Okay, I'm late to the party, but I finished
Collateral Damage earlier today and I enjoyed it.
Mack never writes a bad book in my view.
It is not a separate rank, it is a billet.
Officially, the highest rank in Starfleet is "admiral." Everything after that ("Chief Admiral, Starfleet," for instance) is a billet, with some being higher than others in Starfleet's hierarchy of command.
The "commander-in-chief" of Starfleet is the President of the United Federation of Planets.
In fairness, the canon has been kind of contradictory here. The admiral serving as Big Cheese of Starfleet in TUC was referred to as the "C-in-C," but TUC also established very firmly that the Federation President has operational authority over Starfleet, and DS9's "Homefront" explicitly referred to the Federation President as "[Starfleet officers'] commander-in-chief."
My personal rationalization is that "commander-in-chief" is a term that doesn't
always refer to the supreme commander of a nation's armed forces; the commanding flag officers of the United States's
unified combatant command theaters used to be known as the "commander-in-chief of [UCC]," but the Bush Administration had those officers' billet name changed to "combatant commander" in order to reserve the phrase "commander-in-chief" for the U.S. President for propaganda purposes. So I tend to assume "commander-in-chief of the Federation Starfleet" is (the possibly informal name for) the billet of commanding admiral of Starfleet, and that the Federation President is commander-in-chief of all armed forces, no just Starfleet. (So, Starfleet and the
Federation Naval Patrol, apparently.)
I think half the problem is a lot of the characters aren't particularly engaging and we've been here before with a lot of the action sequences - the Nausican, Okona, Lavelle, the inhabitants of the station in danger, none of them really caught my interest or felt particularly new or original in their use.
I was kind of fascinated by Kinogar and found his actions very sympathetic, even if I didn't agree with them. His entire world was gone. He had a handful of people following him, and he was trying to build a future for them in a way that comported with their culture's values and didn't make them feel weak.
Other returnees like Wildman and Lavelle didn't really feel like the characters we knew before,
Funny thing: For whatever reason, when I first read Wildman's name, my eyes glossed over "Naomi" and I assumed it was Samantha. Right up until Okuna goes to the strip club, and Naomi says, "Oh, damn, Agonist! You always take me to the nicest places." I read that and I thought, "That sounds like a Naomi line, not a Samantha line." And went back, re-read her introduction, and realized it had been Naomi the entire time.
Anyway, that's a very
adult kind of humor, but something about the mischief of it felt to me very much like an adult version of the kid from VOY.
And Lavelle has always been an asshole, so no problems there.
It worked for me.
partly due a shift to everyone speaking a bit more informally than usual in Trek
A welcome change to my mind. One of the biggest weaknesses of Berman-era Trek was its unrealistic portrayal of spoken language.
so many odd references about getting paid or salaries
The canon has been contradicting itself on this for decades now. But it's pretty clear that in Trek Lit, even in the socialist utopia of the UFP, people get paid.
All that time might have been better spent doing more with the crew, Smrhova gets a lot of focus, picking up a thread about her feeling she isn't as capable as others. Great to see it touched on again as she has been all but ignored since the last time David Mack wrote her but it doesn't really go anywhere and she doesn't really achieve much other than be angry most of the time.
Really? I felt like she'd gotten to a point at the end of the novel where she'd gained more self-confidence. She wasn't totally recriminating herself for the away mission on Nausicca going awry.
Phillipa Louvois may not have been the most likeable character but she deserves better than being written as a one note vengeful harpy as she is here. I think absolutely there should be people who find what Picard did unacceptable but a bit more shade in their characterisation, and a bit less willingness to stretch the legality of the situation themselves might have been nice.
I don't think Louvois comes across as a one-note vengeful harpy. I totally understand why she feels the way she does. Before seeing the exculpatory recording from L'Haan, it's not unreasonable to find it hard to believe that Picard could have been party to a conspiracy to remove Zife from office illegally yet not be party to a conspiracy to kill him. And while the admiral found a reason not to move to court-martial, the simple fact that Picard was on the call when the admirals started talking about blackmailing Zife into resigning and possibly needing to use force to remove Zife if he refused, and he
didn't report this to the Chief Admiral or the Secretary of Defense or the Federation Council... yeah, I think being disillusioned in him, being
furious at him, is totally understandable. I don't know if I'd feel any differently if I were in her shoes.
