Destiny

[Sci]

wrapping up the Borg storyline with such finality(within main continuity) was a disappointment for me. Borg stories are some of the best Trek books.

I think that reaction is completely subjective. You either like the Borg or you don't; you either want them to be used, or you don't.

Ultimately, that stems from the fact that the Borg are unlike any other STAR TREK antagonists. They aren't a culture, with different factions who have different perspectives; they aren't really characters, with full personalities and motivations; they can't be reasoned with or relied upon or trusted; there's no possibility of peaceful coexistence; and they are far, far too much more powerful than the Federation for our heroes to ever realistically be able to beat them.

The Borg aren't characters, in other words; they're monsters. And the thing about monsters is, at the end of the day, you either escape them, or you kill them. There's no in-between.

I would argue that the Federation had escaped the monster too many times for it to be believable that it would just keep escaping it -- and too many times for the monster to be scary or interesting anymore. The monster had to die. For you, stories about the monster still had a thrill to them. It's completely subjective.

er, I said that it was a disappointment "for me." Why did you have to belabor the point that it was my subjective opinion when I never indicated it was otherwise?

Well, my goal was to explore why I disagreed with your conclusion without coming across as combative. Apparently I failed at that.

Oh, and I also thought the "Borg origin"(what was this the fourth or fifth Borg origin we'd gotten in Trek literature?) was pretty cheesy.

I strongly disagree with this. I loved the idea that the Borg were born out of a desperate attempt to survive inevitable death, instead of being yet another lame sci-fi aesop about the evils of technology or what-have-you. I thought Mack did an amazing job describing the desolation of the arctic landscape, the absolute hopelessness of trying to survive in a land so hostile. I could feel the bitter cold of the landscape, and thought the ongoing panic of trying to find food and shelter when there was nothing, just absolutely nothing, was incredibly well-described. And the way that complete and utter panic, that absolute desolation, that inevitable death, could drive some of the characters to betray everything they believe in, to lose themselves in the name of survival... It was wonderfully well-done, I thought.

 

[JD]

I would argue that the Federation had escaped the monster too many times for it to be believable that it would just keep escaping it -- and too many times for the monster to be scary or interesting anymore.

I've had the same feelings about The Borg for a while, which is probably part of why I loved Destiny so much.

Oh, and I also thought the "Borg origin"(what was this the fourth or fifth Borg origin we'd gotten in Trek literature?) was pretty cheesy.

Well, it was the first one in a Novelverse novel, and honestly, I've read about the others on MB and I thought what we got was by far the most interesting and unexpected. Weren't most of others seemed to be pretty much experiments or viruses gone wrong, and I'm sorry, but that kind of stuff has been done to death in monster and sci-fi stories.

 

[TerraUnam]

but then the Titan's computer would've been screaming out Omega Directive warnings.

I'm just the critic; it's the author's job to make it make sense. I think David Mack should have fitted the Omega thing in earlier than he did.

Sci:

In God's of Night the Caeliar gave the Columbia's crew a tour of the Great Work and said that their machinery used more power than humanity had ever harnessed. Not mentioning Omega as such, but still talking about an Infinite Source of Energy.

There is the part in Mere Mortals where Keru and Torvig are exploring the guts of Axion and detect the power source. I can't remember how much they found out, though.

I can never read about the Caeliar's Omega generators and their role in Lost Souls without thinking that Chekhov's Rifle was not properly placed. Something just seems off reading it. I've re-read the series multiple times and I just can't shake it.

But then you read the Change scene in Mere Mortals and all is forgiven. That nearly brought me to tears when I read it the first time. It's still my favourite scene in the whole series.