A STITCH IN TIME Read By Garak Himself...
- Thread starter Farscape One
- Start date
Unfortunately, while visiting Memory Beta for further information about readable Trek book with garak as one of the main characters, I just found out some disturbing things which might make me reevalue my previous positive review about Una MacCormack, her novels about Garak and TrekLit in general.
So I better stick to my rules when it comes to TrekLit:
Rule 1: Never ever trust or like an autor ,a book or any book series.
Sooner or later something will show up which makes you very dissapointed and will change your opinion.
Rule 2: Never ever have a favorite character! That character will be killed off or ruined sooner or later.
Rule 3: Always be cautious with everything written after 1999.
Always remember that dystopia now rules in the "Gray Universe".
Rule 3: If you want to read a really good story which you really like, write it yourself!
Rule 4: When stuck in some contradiction, always stick to the Lynxverse!
It's the one and only option if you will stay happy with Star Trek
As someone who is new to the lit side of Star Trek, do you mind elaborating a bit on what you're saying here? I find it deeply confusing (with no context; A Stitch In Time was my first ever ST book/audiobook, and I now want to start exploring it in earnest).
I can understand your confusion and I'm sorry if what I wrote came out very confusing. But i will explain it in more detail here and doing so without revealing too much of the story I'm referring to, in case someone really want to read the book I'm referring to.
First of all, what I wrote has nothing, I repeat nothing to do with the excellent book A Stitch In Time written By Andrew J Robinson. This book about Garak is amazing and I strongly recommend it.
It has all to do with the books I'd menitioned in a previous post in this thread, the books about Cardassia written by Una MacCormack.
In that previous post, I praised those books and wrote that:
As for the books I mention in that post, they are great and I'm not gonna change anything I wrote, except for the two last sentences.The Never-Ending Sacrifice is fantastic. I bought it as a Christmas gift to myself last year and had just finished re-reading it. I just had to read it again after re-reading A Stitch In Time as well.
Rugal's story is incredibly exciting and touching and the fact that Garak is in it makes it even better.
Now I'm re-reading The Crimson Shadow which I also bought last year and I'm planning to buy more books which she has written about Cardassia.
Una MacCormack has given me back the faith and interest in TrekLit!
For obvious reasons I'm not gonna buy more of those books and my faith in TrekLit has once again been shattered.
The reasons are to be found here:
From Memory Beta about Garak
Later life and "death"
By 2399 Garak had fallen out of favor with both the Union and the Federation, Cardassia considered him an embarrassment as he was the last surviving member of the Obsidian Order and the Federation considered him a liability as protecting him could mean a straining in the Federation-Bajoran relations so when Bajoran Intelligence discovered that in 2340 he had been responsible for the destruction of Bajoran settlement on Ordeve he was branded a criminal and forced to hide.
When he was sighted on Ordeve Admiral Jean-Luc Picard tasked Lieutenant commander Raffaela Musiker to track him down and arrest him, she recruited Elnor and were transported on the planet by Captain Cristóbal Rios with the USS Stargazer (NCC-82893).
Garak had by then surgically altered himself to look Bajoran and adopted the cover identity of a Vedek called "Saba Taan" like the man he had first met on the planet almost 50 years before.
He was found and identified by Raffi and Koma Tath agent Toze Falus and taken prisoner by they were unable to take him to custody as a force field protected by Obsidian Order codes had activated behind them, forcing them to go further in the Caanta valley.
There they found a Bajoran settlement where people reacted to Garak's presence by welcoming him with happiness and love and revealed to him that they were the children who had survived Garak's attack in 2340 and that he really was Saba Taan, and due to a temporal causality loop, was destined to go back in time to save them from his actions and protect the Orb to redeem himself for his crimes, while Toze initially opposed the news he eventually allowed Garak to use the Orb of Restitution to travel back in time, official reports listed him dead while trying to protect the Orb from a Tal Shiar attack. (PIC novel: Second Self)
Vedek Saba Taan
Garak arrived in 2340 five months before the arrival of his younger self and used the time he had to create a safe haven for the children and help the Bajoran Resistance smuggle weapons through the local temple, he also briefly met his younger self and told him that he forgave him for what he was about to do. When the younger Garak attacked the settlement he snuck away with the children and the Orb in the Caanta valley where he raised and protected them until he died in 2357 after performing Shri-tal with his Bajoran charges.
After his death he was buried in a tomb adorned with a Bajoran holy symbol and the coat of arms of the Obsidian Order and was remembered by his new family with much love.(PIC novel: Second Self)
Later life and "death"
By 2399 Garak had fallen out of favor with both the Union and the Federation, Cardassia considered him an embarrassment as he was the last surviving member of the Obsidian Order and the Federation considered him a liability as protecting him could mean a straining in the Federation-Bajoran relations so when Bajoran Intelligence discovered that in 2340 he had been responsible for the destruction of Bajoran settlement on Ordeve he was branded a criminal and forced to hide.