It was a goddamn coup, he
knew about it, and he did nothing to stop it. Even if that's not enough to court-martial him -- and I disagree with that presiding officer's recommendation; I think it's enough to court-martial -- I think it's totally legit to feel like that's a fundamental betrayal.
Also, if you know, who was the Chief Admiral during the Tezwa crisis? I know Admiral Ross took the position after Nanietta Bacco became President,
Pedantic side-note: I believe Ross was Starfleet Liaison to the Office of the President, not Chief Admiral/whatever.
The Naomi Wildman stuff is confusing. She should be 14 years old at this but she’s already a lieutenant in Starfleet and that she she’s at a faster rate but that simply doesn’t give her enough time to achieve that rank.
I mean, if she's only a lieutenant junior grade, and if Starfleet has an officer shortage after the Borg Invasion, I don't think it's particularly implausible (provided that she is a biological adult for her species).
I don't think I'd call Okona an obscure character, he was the title character and one of the main focuses of an episode.
One episode out of 768 episodes across six television series and 13 films at the time of publication; from 1988; which has not had any following
at all until this book. I'd call that fairly obscure.
The James Bond pastiche....Though more of a Metal Gear Solid pastiche if I am honest...wore thin after a while.
I don't particularly see how anything in this book was a
James Bond pastiche. There are no elements of exaggerated glamour, no pseudo-colonialist attitudes, no Anglophilia.
Especially when it somewhat reduced Shrmovavavava (I never remember the name)
Edit: (had to answer door mid post)
Reduced her to Daddy issues and Bond Girl Who gets shagged.
So, I don't know if I agree with the decision to have Smrhova and Okuna have sex at the end, but I also don't think it's this disempowering thing. Smrhova only decides to spend a night with him after he has shown contrition for his prior sexual harassment. Once she expresses how disrespected it makes her feel, he acknowledges this and starts to show respect for her power and her feelings. Only then does she even consider the possibility of having a night together.
Again, I'm not sure I'd go with that as an the ending to their arc, but I also think that the ending is constructed
not to take away her agency or reduce her as a result of their relationship.
As a book it goes out of its way to enforce many of the divisions we discuss...there’s common profanity (regardless of STIV)
ST4 only suggests that certain profanities of the 1980s are not in use on Earth in Kirk's time and that Spock is unaware of Earth profanities. Considering that most of the profanities we see in this book are from non-Human characters who are presumably not speaking English, I don't see the issue.
and money everywhere (regardless of ST IV and many TNG lines)
Almost all of the scenes featuring money take place on non-Federation worlds.
There's a reference to Starfleet officers receiving a salary, which is consistent with TOS, and there's a reference to a lawyer needing to get paid, which is consistent with DS9's portrayal of small businesses providing services in exchange for currency ("Little Green Men"), with TUC's line about Scotty buying a boat, with GEN's line about Kirk selling a house, and with Beverly's line about charging her account on the
Enterprise ("Encounter at Farpoint").
It is also, as it so happens, consistent with PIC's depiction of Jean-Luc needing to pay Rios to acquire his services as captain of
La Sirena, though of course this novel was published before PIC came out.
Nothing about the depiction of Starfleet officers' relationship to money contradicts the idea that money is something not generally needed for necessities.
Starfleet is pretty much a military (admittedly less of a stretch.)
That's always been the case canonically, no matter what nonsensical dialogue they tried to put in every now and then to contradict it. You can't be have a court-
martial if it's not a
military organization.
and the Federation is generally a bit shady.
No,
Starfleet Intelligence is generally a bit shady, and S.I. has always been portrayed as such in the canon. The
Federation as a whole is a flawed society that is nonetheless making an admirable effort to restore the rule of law in the wake of a revelation that shook people to their very cores, and is working to make amends for its own acts of neglect.
The nausicaan stuff could have been very interesting, especially when at one point it looked like Mack was toying with the idea of having them supercharge their terraforming with the stolen tech (the fact the Husnock Weapon is based on Omega particle tech is basically forgotten or ignored by the end) and a few more scenes to do with that would have been good, but would have messed with the Metal Gear story.
