Just finished Destiny. Some Spoilers

[milo bloom]

I pulled up this thread to comment on the books, but this caught my eye and I had to say something:

What people misunderstand about the Prime Directive -- what the writers of TNG in particular misunderstood -- is that it's not about protecting "primitive" cultures from their own weakness or inadequacy. It's about protecting them from the Federation's weaknesses. It's about recognizing that "we" (i.e. the Federation) are fallible and capable of getting too arrogant or making bad choices based on lack of information, so we shouldn't think we have the right to impose our ideas and values on other cultures. That doesn't mean those cultures are somehow too infantile to handle new knowledge. That's condescending rubbish. It means that the Federation recognizes that if it has significantly more power than another culture, then that creates a risk of abusing that power and thinking we have the right to tell another culture what to do when in fact they're entirely capable of making their own decisions. So interpreting the Prime Directive as being about the other culture's inadequacy or immaturity is getting it completely backward. It's actually about trusting the other culture's ability to take care of itself and recognizing the Federation's capacity for error. Unfortunately, judging from TNG, the 24th-century Federation itself has forgotten this.

This is fantastic. It needs to become the opening statement to any Trek writers' guide (novel, film, tv, etc) instantly and forevermore. I say without any cheekiness and with all seriousness: Bravo.

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Wasn't sure which Destiny thread to bump, but I just found this one and was just blown away. In response to someone's criticism I saw about the solution being "too neat", I'm okay with it because the Borg as a plot device had become an albatross around the neck of Trek Lit (not the forum, the "gestalt", if you'll pardon the analogy, of the book universe). They were fearsome, but too good, and having the technologically powerful, but socially flawed Caelier take care of them was a perfect idea, especially the part where they didn't give any assistance to all the races and cultures that had been affected by the Borg over time. It was perfectly in character, and any type of assistance beyond fixing their own fallen children would have cheapened this otherwise incredible story.

And as for the Columbia crew: anything associated with ENT seems to get a bad rap, and I was absolutely thrilled to see them get a (more than) fair shake in this story (not justifying the actions of the MACO's, but just the overall "realness" of the treatment of that era's characters.) As I was reading the first book, I kept thinking the actions of the Columbia crew would just be a little seed for the story, but Mr. Mack just kept going and going and I couldn't have been more thrilled.

A fantastic addition to the Trek lore, this is what "tie-in" literature should be.

 

[David Mack]

^ Thanks for your comments and praise, milo bloom. I'm happy to hear how much you enjoyed the trilogy.

Best,
David Mack

 

[milo bloom]

Glad to do it, it's not many forums where you can actually bend the ear of the person responsible, I'm glad we have that opportunity.






One complaint though, not enough naked T'ryssa Chen ( I read Greater Than the Sum immediately before jumping into your story).