So what are you reading now? (Part 3)

[William Leisner]

If you call a 6-1 balance "equal," sure...

 

[JD]

Well, I meant for the '60s. Not for today.

 

[Nerys Myk]

I think Star Trek was probably on par with other TV shows of the time when it came to female characters. Though, Characters like Emma Peel and Cinnamon Carter were probably more "cutting edge" than Uhura.

 

[BrotherBenny]

Is there a reason that Ship of the Line isn't highly regarded?

The problems I had with Ship of the Line... well, how much time do you have?

Spoiler: Ship of the Line, hidden for length

In 1988, Diane Carey wrote the first Next Generation novel, Ghost Ship. Not long after that, she hit the convention circuit full of stories about what a jerk Gene Roddenberry was and how gawdawful The Next Generation was.

Not surprisingly, Carey didn't write any TNG novels for the next few years. She did write a novelization of Descent, but until 1997's Day of Honor crossover she pretty much ignored TNG. For that matter, in her Day of Honor contribution, she pretty much ignored TNG, putting all her creative energy into a holodeck story about the American Revolution.

So naturally, in 1997, she was the one who wrote the first novel about the Enterprise E, the first novel to follow the events of ST: Generations. Carey's distaste for The Next Generation in general and Captain Jean-Luc Picard in specific permeates every page of the book. Picard is nominally the hero of the book, of course, so she is usually subtle, but the scene in which Picard interacts with an interactive, holographic Kirk program is a good counterexample. Carey's goal here is to teach Picard that Kirk was the greatest starship captain ever, and she does so by making Picard misconstrue the events of the holodeck program -- a recreation of the events of "Balance of Terror" -- and fills Picard's head with thoughts of what a one-dimensional, blustering, violent slob Kirk is considered to be in Picard's time. She does the latter so that Picard can continue to discover how wrong he was and marvel in Kirk's genius and multifaceted personality; she does the former to criticize modern Trek and Picard's style of command. How? Picard keeps accusing Kirk of starting a war with the Romulans, even accusing Kirk of firing the first shot in the altercation, even though the holodeck program begins with the destruction of the neutral zone outposts by the Romulans. He also accuses Kirk of being too bold and daring, implicitly portraying himself as someone who can't make a decisive move without being told by Starfleet Command what that move will be. There's a kernel of truth in that, but it's something that was increasingly less true as TNG went on.

Carey's antipathy toward TNG, or perhaps her ignorance of it, also comes to the fore during the confrontation between Bateson and Riker. When Bateson rants about knowing more than Riker does about Klingons, Riker doesn't mention his stint as first officer aboard a Klingon ship, the fact that the Enterprise under Picard had a Klingon security chief, or the role that the Enterprise and its crew played in the recent Klingon succession and civil war. All of these things are relevant to Riker's point, but Carey has set him up to take a fall, so none of that is mentioned. Carey thinks Bateson is right, so she ignores everything on TNG that refutes him.

Consider Bateson's remarks on p.199-200: "You look down your noses at the conflicts of the past as if we had wars because we thought they were fun. I've got news for you. It's no fun. Someday you're going to have to fight unthinkable odds too, and on that day you'll remember me. You'll find out that there comes a time when you have to stand up and hit somebody." One word: Borg. Has Carey never seen BOBW? Riker has been through shit that Bateson can't imagine. But again, she has to put Riker and TNG in their place, so again Riker doesn't say what should be said. It's a classic case of the author ignoring character and continuity to make her point.

Carey's usual stylistic quirks are somewhat muted in this novel, fortunately, making her prose more readable than in most of her previous novels. Still, there are some appalling clunkers that should have been red-pencilled by someone somewhere along the way. Take, for example, "After the horror of the statement thudded to the deck at everyone's feet, Mike Dennis was the only one to speak." [p.32] (Alas, she doesn't mention whether the horror of the statement broke on impact, or bounced, and there's nary a word about who cleaned it up.) And as usual every character in the book shares Carey's obsession with the Age of Sail, peppering every conversation with some bit of sailor's lingo. Oh, and of course one of the finest touches in this book comes when Carey quotes herself for several paragraphs on p.143, and again on pp.225 and 321, providing a perfect example of her ego and her sailing obsession.

Something else worth noticing in this novel: women are almost nonexistent in this book. Troi and Crusher are present, but they have about as much to do in this novel as they do in the movies. Bateson's crew is apparently all male; likewise Kozara's. Which reminds me: In the book, Bateson's arrival in the 24th century follows a dramatic fight for survival against a Klingon attack. There are no women on the bridge. Bateson is frantic, the bridge a place of chaos. In the episode, Bateson is calm and relaxed, and the crew visible behind him include two women, neither showing signs of fleeing a desperate situation. In other words, Carey didn't even bother to stay consistent with the one little minute of actual canon material about Bateson.

I stuck it put to about Chapter Ten. After that, I said "f#*% it", flipped to the last chapter and called it quits. At first, I thought I couldn't get into the book because there were no characters I knew. Later I realized that the writing didn't make me care about the new characters. And even the depictions of Riker and Picard are WAY off.

