Give me Vanguard with a Deadwood flavor, and I'm in. 
Vanguard Precipice- It's been read. Probable spoilers
- Thread starter wew
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^ It shouldn't, unless they occur at line breaks. I don't know how S&S produces eBooks, so I can't even begin to speculate how/why that error happened.
It sounds to me like it might be a case where the hyphenations were put in at line breaks in the text edition while the e-book edition had a different font size or page size so the hyphens ended up in the middle of lines. I've seen glitches like that show up in print from time to time when someone forgot to fix a hyphen or when the formatting was changed from the original.
Fun, fast moving book. Who knew Quinn was Rambo under all that booze?
Wanderer in a bottle, suck it, bitch.
Can't wait for the next one...
Wanderer in a bottle, suck it, bitch.
Can't wait for the next one...
^ Glad you both enjoyed it. Thanks for the kind words! 
A little late to the party but I just finished. I really enjoyed this. A quick, breezy read that felt like a well done action movie. The character pairings were all a lot of fun. It had been a long time since I read the last in this series and it was fun jumping back in. There were a couple of things that felt off to me though:
I always pictured Quinn as a Harry Mudd/Cyrano Jones type (in fact even though I am sure he has been described differently, I imagined him as a leaner Harry Mudd) but somehow in this novel he became a super hero when I wasn't looking. His pairing with Bridey Mac was a lot of fun but it almost seemed liked a different character to me.
Reyes seems to have become just a snarky quip machine (in the vein of what all the characters in New Frontier have turned into). I know he had a rough time in this book but I don't recall him being that shallow a character.
I am sure this is just because I missed something in an earlier book but I was surprised to hear Xiong described as an older man. I always imagined him as a young idealistic scientist.
To end on the positive note, I really did enjoy the story. I loved the Pulp Fiction reference, the Big Bang Theory references, I missed the Falcon nod but caught the Mynock one. Looking forward to the next book!
I always pictured Quinn as a Harry Mudd/Cyrano Jones type (in fact even though I am sure he has been described differently, I imagined him as a leaner Harry Mudd) but somehow in this novel he became a super hero when I wasn't looking. His pairing with Bridey Mac was a lot of fun but it almost seemed liked a different character to me.
Reyes seems to have become just a snarky quip machine (in the vein of what all the characters in New Frontier have turned into). I know he had a rough time in this book but I don't recall him being that shallow a character.
I am sure this is just because I missed something in an earlier book but I was surprised to hear Xiong described as an older man. I always imagined him as a young idealistic scientist.
To end on the positive note, I really did enjoy the story. I loved the Pulp Fiction reference, the Big Bang Theory references, I missed the Falcon nod but caught the Mynock one. Looking forward to the next book!
PRECIPICE is a book I picked up immediately after finishing OPEN SECRETS because I was fascinated by the idea of T'Prynn on the run and Diego Reyes having been captured by the Klingons. This book manages to resolve both of those plotlines but I was really much more interested in the story about Cervantes Quinn's guerilla war against the Klingons on a post-apocalyptic world. I really liked the revelation of his surprisingly dark and troubled past as well. It turns out mercenaries exist in the Federation. Who knew?
David Mack manages to insert some social commentary on the dangers of man-made climate change while also doing an Indiana Jones-style search for a Shedai relic. Chancellor Gorkon makes an appearance and that is a welcome expansion on a character I very much enjoyed. He's not a particularly nice man, threatening to murder Diego's girlfriend at one point, but he's after peace and that makes him "our" friend.
I kind of like the homages to the PRIVATE LITTLE WAR but I was a bit confused by the fact that Gorkon is so concerned about making a peace treaty now since the Organians have effectively enforced one already. There's time enough to let the ink dry on that because there's no way to actually wage war at present (which actually makes me wonder when the Organians backed off before The Undiscovered Country). If not, Chang's planned invasion of the Federation would have just been embarrassing.
