Looking for Advice on a List of Old Trek Books

[JD]

The other day I was looking around at older Trek books on Google Play and I found some that I've been curious about for a while, but I wasn't sure which ones were worth reading. So I was just wondering which of these you guys would recommend.

ENT:
Last Full Measure
Rosetta
Deadulus

VOY:
The Black Shore
Battle Lines

DS9:
Wrath of the Prophes

TNG:
A Hard Rain
Double Helix: The First Virtue
The Best and the Brightest
The Eyes of the Beholders
A Rock and a Hard Place
The Devil's Heart

SGZ: Looking for an overall opinion on the whole series

Starfleet Year One

TOS:
The Rift
The Joy Machine
Ishmael
Gateways: One Small Step
Dwellers in the Cruicible

 

[Lee]

TOS:
The Joy Machine - no.
Ishmael and Dwellers in the Crucible - yes yes yes!

 

[ronny]

ENT - Rosetta is probably the best of the ENT options. The other books are not bad though. I think I liked all but one or one and a half of the pre relaunch ENT books.

VOY - The Black Shore is the best of the 2 by far here. Or maybe not by far, I thought I didn't like battle lines but I see I gave it 3 stars on Goodreads so it must have been better than I remembered.

DS9 - I read the recap of Wrath of the Prophets and I still don't remember it. Even the scenes with Ro and Kira working together, I remember they worked together but not what they did together.

TNG - A Rock and a Hard Place is my favorite here. I remember the rest as being pretty meh.

SGZ - I liked this series.

Year One - There's nothing here I remember thinking was essential.

TOS - My favorite here is Ishmael. In fact that's my favorite out your whole list. The Rift is second place TOS. The Joy Machine is the only book in your list I haven't read.

 

[Jinn]

Rosetta and Daedalus are great.

 

[JD]

Which old western does Ishmael crossover with?

 

[Thrawn]

I recommend A Rock and a Hard Place and The Rift; I don't recommend Gateways: One Small Step. The Black Shore and The First Virtue are solid 7/10s - enjoyable but they won't be on your list of favorites. I haven't read any of the others.

 

[Christopher]

Which old western does Ishmael crossover with?

Here Come the Brides -- which starred Mark Lenard as the regular antagonist, as well as TOS guest stars Robert Brown and David Soul as two of the heroes, hence the in-joke behind the crossover.

 

[20fridge]

The Black Shore is one of the best Voyager novels set during the series. Battle Lines is pretty mediocre.

A Hard Rain feels like a retread of "The Big Goodbye".

A Rock and a Hard Place is a pretty good Riker story.

 

[borgboy]

I wasn't that crazy about Daedalus and Rosetta but I love The Last Full Measure, which paves the way for the ENT relaunch.
The Black Shore is really great.
A Rock and A Hard Place is good.
Dwellers in the Crucible is also good, and pretty edgy for an older Trek book.

 

[Tracy Trek]

Here Come the Brides -- which starred Mark Lenard as the regular antagonist, as well as TOS guest stars Robert Brown and David Soul as two of the heroes, hence the in-joke behind the crossover.

Jane Wyatt who played Spock's mother and Majel Barrett also guest starred on Here Come the Brides on one episode a piece. Just not the same episode.

I liked The Eyes of the Beholders on your list for TNG. For TOS, I liked Ishmael. I see you've already found out it was a crossover.

 

[JD]

Is Eyes of the Beholder the one where Richard Arnold made the writer change a supporting character from an Andorian to a new race?

 

[Defcon]

No. but they had to change the girl's father from being a crewmember to being a passenger. TO save @Therin of Andor some time and energy :

Sadly, the Selar/Thala relationship was never picked up by "New Frontier" when Selar became a regular character of the novel series.


Thala by Ian McLean, on Flickr

This book had some hurdles to jump. Richard Arnold had been insistent that there were "no Andorians among the Enterprise-D crew", and this was specifically stated by Troi in "The Offspring" (March 1990, probably around the time a Sept 1990 novel manuscript would be being critiqued).

So the Andorian diplomat, Thev, killed by the Borg's action (aired May 1989) had to be described as a passenger, not a crewmember (as probably originally planned).


Borg attack, Q Who by Ian McLean, on Flickr

When the Ms Crispin attempted to create a religion for the Andorians for her story, the response from the Star Trek Office was that "Paramount has developed no such culture or religion for the Andorians. Please delete all references to the Andorian culture or religion." [Quote from the old UseNet discussions with the author.]

March 1990's "Metamorphosis" also had Andorian subplots stripped out. Jean Lorrah had intended that her guest alien character, Thralen, be an Andorian, but was requested by the Star Trek Office at Paramount to make the change to a yellow-haired antennaed Theskian, since there were "no Andorians among the Enterprise-D crew". [Quote from the old UseNet discussions with that author.]

 

[Csalem]

The Best and the Brightest and Starfleet: Year One are great reads, even if Enterprise has over-written the latter.

 

[JD]

No. but they had to change the girl's father from being a crewmember to being a passenger. TO save @Therin of Andor some time and energy :

Ah, it sounds like Metamorphosis was the one I was thinking of.

 

[Therin of Andor]

ENT:
Last Full Measure
Rosetta

TNG:
The Best and the Brightest
The Eyes of the Beholders
A Rock and a Hard Place

TOS:
The Rift
Ishmael
Dwellers in the Cruicible

I trimmed your list to indicate those I particularly enjoyed. All very memorable to me.

