![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
land_sereneTitle: Star Trek: The Next Generation - Q & A
Author: Keith R.A. DeCandido
Publisher: Pocket Books
Format: Paperback
Pages: 320
Times Read: 1
Rank:
Summary: On her first mission, the Enterprise was sent to Farpoint Station. A simple, straightforward investigation. Perfect for a crew that had never served together. Then there was Q. An omnipotent lifeform that seemed bent on placing obstacle after obstacle in the ship's -- and in particular in Picard's -- way. And it hadn't ended with that first mission. When he was least expected, Q would appear. Pushing, prodding, testing. At times needling captain and crew with seemingly silly, pointless, and maddening trifles. Then it would turn all too serious, and the survival of Picard's crew was in Q's hands. Why was it today that Picard was remembering the day he took command of the Enterprise-D? Now he commanded a new ship, the Enterprise-E. His crew was different. There was nothing about Gorsach that in the least resembled Farpoint. But Picard couldn't shake the feeling that something all too familiar was going on. All too awful. All too Q. ~ Amazon.com
This was a bit of a disappointment for me, quite frankly, and it reminded me why I stopped reading Star Trek books. I only picked it up because it was Q-centric (despite the lack of Peter David authorship) and I’m still a sucker for anything with Q. I only really scored the book as high as I did because the characterizations were, for the most part, well done. I think Worf was the only one who was rather OOC – at the risk of quoting Darcy, he smiled too much – but otherwise the author did well. Q himself was portrayed adequately, though really the only way you can mess him up is by not going over the top. The plot, however, left much to be desired. The premise was too close to All Good Things… to be really original – Picard and Co. set in motion the end of the universe, Q ends up sending him to different quantum realities to see the results, etc. – and I really didn’t get much from it. The resolution was most assuredly anti-climactic, and I don’t think our dear captain really learned anything from the events, as he usually does with Q. The author also had the annoying habit of creating random characters in random parts of the galaxy witnessing the effects of the so-called end of the universe. Like, they’d just be tossed in, see the anomalies, and either die or report their findings to their superiors. That’s all, the end.
My other beef has to do with why I stopped reading ST novels in general, which is that they have picked up the annoying habit of almost following in a series…but not quite. As in, you really don’t have to read 20 other books first in order to understand the plot, but characters from past books will be present and events from at least two or three others will be heavily mentioned. This has bugged me with Star Wars books for a while, and it annoyed me greatly when it spread into the ST universe as well. Either make a clear-cut series where one needs to read all the books to follow the plot, or make them stand alone. I never minded references to the shows or movies – that’s just expected – but if I need to read other books, I’d like to know exactly which ones so I’m not just blundering along.
All in all, good characterization, weak plot, annoying references. But I still love Q.
Author: Keith R.A. DeCandido
Publisher: Pocket Books
Format: Paperback
Pages: 320
Times Read: 1
Rank:
Summary: On her first mission, the Enterprise was sent to Farpoint Station. A simple, straightforward investigation. Perfect for a crew that had never served together. Then there was Q. An omnipotent lifeform that seemed bent on placing obstacle after obstacle in the ship's -- and in particular in Picard's -- way. And it hadn't ended with that first mission. When he was least expected, Q would appear. Pushing, prodding, testing. At times needling captain and crew with seemingly silly, pointless, and maddening trifles. Then it would turn all too serious, and the survival of Picard's crew was in Q's hands. Why was it today that Picard was remembering the day he took command of the Enterprise-D? Now he commanded a new ship, the Enterprise-E. His crew was different. There was nothing about Gorsach that in the least resembled Farpoint. But Picard couldn't shake the feeling that something all too familiar was going on. All too awful. All too Q. ~ Amazon.com
This was a bit of a disappointment for me, quite frankly, and it reminded me why I stopped reading Star Trek books. I only picked it up because it was Q-centric (despite the lack of Peter David authorship) and I’m still a sucker for anything with Q. I only really scored the book as high as I did because the characterizations were, for the most part, well done. I think Worf was the only one who was rather OOC – at the risk of quoting Darcy, he smiled too much – but otherwise the author did well. Q himself was portrayed adequately, though really the only way you can mess him up is by not going over the top. The plot, however, left much to be desired. The premise was too close to All Good Things… to be really original – Picard and Co. set in motion the end of the universe, Q ends up sending him to different quantum realities to see the results, etc. – and I really didn’t get much from it. The resolution was most assuredly anti-climactic, and I don’t think our dear captain really learned anything from the events, as he usually does with Q. The author also had the annoying habit of creating random characters in random parts of the galaxy witnessing the effects of the so-called end of the universe. Like, they’d just be tossed in, see the anomalies, and either die or report their findings to their superiors. That’s all, the end.
My other beef has to do with why I stopped reading ST novels in general, which is that they have picked up the annoying habit of almost following in a series…but not quite. As in, you really don’t have to read 20 other books first in order to understand the plot, but characters from past books will be present and events from at least two or three others will be heavily mentioned. This has bugged me with Star Wars books for a while, and it annoyed me greatly when it spread into the ST universe as well. Either make a clear-cut series where one needs to read all the books to follow the plot, or make them stand alone. I never minded references to the shows or movies – that’s just expected – but if I need to read other books, I’d like to know exactly which ones so I’m not just blundering along.
All in all, good characterization, weak plot, annoying references. But I still love Q.