new book and comics reviews on StarTrek.com

[KRAD]

StarTrek.com has posted a bunch of new reviews by our own Paul Simpson of various recent Trek prose and comics titles.

Book reviews are of TNG: The Buried Age (3 out of 4 phasers), COE: Grand Designs (3), Strange New Worlds 10 (3), TNG: Death in Winter (2), TNG: Resistance (3), TNG: Q & A (4), TNG: The Sky's the Limit (3), Academy: Collision Course (1), TNG: Before Dishonor (1), Titan: Sword of Damocles (3), COE: Creative Couplings (3), and TNG: Slings and Arrows Books 1-3 (3).

Comics reviews are of Klingons: Blood Will Tell (3), TNG: The Space Between (2), Alien Spotlight #1-3 (2), and the first few issues of ST: Year Four (3).

 

[Smiley]

I'm sorry, but I can't trust any review source that gives Before Dishonor a 1/4.

 

[PaulSimpson]

Merry said:
I'm sorry, but I can't trust any review source that gives Before Dishonor a 1/4.

Surely the whole point of reviews is that it gives one person's opinion - you're free to take it or leave it. I'm not sure a question of "trust" comes into it: I read 'Before Dishonor' and was disappointed for the reasons I state in the review. As is often said on here, your mileage may vary!

Paul

 

[Defcon]

^One of the points in your review isn't totally fair:
Peter David has stated that he had no chance to read KRAD's manuscript, and only T'Lana was in Resistance as well, and she can't be off since Dillard doesn't really gave her much of a character in Resistance IMO. I guess in the end it's Margaret Clark's fault, since she is the editor and responsible for keeping the books consistent.

My take on the TNG "Relaunch" ist that it is a huge failure when you look at it as an ongoing series(even if you define ongoing like in S.C.E./CoE, in contrast to DS9R's story arcs), but it isn't too bad if you look at it as seperated stand alone novels, since there has been one very good book so far (Q&A), one good (Before Dishonor) and two more or less average novels (Resistance was better than DiW, though).

 

[Stevil2001]

On the other hand, your average reader can't be expected to read a book and think, "Oh, the element of this I don't like is an editorial fault, not an authorial one, so I'll let it slide." All Paul is saying is whether or not the book worked for him.

 

[8of5]

Defcon said:
My take on the TNG "Relaunch" ist that it is a huge failure when you look at it as an ongoing series(even if you define ongoing like in S.C.E./CoE, in contrast to DS9R's story arcs), but it isn't too bad if you look at it as seperated stand alone novels, since there has been one very good book so far (Q&A), one good (Before Dishonor) and two more or less average novels (Resistance was better than DiW, though).

I'd go with that. I thought Resistance was alright, and really enjoyed Q&A and Before Dishonor as standalones, but as something ongoing I'm pretty disappointed... I guess the DS9 relaunch set the bar pretty high.

Reviews are certainly fickle. On my blog I gave a pretty poor review of the Vulcan Alien Spotlight and had high praise for the Andorian issue. Yet Trekweb's new reviewer went as far as recommending not buying the Andorian issue, but hoped the Vulcan issue would be the state of things to come...

 

[PaulSimpson]

Defcon said:
^One of the points in your review isn't totally fair:
Peter David has stated that he had no chance to read KRAD's manuscript, and only T'Lana was in Resistance as well, and she can't be off since Dillard doesn't really gave her much of a character in Resistance IMO. I guess in the end it's Margaret Clark's fault, since she is the editor and responsible for keeping the books consistent.

But neither I nor any other reviewer can take into account what may or may not have happened during the creation of a product. It's our job to review the product as put out there in the shops. In another part of my life, I work as a professional musician - no-one cares whether I've had a bad day or my 5 year old daughter's kept me up all night because she's sick. If I play badly at their wedding, then I deserve the criticism.
Let's turn this one around - if Peter's book came out first, established those characters, and then KRAD treated them as he did in his books, I would be calling the same foul - except that it would be KRAD who'd be getting the criticism.

Paul

 

[Allyn Gibson]

Merry said:
I'm sorry, but I can't trust any review source that gives Before Dishonor a 1/4.

I think this is a satirical reference to Nintendo fanboys who got their knickers in a twist over GameSpot's low review score for Zelda: Twilight Princess (still a respectable 8.9 from the website), and who then decided the same reviewer's recent firing for scoring Kane & Lynch at a 6.0 (sacked due to advertiser Eidos's withdrawing a six-figure ad buy due to the reviews) was some sort of karmic retribution for the diss to Zelda.

 

[PaulSimpson]

Allyn Gibson said:

Merry said:
I'm sorry, but I can't trust any review source that gives Before Dishonor a 1/4.

I think this is a satirical reference to Nintendo fanboys who got their knickers in a twist over GameSpot's low review score for Zelda: Twilight Princess (still a respectable 8.9 from the website), and who then decided the same reviewer's recent firing for scoring Kane & Lynch at a 6.0 (sacked due to advertiser Eidos's withdrawing a six-figure ad buy due to the reviews) was some sort of karmic retribution for the diss to Zelda.

It's getting terrible; you can't even trust the comments on TrekBBS not to have hidden meanings!

P

 

[Trent Roman]

I guess the format doesn't permit longer reviews... which is a shame, because one or two lines of opinion after a descriptive blurb doesn't amount to much information.

Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman

 

[David Mack]

^ In this case, I have to echo Trent's sentiments.

While it's nice to see StarTrek.com paying attention to the books, the capsule reviews just don't seem sufficient for evaluating a novel or a collection of novellas or stories. I'd rather see a full review of each month's new titles than these abbreviated round-ups.

Just my opinion, of course.

 

[JD]

^I third that. It's nice to see the people trying, but I wish we could get more detailed reviews.

 

[Turtletrekker]

Wow. Reviews of reviews.

 

[TheAlmanac]

I'll have to fourth that review-of-reviews...

Having the books and comics talked about on the official site is cool (and selfishly, I can't complain about the nice rating for Strange New Worlds 10 ), but it would be great to have more room to go into some detail.

However, many thanks for the work you have done, Paul...I'm sure the format was not entirely of your choosing.

Also, congratulations to KRAD for getting the best review in the bunch for Q&A!