I've started "A Time to . . ."

[lstyer]

I've started reading the A Time to . . . series and just finished . . . be Born. It wasn't bad.

I had previously listened to the (presumably abridged) audiobook of Vornholt's first two Genesis Wave books, and I see some improvement over those, though the fact that I wasn't dealing with an abridgment in this case might render the comparison a little unfair to Genesis Wave. On the other hand, my biggest problem with those books was that there were a few too many "guest stars" showing up for my taste. That seemed less a problem in Born.

The only thing that really struck me as totally off in Born was the portrayal of the Traveler. I admit it's been quite a while since I watched his later appearances, but I caught "Where No Man Has Gone Before" fairly recently and the characterization in Born didn't really match up at all. The non-interference angle in particular didn't really fit in with the idea of a powerful alien who hurls starships across galaxies pretty much for the hell of it.

I've started . . . to Die, and part of me wants to go ahead and finish it now since Born wasn't really a complete story, but another part of me would rather break it up a bit. I'm a flighty reader, so we'll see.

Anyway, I realize I'm several years late to this party, but I figure that just means lots of folk will have opinions. What do y'all think of this one?

 

[Smellincoffee]

I bought the first book when it came out and couldn't get through it, but when I returned to it this year I enjoyed it well enough. I haven't continued in the series because I've been busy with other Trek books. The latter books in the series are supposed to be excellent stories, and even today TNG/Titan books reference their events.

 

[Paris]

I don't want to disparage the first 6 books of the series, as i haven't personally read all of them, but i found the last three to be the absolute best trek books i had ever read before Articles of the Federation and Destiny. David Mack's duology followed by KRAD's installment (the last of the Time To...books) were excellent. If you don't feel like reading them in order, i would highly recommend jumping to book 7: A Time to...Kill, and continuing from there

 

[Steve Roby]

I thought Vornholt's were by far the weakest of the series, and among his weakest Trek contributions. I didn't buy the plot or the characterization, and the prose was often weirdly stilted. I liked Vornholt's early Trek stuff, but Gemworld and his ATT books just didn't work for me at all.

The rest of the ATT books are pretty good to excellent, but they suffer from recapitis. I waited until I had them all to read them so I wouldn't forget what happened, but there was a lot of recapping in each book about everything that had happened in the previous books, and it sometimes felt a bit excessive. Might not have minded it so much if I'd just read them as they came out.

(Worst case of recapitis in Treklit: A Hard Rain, which was written to be published in monthly installments but was published as a single novel instead -- without losing the recaps at the beginning of each chapter.)

 

[captcalhoun]

Born/Die are okay, but Sow/Harvest are better. Love/Hate suffers from similarity of plot to Sow/Harvest. Kill/Heal and War and Peace are pure Win and Awesome.

 

[neogothboy74]

I read the first 2 books in the series earlier this year (Born / Die) and they were such a chore...I didn't really enjoy them. I started the 3rd one and while I liked it more than the previous 2 I lost interest. Perhaps I'll skip to the final 3.

 

[ryan123450]

I have mixed feelings about the first 6 books, while I agree with everyone else that the final 3 are essential Trek reading. This was my introduction to Vale, and I grew to love her as a character quickly. I like the Data storyline of ATT, but hated the Picard storyline. Nothing seemed very in character for him. All three duologies had pretty uninteresting storylines, but all in all it was worth it to experience the positive points and get the whole storyline of the crew's pre-Nemesis adventures.

 

[ronny]

I thought Vornholt's were by far the weakest of the series, and among his weakest Trek contributions. I didn't buy the plot or the characterization, and the prose was often weirdly stilted. I liked Vornholt's early Trek stuff, but Gemworld and his ATT books just didn't work for me at all.

The rest of the ATT books are pretty good to excellent, but they suffer from recapitis. I waited until I had them all to read them so I wouldn't forget what happened, but there was a lot of recapping in each book about everything that had happened in the previous books, and it sometimes felt a bit excessive. Might not have minded it so much if I'd just read them as they came out.

I agree with everything that's said about Vornholt here. I always cringe when ever I read someone saying the "just read the last three books" thing because the Vornholt books are the only two I didn't like in the series and I thought the Ward/Dilmore pair of books was almost up there with the Mack books.

 

[VDCNI]

I quite liked Born but thought the second part Die was just dreadful - a huge drop in quality.

The rest were all good though Love/Hate got a bit tiresome after a while.

 

[Tirius]

I don't want to disparage the first 6 books of the series, as i haven't personally read all of them, but i found the last three to be the absolute best trek books i had ever read before Articles of the Federation ...

This, this exactly. Well, I have read all of them, re-read them recently in fact, but those last three are truly epic. If I had to ditch all my Trek books and keep only 5, it would be those 3, Articles and Orion's Hounds.

 

[lstyer]

Die has just about brought me to a screeching halt. I've been reading on it for almost a week and I'm only about half way through, which is slow even for me. Not much seems to actually happen here, at least in comparison to Born. I want to finish because I am curious what's up in that crazy battlefield, but getting there isn't easy at this point.

I thought the Ward/Dilmore pair of books was almost up there with the Mack books.

I've liked the Ward, Dilmore, DeCandido and Mack Trek books I've read so far, so I'm looking forward to their entries. Maybe that can motivate me to get moving on Die.

 

[lstyer]

I finally finished Die. The second half was a big improvement over the first, so I'm glad I stuck it out. This duology suffered a bit from what, in comics, is being called "decompression," that is, it took what probably could have made a fairly tight single novel a bit longer than either of the existing novels, but stretched and padded it into two novels in which not much seems to happen.

 

[Destructor]

I just finished the series and am glad that I read them all rather than skipping them. The quality did vary but they did link together and form a cohesive whole which I think was the most important part. I didn't like the disjointed nature of the final book but am certainly keen to move on to the rest of the TNG launch.