When he was sighted on Ordeve Admiral Jean-Luc Picard tasked Lieutenant commander Raffaela Musiker to track him down and arrest him, she recruited Elnor and were transported on the planet by Captain Cristóbal Rios with the USS Stargazer (NCC-82893).
Garak had by then surgically altered himself to look Bajoran and adopted the cover identity of a Vedek called "Saba Taan" like the man he had first met on the planet almost 50 years before.
He was found and identified by Raffi and Koma Tath agent Toze Falus and taken prisoner by they were unable to take him to custody as a force field protected by Obsidian Order codes had activated behind them, forcing them to go further in the Caanta valley.
There they found a Bajoran settlement where people reacted to Garak's presence by welcoming him with happiness and love and revealed to him that they were the children who had survived Garak's attack in 2340 and that he really was Saba Taan, and due to a temporal causality loop, was destined to go back in time to save them from his actions and protect the Orb to redeem himself for his crimes, while Toze initially opposed the news he eventually allowed Garak to use the Orb of Restitution to travel back in time, official reports listed him dead while trying to protect the Orb from a Tal Shiar attack. (PIC novel: Second Self)
Vedek Saba Taan
Garak arrived in 2340 five months before the arrival of his younger self and used the time he had to create a safe haven for the children and help the Bajoran Resistance smuggle weapons through the local temple, he also briefly met his younger self and told him that he forgave him for what he was about to do. When the younger Garak attacked the settlement he snuck away with the children and the Orb in the Caanta valley where he raised and protected them until he died in 2357 after performing Shri-tal with his Bajoran charges.
After his death he was buried in a tomb adorned with a Bajoran holy symbol and the coat of arms of the Obsidian Order and was remembered by his new family with much love.(PIC novel: Second Self)
As a fan of the character, I simply can't accept this crap. It's totally out of character for this Cardassian patriot and nothing more but downright character destruction.
I was looking around for more books by Una MacCormack about Garak and Cardassia but after finding what I did find, I changed my decision to buy more books.
Congratulations Una MacCormack, you just lost a possible reader and buyer of your books! Good job!
I don't understand what's wrong with those authors, producers and TV episode writers. They seem to be very self-destructive, creating masterpiece scenarios and then totally destroy everything.
No wonder that Star Trek's popularity has been going down in recent years when people in charge does everything to destroy popular main characters.
But maybe it's a sign of the times. We're living in a dystopian century and an even more dystopian decade, the 2020's.
So I will stick to my TOS, TNG, DS9 and VOY DVD:s and if I want good stories, I write them myself.
I had my suspicions that it would have to do with Garak’s final story, um, being a concept conceivable by the human mind. Lynx believes that characters should never die, even implicitly of old age. Though the mention of “patriotism” meaning Garak acted out of character (and, having actually read the story, it wasn’t exactly his plan for things to work out the way they did), makes me wonder if there’s a novel interpretation of “The Wire” and Garak having a nervous breakdown over either killing or sparing a bunch of Bajoran children during the occupation. Maybe someone’s conflated it with “Duet” in their memory.
You're absolutely right. I should have been more clear in my comments.
It was the result of me being in a bad mood after just have discovered what her latest book about garak was about plus that I didn't want to reveal too much of the plot in the book and destroy for those who might buy and read it.
As you can see, I tried to correct that and sort out what was unclear when I wrote my reply to David cgc, Tuskin38 and Dr Mike.
Honestly, I'm really sorry that I have had to become the "angry Lynx" of the late 1990's again. Or at least something similar to that not so nice person.
But I'm sick and tired of constantly having my favorite characters destroyed and/or killed off.
First Kes and now Garak.
And that when I actually planned to buy more books which Uma MacCormack may have written about Garak because I actually liked The Never-Ending Sacrifice and The Crimson Shadow .
How can she come up with such a horrible story? Adding a lot of bad things which weren't even in the series just to destroy the character and make him look like a psycho, mass murderer and total idiot.
I mean, Garak is such an interesting character that she could have written a dozen books with him as main character or one of the main characters which could have taken place during the 10-year period between the end of the Dominion war and the events in The Crimson Shadow.
Instead she destroys and kills of the character!
First Kes and now Garak.
And that when I actually planned to buy more books which Uma MacCormack may have written about Garak because I actually liked The Never-Ending Sacrifice and The Crimson Shadow .
How can she come up with such a horrible story? Adding a lot of bad things which weren't even in the series just to destroy the character and make him look like a psycho, mass murderer and total idiot.
I mean, Garak is such an interesting character that she could have written a dozen books with him as main character or one of the main characters which could have taken place during the 10-year period between the end of the Dominion war and the events in The Crimson Shadow.
Instead she destroys and kills of the character!
This recent book is obviously a part of some seres based on The TV-series Picard. In that case I must add that Picard obviously is the worst Star Trek series ever with its constant dystopia and ruining of established Trek things, even worse than Discovery.
