Spoilers Coda: Book 3: Oblivion's Gate by David Mack Review Thread
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So Schroedinger doesn't know if the cat is alive or dead even when he opens the box?
Somebody ought to sic the Humane Society on Schroedinger.
Finished now and there are many, many pages to catch up with. I voted outstanding because reading the book was exciting as hell. But after all is said and done, while it was fun to read and well put together, this was not a fun goodbye or even a GOOD goodbye for me. I am sad that I'll never get to see any of this timeline's characters again, and I am doubly sad that the unique characters of the litverse got to do absolutely nothing besides die gruesome deaths or show up as a Mirror cameo, who would then go to die gruesome deaths. That's IF the characters were even included. I don't know how to parse my feelings for this because the book was a wild bloodbath ride and I enjoyed pretty much every part of it other than once again having to have a scene with a Borg queen. I could have done without it but this story seemed to demand something like that given everything else that was going on. The cloud of nanites was way extra.
I felt conflicted the whole way. I teared up for at least half the dramatic deaths but it all felt very visceral rather than meaningful. There's a rush from seeing these characters in their death throes and something even magical about the idea of a small group of Starfleet officers fighting to do what's right all the way up to the end of time itself, but at the same time it felt like just way too much. So much heaviness on the heart that I felt numb to the adventure at times. I like books that make me feel things, but this was painful and I don't know if I enjoyed that pain this time around. I feel spoiled saying this, but I kinda like what we got (definitely not perfect) but I wish I could have gotten something I liked more.
I would have preferred a version that spread out the adventure across the litverse the way Destiny did. I would have 100% accepted the death-a-thon if we could have spent some of this book (and definitely previous books) seeing more of the unique characters doing things and helping out and having meaningful deaths rather than say.... having characters go back and forth rescuing each other when there's like 40 minutes left to the end of the universe or spending so much time with the Mirror universe characters. If I couldn't get the happy ending I wanted, then a bloody tragic end that showed off the litverse rather than completely focus on the mainline cast (and their counterparts! lol) would have been great too.
Things I loved:
- Luc and Rene's interactions. I felt like we got more meaningful relationship development as father and son through Luc than JL.
- "Julian... call me Ben"
- Julian's heartbreaking recollection of his life, pros/cons
- Riker coming in at the last moment (as is tradition) by way of big ass guns and officers rather than by warping in
- Kira as the Hand of the Prophets gets to find out exactly what path the Prophets had laid out for her. For Kira, I feel she gets the only truly happy ending here.
- Crackpot Wesley
- The Worf spiritual family reunion. Everything about how Worf handles this situation is so in character, I loved it.
- Implication that PIC Picard was affected by the time-psychosis
Things I did not love
- Spending so much time with the Mirror characters
- Not even a passing mention of Voyager. I know they didn't really fit anywhere in this story based on how everything was set up for this trilogy, but it still stung. I mean, the da Vinci got a shoutout where they didn't do anything but just show up and lament the end of time.
- Julian's actual death. Imagining him blowing himself up while his guts are already hanging out, whilst running. Spent many years feeling bad for Julian and felt bad for him to the end. Guy can't catch a break.
- The universe unraveling without more intimate interludes. This could have been a place where we could have at least seen some of that great worldbuilding of the litverse, if not anything but to watch it get sucked up.
- Characters, for some reason, wanting to go rescue each other at the end of time. I get it on like, the emotional level, but my God it felt really unrealistic given the timetable of events.
- Riker doesn't get his head cleared until the very end, cementing Titan's crew as the worst crew in Starfleet. I feel like Titan's characters got shafted even more than characters that didn't show up. They got to be in this and the previous book quite a bit, all to look stupid.
- The death of the Titan crew. I really, REALLY enjoyed the Titan books way back when, and rather than a last hurrah for them they get to act dumb and then then die off-page like five minutes after finally getting on track. Poor freaking Torvig.
I felt conflicted the whole way. I teared up for at least half the dramatic deaths but it all felt very visceral rather than meaningful. There's a rush from seeing these characters in their death throes and something even magical about the idea of a small group of Starfleet officers fighting to do what's right all the way up to the end of time itself, but at the same time it felt like just way too much. So much heaviness on the heart that I felt numb to the adventure at times. I like books that make me feel things, but this was painful and I don't know if I enjoyed that pain this time around. I feel spoiled saying this, but I kinda like what we got (definitely not perfect) but I wish I could have gotten something I liked more.
I would have preferred a version that spread out the adventure across the litverse the way Destiny did. I would have 100% accepted the death-a-thon if we could have spent some of this book (and definitely previous books) seeing more of the unique characters doing things and helping out and having meaningful deaths rather than say.... having characters go back and forth rescuing each other when there's like 40 minutes left to the end of the universe or spending so much time with the Mirror universe characters. If I couldn't get the happy ending I wanted, then a bloody tragic end that showed off the litverse rather than completely focus on the mainline cast (and their counterparts! lol) would have been great too.
Things I loved:
- Luc and Rene's interactions. I felt like we got more meaningful relationship development as father and son through Luc than JL.
- "Julian... call me Ben"
- Julian's heartbreaking recollection of his life, pros/cons
- Riker coming in at the last moment (as is tradition) by way of big ass guns and officers rather than by warping in
- Kira as the Hand of the Prophets gets to find out exactly what path the Prophets had laid out for her. For Kira, I feel she gets the only truly happy ending here.