I read up to page 35 and decided that this was the worst book I've ever read. Someone at Pocket was smoking something when they approved this.

 

[Csalem]

I had started Seven Deadly Sins but just couldn't get into it. So I put it down and decided to revisit The Return by Shatner after being inspired by the recent threads on it.

 

[Greg Cox]

VAMPED by Lucienne Diver, a young-adult vampire novel by an old friend of mine.

 

[Joel_Kirk]

I was reading 'Congo' by Michael Crichton...but....but...

 

[JD]

I had started Seven Deadly Sins but just couldn't get into it. So I put it down and decided to revisit The Return by Shatner after being inspired by the recent threads on it.

You mean you returned to The Return?

 

[Dancing Doctor]

I finished Unspoken Truth, briefly looked at The Needs of the Many before deciding to save it for another day, and finished Beneath The Raptor's Wing.

Now I'm going to reread (since I just sort of went "Eh" the first time around) Echoes and Refractions

 

[BrotherBenny]

I'm still working on reading CSI: Blood Quantum. I really hope to finish it this week so I can start reading the other stuff I have on my shelf, and then go and get the next books in the relevant series, either in ebook or dead tree format.

 

[Greg Cox]

I'm still working on reading CSI: Blood Quantum. I really hope to finish it this week so I can start reading the other stuff I have on my shelf, and then go and get the next books in the relevant series, either in ebook or dead tree format.

I enjoyed BLOOD QUANTUM. Haven't tracked down the new CSI book yet . . . .

 

[BrotherBenny]

I'm still working on reading CSI: Blood Quantum. I really hope to finish it this week so I can start reading the other stuff I have on my shelf, and then go and get the next books in the relevant series, either in ebook or dead tree format.

I enjoyed BLOOD QUANTUM. Haven't tracked down the new CSI book yet . . . .

Thanks Greg, you've just added another book to my list of...let me think...10, now 11, books I want to get and read (in addition to the 40 or so I already have on my bookshelves).

 

[Cap'n Crunch]

A few days ago I finished The Adventure of Wisteria Lodge, a story from the Sherlock Holmes collection His Last Bow. I'm now reading Supernatural: Heart of the Dragon by some guy with four initials. Next up, The Adventure of the Cardboard Box also from His Last Bow.

 

[Reanok]

I'm reading a scifi mystery novel The Loch by Steven Alten.I like the real scientific facts about scientists and the deepsea Rotv submarienes also the research they're doing finding strange oceanlife in the deepest unexplored parts of the abyssmal plains.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Finished "The Children of Kings". Not sure what to make of it. I'll be picking up "The Burning Land" ( the 5th book in Cornwell's Saxon Chronicles) tomorrow.

 

[AJHalliwell]

Just bought the STO: The Needs of the Many book, and the first chapter was kinda hard to get through for some reason -- fell asleep twice, (to be fair, I haven't had alot of sleep in the last week) but after that I'm flying through it. It's actually turning out pretty interesting, and it's been a good couple of years since I've finished a Star Trek book (been kinda on a off-Star Trek mood. I feel it comin back though!)

 

[F. King Daniel]

I'm still reading Vulcan's Heart, which I'm enjoying except for the Spock/Saavik pon farr lusting (even though I keep telling myself "Pandora Principle didn't happen, this Saavik wasn't raised by Sarek and Amanda, Spock only met her at the academy prior to STII"), even worse, Charvanek is doing it with her cousin . Also I think they keep referencing an old DC comic where Romulans mess with the barrier at the edge of the galaxy to create supersoldiers - and that story includes a Saavik backstory almost the same as Pandora Principle!

No more incest in Trek novels, please. I vaguely remember a TOS novel where some alien girl was doing it with her brother (because it's "ok" on her planet ) which utterly and totally ruined it for me.

 

[Greg Cox]

No more incest in Trek novels, please. I vaguely remember a TOS novel where some alien girl was doing it with her brother (because it's "ok" on her planet ) which utterly and totally ruined it for me.

In the immortal words of Theodore Sturgeon: "If all men were brothers, would you let one marry your sister?"

 

[JD]

I still haven't decided what I think of Spock and Saavik. At one time it is creepy with the whole surogate daughter/mentor-pupil relationship, but at the same time it does kinda make sense since they did do the nasty on Genesis.

 

[Christopher]

I don't get the whole "creepy" reaction. I mean, they're not biologically related. Sure, in some versions, Spock took a role analogous to a father figure for Saavik, but it could just as well be called a teacher-pupil relationship. And they didn't get married until decades afterward, well after Saavik had established herself as an adult and equal. Vulcan's Heart puts it in 2329, which is something like 55 years after Spock mentored the child Saavik. So that would be a 99-year-old man (or 97 if you go by Memory Alpha) marrying a 65-year-old woman (going by her birthdate on Memory Beta). So it's hardly cradle-robbing.