Invasion!

[Smiley]

Somebody wrote that the Invasion! miniseries from 1996 put them off Trek lit for a time, and after reading them again, it's easy to see why.

Of the four, Time's Enemy is the only one I might read again. It's the strongest because it pays attention to the characters and integrates them well with the miniseries concept.

The Furies themselves are a decent concept, but they have no interesting characters or plots, Kirk's "friend" being the only possible exception. The first, second, and fourth books are all strictly by-the-numbers in their storytelling, and I found myself checking the page numbers far too often. At least the second book had the virtue of being short.

I did like the author essays in the last book. Although I would rather read more background on the miniseries itself, it's cool to hear about the Trek experience of the authors.

Invasion! left a sour taste in my mouth, but thankfully, the book I'm currently reading (The Lost Years) is much sweeter.

 

[Reanok]

Times's Enemy is one of my favorite Ds9 books the other Invasion books are okay but not my favorite StarTrek miniseries.

 

[greenmystik]

I might have to go back and re-read these books. It's been so long since I've read them I can't really remember anything about them. I do remember one being a real bore though.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

I recall quite enjoying First Strike (though I'm not really a TOS fan), having a "meh" reaction to The Soldiers of Fear, absolutely loving Time's Enemy (despite being a major detour from the overall thrust of the Invasion! series), and The Final Fury was serviceable, but not stellar, especially considering ab Hugh's other Trek books. I also don't even remember how the storyline was resolved, which tells me it wasn't that memorable or interesting.

I'm not sure it "put me off" Trek books, but it was the last set of them I really made an effort to read.

I don't think the series itself was a bad idea, but the books felt like they were at right angles to each other. Rather than one cohesive story, I got four totally different stories that just happened to feature the same villain race.

 

[RonG]

I didn't think much of the novels themselves (apart from Time's Enemy ), but rather of the importance of the series in the larger Trek lit context.

That being a forerunner or "pilot" to the notion of a shared Trek universe, with recurring themes, characters and settings.

I think the current "state" of Trek lit, which I would call a "golden age" of Trek stories (even though or maybe because there is no Trek onscreen), owes its conception and reception to earlier works like Invasion! .

 

[Quimby]

It has been a long time since I read them but I remember the TOS story being very good with an interesting enemy but the TNG book stripping out everything that made the enemy interesting and turning them in just the alien empire of the week.

I also remember enjoying the DS9 book alot but feeling at the time that it had been originally planned as a seprate story that was shoehorned into the Invasion story line. I have little memory of the VOY book.

 

[donners22]

I didn't mind the books themselves, but the linked books became a bit of an irritation to me. I remember being absolutely thrilled by the preview of Time's Enemy, and couldn't wait to get that one.

 

[Gatekeeper]

I still have the "Invasion!" series on my bookshelves — and, as others have noted in this thread, "Time's Enemy" was the strongest of the four.

Gatekeeper

 

[NAHTMMM]

Yeah, the TOS and DS9 entries were my favorites, with TNG being not-as-good and the VOY attempt at a wrap-up dropping off the table at the end.

 

[Vastator]

Time's Enemy was my favourite out of all of them partly because of the enemy you face in the book. The Unclean were like a different nastier take on the Borg.