Ah, it sounds like Metamorphosis was the one I was thinking of.

From my "Andor Files" webpage:
"Lieutenant Thralen, a Theskian with blue skin, antennae and yellow fur-like hair is an USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-D) crewman. His race is said to be 'related' to Andorians, but is 'more gregarious'." [Metamorphosis (Pocket, 1990) by Jean Lorrah.] The author had originally intended that Thralen actually be an Andorian, but was requested by the then-Star Trek Office at Paramount (ie. Richard Arnold, vetting manuscripts for Gene Roddenberry) to make the change, since there were "no Andorians among the Enterprise-D crew" (quote from an Arnold memo published on GEnie and Newsnet bac in the day). Jean Lorrah was seemingly paying homage to some Andorian speculations from the old zine article, A Summary of the Physiological Roots of Andorian Culture (1976) by Leslie Fish, a friend from her fanfic days (eg. references to Thralen's "the Great Mother" deity).

"The Offspring" episode then confirmed canonically that no Andorians were on the ship (Troi's reaction to Lal's research).

Re The Eyes of the Beholders, Pocket, 1990: The memo sent to AC Crispin, about Thala, her diplomat father, Thev, and Administrator Thuvat (of the Andorian colony world Thonolan IV), concerned Andorian religion. The response from the Star Trek Office to Crispin's manuscript was that "Paramount has developed no such culture or religion for the Andorians. Please delete all references to the Andorian culture or religion." (Again, quote from an Arnold memo published on GEnie and Newsnet bac in the day). (Thuvat was permitted to be not eager to find placement for Thala with a foster family, since Andorians abhor disabilities amongst their populace, and there are continued rumours as to the practice of exposure of imperfect infants to the elements.)

 

[F. King Daniel]

The other day I was looking around at older Trek books on Google Play and I found some that I've been curious about for a while, but I wasn't sure which ones were worth reading. So I was just wondering which of these you guys would recommend.

ENT:
Last Full Measure

Nope

Rosetta
Deadulus

Yes, and add Daedalus' Children to complete the duology

VOY:
The Black Shore
Battle Lines

Don't remember Black Shore, but loved Battle Lines

DS9:
Wrath of the Prophes

Isn't that part of the Millennium trilogy? If so yes, but you need the whole thing.

TNG:
A Hard Rain
Double Helix: The First Virtue

No and NO

The Best and the Brightest

I liked this one

The Eyes of the Beholders
A Rock and a Hard Place

Don't recall these

The Devil's Heart

YES

SGZ: Looking for an overall opinion on the whole series

Reunion was good, Valiant was okay, quit on the next one and never went further.

Starfleet Year One

Interesting look at what might have been. Nothing amazing though.

TOS:
The Rift

Yes

The Joy Machine

yes

Ishmael

VERY YES

Gateways: One Small Step

God no

Dwellers in the Cruicible

YES

 

[new_mercury]

Highly recommend Last Full Measure and all the post series Ent novels if you can get them (and I'm not the biggest Enterprise fan going but really enjoyed these)

Stargazer series is also a definite must read

 

[Stevil2001]

The Best and the Brightest is excellent. I wish there'd been more books about these characters.

Ishmael is very good. The crossover thing is overstated, in my opinion. I read it and loved it long before I knew that about it. It's just a great Spock story.

The First Virtue isn't great, but if you like New Frontier, it's interesting to see the Thallonians filtered through someone else's perceptions. Makes them a more three-dimensional culture.

 

[F. King Daniel]

There's a complete(?) summary of Ishmael's crossovers and references here. Spoilers.

 

[JD]

I trimmed your list to indicate those I particularly enjoyed. All very memorable to me.



From my "Andor Files" webpage:
"Lieutenant Thralen, a Theskian with blue skin, antennae and yellow fur-like hair is an USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-D) crewman. His race is said to be 'related' to Andorians, but is 'more gregarious'." [Metamorphosis (Pocket, 1990) by Jean Lorrah.] The author had originally intended that Thralen actually be an Andorian, but was requested by the then-Star Trek Office at Paramount (ie. Richard Arnold, vetting manuscripts for Gene Roddenberry) to make the change, since there were "no Andorians among the Enterprise-D crew" (quote from an Arnold memo published on GEnie and Newsnet bac in the day). Jean Lorrah was seemingly paying homage to some Andorian speculations from the old zine article, A Summary of the Physiological Roots of Andorian Culture (1976) by Leslie Fish, a friend from her fanfic days (eg. references to Thralen's "the Great Mother" deity).

"The Offspring" episode then confirmed canonically that no Andorians were on the ship (Troi's reaction to Lal's research).

Re The Eyes of the Beholders, Pocket, 1990: The memo sent to AC Crispin, about Thala, her diplomat father, Thev, and Administrator Thuvat (of the Andorian colony world Thonolan IV), concerned Andorian religion. The response from the Star Trek Office to Crispin's manuscript was that "Paramount has developed no such culture or religion for the Andorians. Please delete all references to the Andorian culture or religion." (Again, quote from an Arnold memo published on GEnie and Newsnet bac in the day). (Thuvat was permitted to be not eager to find placement for Thala with a foster family, since Andorians abhor disabilities amongst their populace, and there are continued rumours as to the practice of exposure of imperfect infants to the elements.)

If Arnold had a problem with that, I bet the stuff established in the DS9R would have made his head explode, although that would of most of the recent post-series books.