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octavia_cade's review against another edition
2.0
Parts of this interested me. I'm never not going to like stories about possession; I'm too much of a horror fan for that, and having the possessed kids at the centre of the narrative be Vulcan is a nice twist. And I enjoyed that the young reporter was from a small colony, had only ever seen humans before, and was genuinely a bit bigoted about alien species - clearly she was always going to Learn A Lesson about that, but it's an interesting take that doesn't come up often in this franchise. Shame it was the only interesting thing about her - I don't buy for one second that she was able to get through to Corona when none of the others could. And I really don't buy the very silly subplot about installing computers that can take over the Enterprise if they think Kirk is commanding it wrongly. Starfleet would never be so foolish as to test that bit of kit for the first time on what's essentially the fleet's flagship. That bit of idiot plot induced so much eye-rolling even Vulcan-child-possession couldn't save it.
birdmanseven's review against another edition
2.0
This might worked well as a standalone Sci-Fi novel, but it's just not Star Trek. That made it hard to read.
joelshults's review against another edition
4.0
I really liked this one. This felt more like a real sci-fi novel and less like a "Star Trek book". I haven't read any Greg Bear before this, I may have to check out some of his other work.
reeshadovahsil's review against another edition
4.0
It took them nine years, three months, and three days to defeat Corona. Eventually, they did it by encouraging empathy. ::stares in one year of quarantine:: Interesting...
I enjoyed this one. The writing does go off the tracks a few times when attempting somewhat clumsily to explore esoteric topics, but doesn't go on for long enough that one can't push through it.
The main original character, Mason, is mildly interesting, if not fully fleshed out. The bits of her personality we are allowed to explore are worth the look, however, especially her admitted and rather outdated flaws. Honestly, it's just nice to have a woman join the ship and not be falling all over herself to seduce someone, for a change.
The secondary human original character, Veblen, was also mildly interesting, as he's put in an untenable position, disliked by the crew while disliking his own role, but is honour-bound to do his duty nonetheless.
Unfortunately, the original Vulcans in the story are not fully realized individuals, most especially the father and the daughter, who both might as well have not been there. I got a strange sense that the author was uncomfortable trying to write Vulcan personalities, so they were being side-stepped, and kind of came across as blank slates.
The main plot was fun and interesting and even a little mysterious at times, and the Big Bad was fascinating and sympathetic when you get right down to it.
The secondary plot was an obvious disaster from the beginning. One's eyes begin to roll back into one's head at the pure stupidity coming out of Starfleet Command sometimes. It's very difficult to believe such a hairbrained idea would make it all the way to a starship before someone realized, Hey, you know, this is actually incredibly stupid! (But I guess these are the same idiots who thought it was a good idea to channel the phasers through the warp core, because why would one ever need phasers if the warp core is imbalanced, certainly that could never happen in a battle...[ST:TMP])
One thing that was driving me batty throughout the story was the author's regular references to "Andorrans." I'm assuming he meant Andorians, since he was referencing them as aliens, so he can't have literally meant the people of Andorra (a tiny speck of a country being smooshed on either side by France and Spain), who are human. I don't know if this was a case of an author not bothering to look into the correct spellings for what he's writing or an editor not bothering to look into what they're editing, but it sure bothered me!
All told, I enjoyed this one and might even read it again someday. I'd probably nestle it in around 3.75 stars if you could get that exact on this site.
I enjoyed this one. The writing does go off the tracks a few times when attempting somewhat clumsily to explore esoteric topics, but doesn't go on for long enough that one can't push through it.
The main original character, Mason, is mildly interesting, if not fully fleshed out. The bits of her personality we are allowed to explore are worth the look, however, especially her admitted and rather outdated flaws. Honestly, it's just nice to have a woman join the ship and not be falling all over herself to seduce someone, for a change.
The secondary human original character, Veblen, was also mildly interesting, as he's put in an untenable position, disliked by the crew while disliking his own role, but is honour-bound to do his duty nonetheless.
Unfortunately, the original Vulcans in the story are not fully realized individuals, most especially the father and the daughter, who both might as well have not been there. I got a strange sense that the author was uncomfortable trying to write Vulcan personalities, so they were being side-stepped, and kind of came across as blank slates.
The main plot was fun and interesting and even a little mysterious at times, and the Big Bad was fascinating and sympathetic when you get right down to it.
The secondary plot was an obvious disaster from the beginning. One's eyes begin to roll back into one's head at the pure stupidity coming out of Starfleet Command sometimes. It's very difficult to believe such a hairbrained idea would make it all the way to a starship before someone realized, Hey, you know, this is actually incredibly stupid! (But I guess these are the same idiots who thought it was a good idea to channel the phasers through the warp core, because why would one ever need phasers if the warp core is imbalanced, certainly that could never happen in a battle...[ST:TMP])
One thing that was driving me batty throughout the story was the author's regular references to "Andorrans." I'm assuming he meant Andorians, since he was referencing them as aliens, so he can't have literally meant the people of Andorra (a tiny speck of a country being smooshed on either side by France and Spain), who are human. I don't know if this was a case of an author not bothering to look into the correct spellings for what he's writing or an editor not bothering to look into what they're editing, but it sure bothered me!
All told, I enjoyed this one and might even read it again someday. I'd probably nestle it in around 3.75 stars if you could get that exact on this site.
wai's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
This is a decent Star Trek novel. Not the best by any means, but it still has the feel of an actual Trek episode and is readable. I'm not really sure if that last point would hold up if it had been any longer, but thankfully it was a very short book making it a quick read. It was a pretty tightly wound plot, no scenes that felt excessive or unnecessary.
However, I will say that positioning one of the main characters of the novel as an original character who's actually a bigot against non-humans, and having the resolution try to redeem her....I just have no interest in that personally. It was too shallow of a plot to attempt something like that and I don't feel like it was really effective in any way - she just comes off as annoying which detracted from my enjoyment of the book.
However, I will say that positioning one of the main characters of the novel as an original character who's actually a bigot against non-humans, and having the resolution try to redeem her....I just have no interest in that personally. It was too shallow of a plot to attempt something like that and I don't feel like it was really effective in any way - she just comes off as annoying which detracted from my enjoyment of the book.
irate59's review against another edition
3.0
Very well done for such an early Star Trek novel. Greg Bear has gone on to be a great writer, and this one gave us reason to believe he would become just that.
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