- Crackpot Wesley
- The Worf spiritual family reunion. Everything about how Worf handles this situation is so in character, I loved it.
- Implication that PIC Picard was affected by the time-psychosis
Things I did not love
- Spending so much time with the Mirror characters
- Not even a passing mention of Voyager. I know they didn't really fit anywhere in this story based on how everything was set up for this trilogy, but it still stung. I mean, the da Vinci got a shoutout where they didn't do anything but just show up and lament the end of time.
- Julian's actual death. Imagining him blowing himself up while his guts are already hanging out, whilst running. Spent many years feeling bad for Julian and felt bad for him to the end. Guy can't catch a break.
- The universe unraveling without more intimate interludes. This could have been a place where we could have at least seen some of that great worldbuilding of the litverse, if not anything but to watch it get sucked up.
- Characters, for some reason, wanting to go rescue each other at the end of time. I get it on like, the emotional level, but my God it felt really unrealistic given the timetable of events.
- Riker doesn't get his head cleared until the very end, cementing Titan's crew as the worst crew in Starfleet. I feel like Titan's characters got shafted even more than characters that didn't show up. They got to be in this and the previous book quite a bit, all to look stupid.
- The death of the Titan crew. I really, REALLY enjoyed the Titan books way back when, and rather than a last hurrah for them they get to act dumb and then then die off-page like five minutes after finally getting on track. Poor freaking Torvig.
@Candy Canes of Qo'noS I think you will enjoy all that @David Mack has to say on Literary Treks about the book, he talks in-depth about a lot of what you mentioned.
Thanks! I'll check it out next time I'm at work.
Great interview. Gives some context for some of the things I wish had gone a little differently. Kudos to all three authors for even managing to will this project into existence.
Finished. Some scenes, or even whole areas, or maybe setups, will stay with me, such as the San Francisco Bridge -> Borg Base traversal and the Bad Guys Base itself.
I felt that Bashir's death scene was perfectly crafted. His own summary of his life was really touching.
I have to say that each time the viewpoint jumped to Kira I heard a little 'You're on hold, but your call is very important to us. You're 37th in the queue' message in my brain :-)
I listened to the audiobook. Does the print book also not include an afterword? (The Benny Russell ending was great, in any case.)
Please explain to me some things as if I'm an idiot. Use simple language and be understanding :-) So, first, if the Ds jump all over timelines, why don't they jump with their avatars? It seems the book suggests in each timeline they need Wesley to base the avatars on the powers stolen from him.
And second, which is always my problem with time-travel stories: in the trilogy we have a description of a timeline where avatars clearly operate. However, they are only created close to the end of that timeline. But: isn't it so that with the way these things usually work in Trek, if a timeline led to the creation of an avatar who went back in time to moment t to change stuff, that moment t would generate a new timeline?
I felt that Bashir's death scene was perfectly crafted. His own summary of his life was really touching.
I have to say that each time the viewpoint jumped to Kira I heard a little 'You're on hold, but your call is very important to us. You're 37th in the queue' message in my brain :-)
I listened to the audiobook. Does the print book also not include an afterword? (The Benny Russell ending was great, in any case.)
Please explain to me some things as if I'm an idiot. Use simple language and be understanding :-) So, first, if the Ds jump all over timelines, why don't they jump with their avatars? It seems the book suggests in each timeline they need Wesley to base the avatars on the powers stolen from him.
And second, which is always my problem with time-travel stories: in the trilogy we have a description of a timeline where avatars clearly operate. However, they are only created close to the end of that timeline. But: isn't it so that with the way these things usually work in Trek, if a timeline led to the creation of an avatar who went back in time to moment t to change stuff, that moment t would generate a new timeline?
Trek does have a number of self-consistent loops that generate themselves, such as "Assignment: Earth," where the Enterprise crew delaying Gary Seven was always part of history, and "Yesteryear," where Spock's survival as a child had always depended on his adult self coming back to save him.
People tend to assume that time travel has to work the same way in every case, but that's not how physics works. The same laws of gravity apply everywhere, but if you let go of a hammer in orbit, it will float rather than falling on your foot, because the conditions in which those laws operate are different. So it stand to reason that the context matters in time travel too. Some time travels will split off new timelines, others will be consistent closed loops.
Thank you! This honestly happened to me, I was able to come to a better understanding and like the book more because of the conversation!
Means so much to hear! Thank you for listening!
It was, from Candide — well spotted!
Positively Trek's interview with David Mack has been released. We discuss the third book in the Coda trilogy, and David addresses some of the concerns mentioned in this TrekBBS forum thread. We also talk about his consultant work on Star Trek: Prodigy and the Trek litverse easter eggs in the show.
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I started this book last night, I am still hoping for a happy end.
How do they actually get to the mirror universe, since they previously needed the wormhole to bring the Defiant there in "The Soul Key", or one of those multidimensional transporter devices to transport individuals?
IIRC, a Mirror Universe jaunt ship's wormhole drive was used to open a wormhole between universes for the Defiant.
Huh? Why are you asking this question in the review thread when it is depicted in Chapter 2?
Yeah, the C.S.S. Enterprise opened up a wormhole for the U.S.S. Defiant to cross over.
I finished it.
Holy fucking shitballs. What a ride.
Holy fucking shitballs. What a ride.
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