain too much. But I think eventually I just stopped caring, and didn't even read his latest DS9 book. I too felt an overwhelming sense of "meh" at the destruction of Deep Space Nine itself, and I really shouldn't have. And I think with this bit of your review, you've hit upon why: DS9 was always a TV series about huge galactic events, but the writers always did really well at focusing those events through the characters we knew on the station so that they felt personal and immediate. With this particular set of big galactic events, the characters on DS9 have very little to do with it. They are affected by events they are not directly involved in or have any influence on, so that removes that intense connection that would let the reader really feel the events rather than just observe them. If I can obnoxiously push my own writing here, I recently completed my series fleshing out what the familiar DS9 crew were doing during the Borg Invasion (see my sig). In it I spent a lot of time trying to lead the characters up to the changes seen in the later novels - Sisko's depression, Kira's joining the church, Ro's move into command. I like to think I've done a good job of making DRG3's choices with those characters feel more organic and less out of nowhere - specifically re Sisko, I grounded his depression in the events of the Borg Invasion and (my version of) the Ascendant conflict. I'd love for you to give it a read, it won't spoil anything for the later novels. I'd certainly be happy if that story point about the transporter duplicates is painted over and never spoken of again - I hated it with a passion. Spoiler: future novels Plus, as of "A Ceremony of Losses", it no longer matters. Yeah the recapping really starts to get out of control, especially when he recaps the story you're reading while you're reading it. As for "Emissary"... Spoiler: future novels I don't remember anything about that 'planet' from PoN/RtD, but I do remember that 'planet' appears three novels further along in "Ascendance", so I guess DRG3 was setting stuff up really early. You're right, I do give him that. Spoiler: future novels The way Kira went back in time to witness those events was a very clever way of bringing the reader back to witness them along with her, so kudos and indeed 'props' are hereby offered on that particular score. I've lamented before that the first set of nu-DS9 characters we were introduced to in "Avatar" - Vaughn, Shar, Tenmei, Taran'atar - are still memorable and beloved even these many years later after they have mostly left the story (I know Tenmei is still a regular but I'm making a point here). And the new characters that have replaced them are absolute zeroes whose names I can barely remember. Spoiler: future novels It only gets worse IMO, and it's not all down to DRG3. The DS9 novels have splintered to such an extent that each author seems to just follow their own pet character on their own story, and none of those characters or stories have anything to do with each other.
I don't know what happened, but right around the time the Typhon Pact started DRG III's books went from being some of the absolutely best Trek Lit out there, to being meh. I enjoyed Rough Beasts of Empire, Plagues of Night, and Raise the Dawn, but they were definitely no where near as good as Mission Gamma: Twilight, or Serpents Among the Ruins, and Revelation and Dust is one of the most boring books I have every read in my entire life. The book is almost 400 pages, and nothing happens until the last hundredish pages.
I'm just teasing! It was just that both you and @lvsxy808 dissing future novels in your replies stuck out to me. I'm largely already aware of the consensus around most novels I'm going to read, because I still follow the discussions on the BBS even though I am behind.
While that one had a fairly direct tie-in with the present-day storyline and is a pretty good example, the one I was really thinking of that really succeeded was Spoiler: The future is the past, the past is the future, it all gives me a headache the way both Rebecca-abduction storylines ended up playing off each other in "Original Sin."
If anyone wants to gripe about the time skip for old time's sake, I'm down. EDIT: AND the transporter duplicates! GAHHH
I enjoy the DS9 novels that aren't mainline story. DRG's mainline story for the actual station has not been interesting for a long time to me. The cast of characters is so huge now, with barely any TV characters on the station or even interacting with it, and the remaining characters have been set dressing since the days of Shar and Tenmei and Vaughn . The foundation of cool characters and interactions are there...but it's sad that for a series that brought huge character development and drama to Star Trek now exists in a novel line that doesn't have any of that good stuff anymore. I mean, has Slaine done anything? But I am 100% down for more Adventures of Captain Sisko in the Third Quadrant, and for them not to jump back to that god forsaken time skip. I'm hoping that now the gaps have been filled we never have to hear about that time skip again. That is...if we get anymore novels for DS9 at all, haha.
It's kind of sad really, the DS9 Relaunch is part of what really got into Trek Lit, but now DRGIII's mainline books are probably my least favorite Trek Lit series.
Yeah. I still can’t finish the Captain Sisko and USS Robinson solo story. That kind of ran out of gas about 1/4 of the way in and was trying to coast and backup into the driveway on fumes.
Ro remains a character I want to read more about. DS9 was good at introducing new off-screen characters, but sadly this has changed.
