Spoilers TTN: Fortune Of War by David Mack Review Thread

I certainly enjoyed this one, voted outstanding. To me, it was a perfect balance of great character moments and action. Here's my video review.

 

Rather disappointed that the Sarai turned on her handler at the end. I actually liked that she was maybe not on their side.
Riker also felt unnecessary here. I had a feeling promoting Riker would make him feel like a third wheel in this series now. They need to give him something else to do now. Looks like he's also outlived Titan.

 

I just finished this one last night and I really enjoyed it.
It was kind of funning seeing all of the different people who were after the Husnock tech. It was especially nice getting to see a bit more of the Pakleds and the Nausicans, who we still haven't spent a lot of time with compared to a lot of other Trek aliens.
I'm a huge fan of DS9's Ferengi characters, so I loved how big of a role Brunt and Gaila played.
I enjoyed the stuff with the Breen a lot, they have quickly become some of my favorite Novelverse baddies.
I've always really enjoyed The Survivors, and it was nice to get a follow up on stuff from that episode.
My only real complaint is that there were so many different groups and individuals involved that at times it felt like the Titan crew was barely even in their own book.
What we did get with the Titan crew was really good though. I wasn't sure about Sarai when she was first introduced, but I'm really starting to like her. This one also gave us some really good stuff for Vale and Riker, as they both continue to adjust to their new positions.
Definitely gets an outstanding vote from me.

 

I finished this novel earlier this month and thought it was alright. Frankly, I never really felt engrossed in the story very much and I wasn't very invested in the whole hunt for Husnock tech. Seeing the Nausicaans at the beginning was interesting, even though we didn't learn much about them. Same goes for Titan's XO. Her being a spy and everything for an evil admiral was a cool idea, and Riker and Troi being on her side at the end seems like a good set-up for a future story, I just think I'd have preferred that one over the plot-driven story we got. Also, I never realized that Batanides appeared in "Tapestry" and also appeared in a bunch of other books and comics. Seeing some Ferengis again, especially in atypcal lines of work, was neat too. Also, and this absolutely isn't the fault of this book, I realized while reading this that the Breen rank thot was spelled exactly like the internet jargon abbreviation for "that hoe over there" and I can't unsee that now.

 

I kept seeing thot all over the net, didn’t have a clue what it meant, just that it was familiar and I felt I did know it, and just misplaced the info. This post has cleared that up for me. Now in my alternate life as an erotica writer, I will always see Breen in my fellow authors profiles. Probably another reason to give up that gig.

 

I also finally finished this one.
I'm not a big fan of the Titan-Series, but this novel really was okay.

I have one question: we already had a Breen Thot TRAN, now we get Thot TREN.
In Cold Equations 2, there was a Breen Helmsman also named "Tren" (in chapter 5). Both are written bei David Mack. So are they supposed to be the same character? Or is it just a coincidence? Maybe names like Tran and Tren are very common among the Breen.

 

Was a really interesting and good novel.
Only think i didn't like was that the Husnock in the flashback seemed to be too one dimensional and evil for evil's sake.

Would have liked to see them being more alien with some stranger motives than simply being bloodlusted, cruel and greedy.

 

Fortune of War was following the same "Breen trying to acquire advanced technology" story thread that Silent Enemies was (also Zero Sum Game, Ceremony of Losses and Disavowed, all also by Mack), so it's entirely possible it's the same character.

But ZSG also established that Breen tend to have their longer original-species name which is then shortened to their single-syllable "official Breen" name. So it's possible that different longer names would be shortened to the same short name just because of the lack of available syllables, which would result in a lot of Thot Trens even if their original name is different.

.

 

Maybe "Tren" and "Tran" are like "Smith" or "Johnson" among the Breen.