Pennington and T'Prynn's bonding was an interesting part of the novel. It's interesting how Pennington really is kind of a disgusting pig and that attitude lasts until the 23rd century rather than being something that is evolved past. His wife was probably right to divorce him and that's kind of sad but fits the more "realistic" element of Vanguard's humans. Kudos, also, for T'Prynn suffering some real consequences. I've felt that heroes get off with slaps on the wrist in Star Trek way too often as, honestly, everyone but Wesley should have been expelled and probably him too in The First Duty.
I was impressed with the tie-in to the more interesting concepts of THE FINAL FRONTIER. Unlike virtually every other Star Trek fan, I actually enjoyed the concepts of that movie. I think Sybok is a fascinating character who should have at least a book or two mentioned about him. He doesn't make an appearance but Nimbus III does. I love Nimbus III as the whole idea of "Fallout planet" is something that I really enjoyed in Star Trek Online. Seeing how it gets created in this book is a lot more exciting than I think some people would have felt.
All in all, a solid piece of entertainment if not quite as good as REAP THE WHIRLWIND. 4/5
David Mack manages to insert some social commentary on the dangers of man-made climate change while also doing an Indiana Jones-style search for a Shedai relic. Chancellor Gorkon makes an appearance and that is a welcome expansion on a character I very much enjoyed. He's not a particularly nice man, threatening to murder Diego's girlfriend at one point, but he's after peace and that makes him "our" friend.
I kind of like the homages to the PRIVATE LITTLE WAR but I was a bit confused by the fact that Gorkon is so concerned about making a peace treaty now since the Organians have effectively enforced one already. There's time enough to let the ink dry on that because there's no way to actually wage war at present (which actually makes me wonder when the Organians backed off before The Undiscovered Country). If not, Chang's planned invasion of the Federation would have just been embarrassing.
Pennington and T'Prynn's bonding was an interesting part of the novel. It's interesting how Pennington really is kind of a disgusting pig and that attitude lasts until the 23rd century rather than being something that is evolved past. His wife was probably right to divorce him and that's kind of sad but fits the more "realistic" element of Vanguard's humans. Kudos, also, for T'Prynn suffering some real consequences. I've felt that heroes get off with slaps on the wrist in Star Trek way too often as, honestly, everyone but Wesley should have been expelled and probably him too in The First Duty.
I was impressed with the tie-in to the more interesting concepts of THE FINAL FRONTIER. Unlike virtually every other Star Trek fan, I actually enjoyed the concepts of that movie. I think Sybok is a fascinating character who should have at least a book or two mentioned about him. He doesn't make an appearance but Nimbus III does. I love Nimbus III as the whole idea of "Fallout planet" is something that I really enjoyed in Star Trek Online. Seeing how it gets created in this book is a lot more exciting than I think some people would have felt.
All in all, a solid piece of entertainment if not quite as good as REAP THE WHIRLWIND. 4/5
If you pay attention to "Errand of Mercy," it's clear that, contrary to what many have assumed, the Organians had no interest in taking an ongoing, hands-on role in enforcing the peace. This was '60s TV, after all, where every episode had to stand completely on its own, so the episode had to build in an explanation for why the Organians would never be seen again. So it clearly established that they find any interaction with corporeal beings intensely painful and repulsive, and only intervened to the extent they needed to in order to get us off their planet. A lot of people seem to assume the Organians were going around directly policing human and Klingon affairs and popping in to slap us on the wrist every time a weapon was fired, but the episode itself makes it clear that they wanted as little contact with us as possible.
So it stands to reason that once the Organians forced the parties to stop fighting, they left it to the governments themselves to work out the specifics of the peace treaty and its enforcement. Maybe there was enough fear of their intervention to make sure both parties stayed at the negotiating table and put together an ironclad treaty, but the Organians themselves preferred to have nothing to do with us noisy kids as long as we stayed off their lawn. So all the explanation we need for the Organians' subsequent absence is right there in "Errand of Mercy" itself.
Well, we saw plenty of sexism and piggish behavior from men in TOS, so that's consistent.
Thanks for the explanation, Christopher.
Vanguard is now my second favorite Star Trek novel series after New Frontier.
DOTI and ROTF are my next two if it's any consolation.
Vanguard is now my second favorite Star Trek novel series after New Frontier.
DOTI and ROTF are my next two if it's any consolation.
My favourite 2 series after Vanguard.
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