I don't particularly see how "Naussicans do terraforming" is interesting. "The Federation has to take responsibility for its own neglect of people it owes help to" is way more interesting. So is, "How should a people on the brink of extinction whom the rest of the galaxy has forsaken react".
Picards profanity was a sneak-by...and tends to mean shit.
But that’s the point, the 24th century is supposed to be different
Even
if we buy that humanity in the 24th Century is somehow morally superior, the idea that that means they don't use profanity is pure hogwash. There is nothing immoral about vocalizations used to express strong emotion, and which particular vocalization is considered "obscene" and which is considered "innocent" is an arbitrary artifact of culture. Hell, in the 16th Century, the word "golly" was considered a
terrible obscenity, because it was a contraction for "God's Body," which was a blasphemy; yet today, "golly" is considered so innocent that it is
the archetypal word for "an interjection used by people who are morally pure." The entire concept of profanity is frankly classist and should be done away with in a truly progressive, enlightened society.
Admiral Betandes should be court marshalled for the bad things she's done To Riker and the Titan crew and Picard and the Enterprise crew. And giving all the section 31 classfied logs to Phillipa Lovouis to use against Picard.
Lovouis is the Attorney General of the United Federation of Planets. I'm pretty sure she has sufficient security clearance to view those files.
A better question is why the presiding officer allowed her to introduce sealed personal logs into evidence if their release to her wasn't authorized under the SCMJ.
I think Phillipa should be disbarred as attorney general she's a corrupt as the Admiral.
No, she is not. She
may be over-zealous in her quest to rid the Federation of the influence of Section 31 and to bring officers involved in the illegal conspiracy to force Zife out of office to justice, but that is
not the same thing as corruption.
Just out of curiosity I didnt understand the particulars of the Time to series such as which author messed up the direction of the Time to series, but how did things change? I dont understand. What would have been the different direction?
So, obviously I don't speak for David Mack, but after listening to the podcast in question, I think that is a reference to a subplot in
Articles of the Federation by Keith R.A. DeCandido, in which Nanietta Bacco deduces that Ross had Zife killed after her office is unable to locate Zife to invite him to a state funeral. (She does not, as far as we know, deduce the involvement of Section 31.) Mack and KRAD are friends so I'm sure he meant the criticism with affection, but, yeah, why Section 31 would think they could kill a former President without anyone noticing he's gone missing is a bit implausible.
QUOTE="Jedi Ben, post: 13266720, member: 60160"]As for Louvois turning up at the end, the only thing she'd earnt is being told to fuck off by Picard - that'd probably happen in new Trek come to think of it. Probably enough established to get her disbarred too.[/quote]
Why? She doesn't do anything illegal or corrupt. And frankly, she's not wrong to feel betrayed by Picard. Even
if we accept the idea that he's not legally responsible for the conduct of the admirals on the call, he knew they were about to blackmail Zife into resigning on pain of violence if he refused. That may not be sedition -- but it sure as hell isn't respect for democracy or the rule of law, either.
And I actively dislike the Nausicaan scenes. The speech by the lead Nausicaan made me flash back to Dr. Lizardo in Buckaroo Banzai trying to whip the Lectroids into a frenzy. Putting the Hitler/Trump rally speech into the mouth of the leader of a band of nearly-extinct refugees felt an awful lot like "punching down."
I'm honestly not sure what scene that is. I don't recall any scene where Kinogar advocates for genocide or ethnic cleansing, and the narrative is deeply sympathetic to him and critical of the UFP by the end.
Thinking about why the Nausicaans grated against me so badly, I eventually concluded that I'm kind of done with TNG Trek, where Starfleet/the Federation (because who can really tell them apart?) are the unquestioned good guys, and the "Big Bad" has to be a terrorist from some weaker power. I can't escape seeing the Federation as the United States writ large. And the past couple decades have rather clearly demonstrated that the United States are anything but unquestioned Good Guys. Treklit seems to be running up against a requirement for the Federation to always be virtuous. Picard shatters that expectation in its first episode. Which seems a lot more real to someone like me, living in 2020 America.
The entire point of the novel is how badly the Federation screwed up, how
wrong the Federation is, and how the Nausicaans are kind of in the right for what they've done. You should consider reading to the end, because the end is far more in keeping with what you're asking for than you seem to think.
I'd love it if S&S commissioned somebody to do it at least though.
