A review by octavia_cade
Mutiny on the Enterprise by Robert E. Vardeman

2.0

The crew of the Enterprise gets brainwashed and mutinies. With a description like that it should be exciting, but my reaction is pretty much "eh". There's nothing terribly wrong with this, and to be fair there are some interesting parts. I particularly liked the planet that was a single living organism - that's a concept compelling enough to build an entire story around, and not just a relatively isolated excursion. But for the most part I found this book pretty unconvincing. I don't find Lorelei that believable, nor do I think it credible how very easy her takeover was. I think perhaps this story suffers a little from loss of focus - it seems like it should have been a tightly focused psychological piece, concentrated by a sense of claustrophobia slowly growing aboard the ship. Instead it wavers off to the interesting planet, and spends too much time on the travelling ambassadors, who seemed fairly unbelievable themselves. A case of trying to fit too much into a relatively short novel and not really doing any of it justice, I think.