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Should I read the "A Time to..." series?

I actually agree with Trent; it seems like a lot of people really dislike the first pair, but I thought that despite the obvious organizational and descriptive difficulties it was a really strong character piece for Picard and Wesley (which surprised the heck out of me), and created a truly unique setting with very legitimate dangers and surprises. The next two pairs just seemed generic. Well-told, smoothly written, but generic.
 
I will third the notion. I enjoyed the first 2 books very much. Overall, the series was quite interesting.
 
For some reason, A Time to Hate is impossible to find for under $20....

yep..:klingon: :scream:

...but the fact you went ahead and looked for it is still very much appreciated, KRAD :bolian:


I believe an amazon marketplace seller was offering a "very good" copy for $6.00 as of last night.

After reading this thread, I've decided to just read the last three books. I've been buying TNG and DS9 books by the bought-load in my plans to catch up. Death in Winter and Before Dishonor weren't terribly great, but I'm enjoying Greater than the Sum so far. I won't be reading Resistance, but I plan on reading Q & A.

I read the first three Deep Space Nine relaunch books and was happily surprised at their quality. I have the first two omnibus editions, so it will be fun to catch-up in order.

On my Star Trek agenda:

Greater than the Sum
The Buried Age
The Terok Nor trilogy
Destiny trilogy
To Reign in Hell
DS9 Millenium trilogy
Klingon Empire
The last three "A Time to" books
Articles of the Federation
The first four Titan books
The rest of the first two DS9 relaunch omnibus editions

We'll see how much of all that I get through before my brain explodes from too much Trek. It's nice to be back in a trek-reading binge, though. It's been a while. Those myriad and mirror universe omnibuses really got me going again. I might even re-read Q-Squared.

Edit: I included the Destiny trilogy.
 
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Snaploud, I'd say that's a pretty phenomenal list you've got there. Just about every single one of those books I'd rate a 9 or a 10 out of 10. (The only one on your list I really didn't like was Titan: The Red King, and opinions there vary.)

It's really fantastic how much good treklit there is these days, isn't it?
 
Snaploud, I'd say that's a pretty phenomenal list you've got there. Just about every single one of those books I'd rate a 9 or a 10 out of 10. (The only one on your list I really didn't like was Titan: The Red King, and opinions there vary.)

It's really fantastic how much good treklit there is these days, isn't it?

I'm really looking forward to the serial nature of some of these stories. It's too bad that it's happening just as bookstores stop carrying older Trek books, though.

It's really shocking to see the pathetic collection of Trek books in my local Barnes and Noble and Borders. I remember when Trek books accounted for two full bookcases! Now, you have to settle for (maybe) the most recent releases.
 
Snaploud, I'd say that's a pretty phenomenal list you've got there. Just about every single one of those books I'd rate a 9 or a 10 out of 10. (The only one on your list I really didn't like was Titan: The Red King, and opinions there vary.)

It's really fantastic how much good treklit there is these days, isn't it?

argggh.. don't tell me that; that's the book I'm getting ready to start! I finished Taking Wing today and I actually liked it quite well. The ending left me looking forward to The Red King. What didn't you like about it?
 
It's really shocking to see the pathetic collection of Trek books in my local Barnes and Noble and Borders. I remember when Trek books accounted for two full bookcases! Now, you have to settle for (maybe) the most recent releases.

Muchly agreed - at my local Borders, the Star Trek book section is roughly two and a half shelves, consisting just of books released in the past year and a half or so, while just a few years ago, there was almost a full shelf's worth of them, and these include titles from at least three years prior, often further back.
 
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Snaploud, I'd say that's a pretty phenomenal list you've got there. Just about every single one of those books I'd rate a 9 or a 10 out of 10. (The only one on your list I really didn't like was Titan: The Red King, and opinions there vary.)

It's really fantastic how much good treklit there is these days, isn't it?

argggh.. don't tell me that; that's the book I'm getting ready to start! I finished Taking Wing today and I actually liked it quite well. The ending left me looking forward to The Red King. What didn't you like about it?

It has a reasonably good set of plots, but they only involve Riker, Tuvok, and a bunch of guest characters that leave at the end of the book. That is, we introduce this whole new amazing cast of aliens, and almost all of them are literally useless for the whole story.