I'm on vacation so it will probably be a couple days before I write up my thoughts on Brinkmanship, but: My hat (and my digestive tract) are safe.
Typhon Pact: Brinkmanship by Una McCormack Published: October 2012 Time Span: November 2383 Brinkmanship rounds out the eight-book Typhon Pact saga, though the Pact itself will obviously continue to cast a shadow over galactic events. It could feel like an odd coda after Plagues of Night and Raise the Dawn pulled all the previous threads together (I suspect it reads weirdly in the context of The Khitomer Accords Saga omnibus), but it's the best of all these books, and so a good stopping point. There is no better writer of Star Trek tie-ins than Una McCormack. One of the things that makes her so good is her careful consideration of point-of-view; this book is told from three perspectives, those of Ezri Dax, Beverly Crusher, and Neta Efheny (a Cardassian spy on Ab-Tzenketh). The choice of viewpoint characters isn't incidental, or just done for reasons of plot, as it often is in tie-in fiction, but suffuses the entire book. In both Ezri and Crusher, we get principled women whose principles keep getting broken on the rocks of realpolitik. Both are healers (kind of), and have an earnest belief in what the Federation does; both have made hard choices in their day but refuse to believe that values have to be abandoned in order to be saved. I liked this depiction of Ezri. I often struggle to connect the character the Destiny-era novels call "Ezri" with the one from television; Brinkmanship threads that needle by showing how Ezri's occasionally foolish compassion informs her command style. The Aventine doesn't get much action here, but we get to watch Ezri do her level best to prevent a war in the best Star Trek tradition. She's tested by her discovery of what one of her friends from the Academy has become in this dark new era, and that works as a stand-in for what Starfleet and the Federation as a whole have been through. I liked the Aventine's solution to the stand-off, which manages to be humanitarian and manipulative at the same time. Crusher was an unexpected choice for viewpoint character of the Enterprise-E thread; she's often an observer, not a mover. But this is what makes her work as a main character. As Picard points out, he already knows how to play this game, but Crusher still has her ideals. I liked her interactions with various participants in the negotiations, especially Madame Ilka, the Ferengi ambassador (I hope we get to see her again). Crusher ends up playing essentially no plot-relevant role, but that's not a bug, it's a feature. Like Ezri, she learns what it's like to balance ideals with realpolitik. This book, incidentally, is probably the first to make me feel like Crusher and Picard are actually married, with nice little details of their relationship (such as how they work a room at a reception), though to be honest, I think it would have worked just as well with them as friends. The remaining third was the best one, about an undercover Cardassian on Ab-Tzenketh. It's got great touches, such as how she recognizes that one of her associates is also a spy, but for the Federation, and how that spy works out that she's a Cardassian. Efenhy is a patriot, but adrift in the less regimented post-Dominion Cardassian society, she finds solace in the strictly regimented Tzenkethi society. This was an excellent spy thriller, as Efenhy makes a number of awful but entirely comprehensible choices-- but one potentially really empowering one. I also really appreciated the insight we got into Tzenkethi society; this is the one Typhon Pact book to really deliver on the series premise and explore an alien society, doing the kind of thing that I think Zero Sum Game aimed for but missed by using infiltration, as well as by using a pair of Tzenkethi cops. I'm not sure this series really accomplished its aims on the whole, but this novel did, demonstrating (like Struggle Within) the worth of the concept was there, even if the execution was often lacking. Continuity Notes: Glinn Dygan, a minor protagonist here, originally appeared in Plagues of Night; I kind of suspect he was created by McCormack for Brinkmanship and seeded back into the earlier novels. There's weirdly little direct references to the earlier Typhon Pact books; the whole time the Federation is trying to defend their skepticism toward the Tzenkethi to the Venette, I kept expecting someone to mention the time the Typhon Pact powers conspired to, I dunno, blow up Deep Space 9!? That might make a little caution justified on the part of the Federation. Other Notes: This is really the only book other than The Struggle Within to take the idea (from A Singular Destiny) of an expanded Khitomer Accord seriously; we get to see what it's like for the Federation, Cardassians, and Ferengi to all work together in common cause, something unimaginable a decade prior. (And still pretty difficult to pull off!) Picard might not be a viewpoint character, but McCormack writes him some good Patrick Stewart speeches anyway. The excerpts from the output of the Venette syndics are touching, and effective in making you fear for this never-before-mentioned race. I think one chapter of this book gave Sam Bowers more personality than all previous Aventine-focused novels put together.
I'd be curious to know what other people think of the Typhon Pact series. Did it work for you? What were its weakest and strongest installments?