Right now I regret that I ever watched the few episodes of that serie I did watch.
So I just have to make another addition to the Lynxverse.
First I thought about killing off Captain Picard in some story and then reveal everything what happened in the series Picard and the Picard books as events in a parallell universe known as "Dystopian Hell Universe".
But that would be rude to the poor Captain who I actually like and find uit sad to see in such a horrible series named after him. So I settle with having captain Piacard still commanding the Enterprise while everything what happened in the series Picard and the Picard books are events in the parallell universe known as "Dystopian Hell Universe".
As for Star Trek series, I won't watch one single episode in any series made after 2000 (well, I might give SNW a chance if I'm in a good mood) and I won't read any Star trek novel made after 2014.
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The TV show already did that anyway.
Books might be "non-canon" but now when the series isn't produced and aired anymore, it's the most close to "canon" we can get.
The problem is that if one author in the world of TrekLit ruins, destroys and kill off a character, you can't expect that the character will show up alive and well in another book, unless that other book is some sort of flashback to past times.
The damage made to the character will remain, no matter what.
The TV show already did that anyway.
I know and that's when i gave up about the series Picard. There was a lot of things that already annoyed me and that was the end of the line for me.
I still don't understand why he was killed of and then brought back as some clone, android or whatever it was.
Totally unnecessary and only destructive.
it's ironic that the only I appreciated in Picard was Seven Of Nine. I wasn't a fan of her when she was in Voyager, mostly because she replaced Kes. But when she showed up in Picard, I was happy to see her.
Are there any good spinoff novels nowadays?
To be honest, I haven't been that happy wioth the development in all those "relaunch" book series. Too many great characters missing from the days of the TV series.
And when I finally find a couple of books I really like, find my interest in TrekLit reborn and are looking for more of those books, then I discover what I discovered and the whole picture is smashed up. Again!
It's really sad and devastating because I really liked Uma MacCormacs' books about Cardassia and Garak and then she destroys the character. Why?
She could have continued to come up with good stories with Garak as main character or one of the main characters.
This book is excellent. The best Star Trek book I've read together with Greg Cox's Voyager book The Black Shore which also is a masterpiece.
Is there some contract that one spinoff author has to respect the other spinoff author's plotlines? I thought as long as they respect the canon on the show they could do what they want.
I don't know.
But if you look at all those "Relaunch books", they seem to be linked to some common timeline and the events in that.
I mean, you don't find one book in which Picard quits Starfleet and settle down for the rest of his life on Bajor, starts a wineyard there and then spend his free time with playing chess with the Kai and then in another book he's back on the Enterprise as if nothing has happened.
I guess it will be the same with poor Garak. No one would dare to contradict the destruction of him and wipe ut all that stupidity in any coming book.
Overreaction?
Maybe that's true.
But I'm famous for my overreactions. Ask other TrekBBS members, esopecially those who have been here for a while.
Honestly, I'm very annoying with how too many of my favorite characters have been destroyed, humiliated, ruined and finally killed off. Why are Trek writers and auhors so incredible destructive?
Favorite? I would never treat a favorite in that way, make him or her look like a war criminal and idiot and then kill him/her off. Especially not if I could make a fortune writing more interesting books about the character.
The sad thing is that I really liked her books, The Never-Ending Sacrifice and The Crimson Shadow.
They gave me my lost faith in TrekLit back together with A Stitch In Time, Andrew J Robinson's masterpiece.
Finally, I thought. Finally I have found a book series which I can follow, one about one of my absolute favorite characters.
And when I went out on Memory Beta to see what more interesting books about Garak I could find, then I got this.
It was like visiting a person with who I have had a terrible argument once and then made up with and thinking, "ah, that one is not such a bad person after all" and then being stabbed in the back when I entered the building.
How many books has she written about Garak except for those mentioned above? I found one with a picture of Garak on the front called Enigma Tales which I actually had some thhoughts to buy but I found some disturbing things about Julian Bashir there so I got second thoughts and when i continued to dig in all that I found the horrible Second Self.
And there and then died my interest for TrekLit and everything Trek produced in this horrible decade.
I suppose that Bashir will be the next victim. Or is he already killed off?
So who's next? Maybe I should set up bettings on which great character who will be annihilated next.
The winner gets a DVD box from this person's favorite series where the DVDs will self-destruct after one or two viweings.
Have you watched DS9? Garek was not a good person before the series, and sometimes even during the series.
I adore Garak but don't object to what Una did.
Firstly it's a time travel story. It's altogether possible that he could reappear in the novelverse through temporal shenanigans, actions of the prophets, duplicates etc.
Secondly, Garak could easily appear in the Legacy show or elsewhere on screen. The shows have already contradicted the novels.
I don't think he was entirely bad either. And he continued to evolve throughout DS9.
That's why I said 'sometimes'.
Assassinating a Romulan senator no matter the outcome really isn't a good thing.
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