Plus, I think they got a cute idea for a story, the whole Red King thing that the title refers to, and were so proud of it that they explained it all right at the beginning without allowing any mystery to build up, and the explanation itself required so many reams of bizarre technobabble that it just lost me entirely.

So, I didn't buy the concept, I thought the book gave up its secrets too early, and it didn't do anything with the "leads".

Really, considering what the mission statement of the whole Luna thing was supposed to be, I'd consider Orion's Hounds the real first book in the Titan series. The other two are an odd extended prologue that fix a whole bunch of other loose ends and nonsense, but really have almost nothing to do with the cast of characters & purpose of the series as a whole. (But at least Taking Wing had all the Romulan politics, which I thought were interesting, going for it. Red King? The gimmick fails, so the novel does too.)
 
Snaploud, I'd say that's a pretty phenomenal list you've got there. Just about every single one of those books I'd rate a 9 or a 10 out of 10. (The only one on your list I really didn't like was Titan: The Red King, and opinions there vary.)

It's really fantastic how much good treklit there is these days, isn't it?

Must say that I've missed a few of the books on that list, but if any of the Millennium books are getting 10/10, I'm assuming that is a rating of ridiculousness rather than quality... ;)
 
Snaploud, I'd say that's a pretty phenomenal list you've got there. Just about every single one of those books I'd rate a 9 or a 10 out of 10. (The only one on your list I really didn't like was Titan: The Red King, and opinions there vary.)

It's really fantastic how much good treklit there is these days, isn't it?

Must say that I've missed a few of the books on that list, but if any of the Millennium books are getting 10/10, I'm assuming that is a rating of ridiculousness rather than quality... ;)
Really? You're the first person I've seen that has thought those were bad. A lot of people rank those as some of the very best books; a couple people even had them in their desert island lists. I thought they were pretty fantastic.
 
Thanks for all the input guys. I think I've decided that I'm going to go ahead with the post ATT novels for now, up through Destiny at least. Then I'm definitely going to go back and read the ATT series later.
 
Have you read The Lost Era: The Sundered? It isn't neccissary to read it before hand, but it does introduce the main alien race from The Red King.

I read The Sundered right before I read the first two Titan books, and it made The Red King way more enjoyable. The Sundered features Sulu on the Excelsior with Chekov, Tuvok and even Akaar. It is, like the first two Titan books, written by M&M, so the books complement each other. I hope we see the Neyel again...:)
 
If you get a chance you might want to check it out. It gives pretty much a full history of the Neyel, and is also a really good book on top of that.
 
Snaploud, I'd say that's a pretty phenomenal list you've got there. Just about every single one of those books I'd rate a 9 or a 10 out of 10. (The only one on your list I really didn't like was Titan: The Red King, and opinions there vary.)

It's really fantastic how much good treklit there is these days, isn't it?

Must say that I've missed a few of the books on that list, but if any of the Millennium books are getting 10/10, I'm assuming that is a rating of ridiculousness rather than quality... ;)
Really? You're the first person I've seen that has thought those were bad. A lot of people rank those as some of the very best books; a couple people even had them in their desert island lists. I thought they were pretty fantastic.

There have been a few worst book threads where they got several mentions, IIRC.
 
Muchly agreed - at my local Borders, the Star Trek book section is roughly two and a half shelves, consisting just of books released in the past year and a half or so, while just a few years ago, there was almost a full shelf's worth of them, and these include titles from at least three years prior, often further back.

Bookshops learned that Star Trek fans were early adopters of Internet shopping.
 
Muchly agreed - at my local Borders, the Star Trek book section is roughly two and a half shelves, consisting just of books released in the past year and a half or so, while just a few years ago, there was almost a full shelf's worth of them, and these include titles from at least three years prior, often further back.

Bookshops learned that Star Trek fans were early adopters of Internet shopping.

I like hitting up thrift stores and giving Trek novels new life. :cool:
 
^
Me too, but after 30+ years of collecting Trek books, I need to downsize my collection, not add to it. :lol:
 
^
Me too, but after 30+ years of collecting Trek books, I need to downsize my collection, not add to it. :lol:

From one collector to another....Blasphemy! :lol:

I couldn't downsize even if I needed to. I must have my books! I Must! :guffaw:

Kevin
 
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