Customer Reviews

The Fate of the Phoenix (Star Trek Adventures)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book definitely is a must-find. At first it is somewhat slow, but it takes time to get in Sondras and Myrnas style of writing this book, and its' prequel, The Price of the Pheonix (which, I recommed reading first). It speeds up about 30 pages in, and never stops fromt there. It is a book unlike many other books. Think of it as a hardcover bestseller book, in paperback format! Read it!

I bought this book on a whim.I read the synopsis on the book and I decided to get it. I was not sorry! If this book was made into an episode the star trek universe would never be the same again. The things that happen to Kirk and Spock here are incredible and unbelievable. Once you read this book you will never look at Kirk and Spock the same way again.

I love this book! I've realized that the older Star Trek books have some amazing story lines, and this is one of the greats!

The plot:the bad guy from the "Price of the Phoenix" is back. But, there was a copy of him made, and this copy looks like and, for the most part, acts like Spock. So, Kirk and Spock have to work with him to catch the Spock look-alike to prevent him from killing the real Spock. In the meantime, the second Kirk (created in the "price of the Phoenix") is with the Romulan commander and he goes after the fake Spock as well. In the end, they all meet and decide to take on the bad guys.

It's kind of confusing, but when you're reading it, you are able to keep up with it pretty well. The authors have done a great job of making this story (which is pretty far-fetched) very interesting and fast-paced.

The only negatives is that, at times, there's too much talking and subtelties going on to keep track of. But, this book is good enough to overcome those problems! Definitely get it!

I greatly enjoyed the Price, and approached this one with some anticipation. The implications of the technology are played out in this, uses that could truly shatter civilization throughout the galaxy. The enemy has reappeared in surprising and unexpected guises, breeding suspicion and fear and of course, a call to action. The second Kirk, now the boy-toy of the Romulan commander, has accepted his status and goes off to live his fate in the Empire, which is nice food for the imagination. Meanwhile, the real Kirk is locked in a deadly battle and race against time. Unfortunately, the plot falls into far more formulaic lines than did the Price, complete with a Deus Ex Machina ending that ruins so much of the bland papp of fanfiction.

This novel could have been much better, but then, to do so would have necessitated a challenge to the ST canon, which is impossible. That, in a nutshell, is why these novels are mediocre: just like the TV series, you get crisis and quick blast-out resolutions that fail to advance any of the (admittedly wonderful) preconditions built into the ST genre.

.. but if you're looking for a good "Star Trek" novel, you haven't. This is the insufferable sequel to the equally insufferable "The Price of the Phoenix". In that book, Kirk and Spock encounter Omne, a Nietzchean supervillain who has developed technology that can resurrect the dead. So, of course, he's back, this time with a clone of Kirk, although that's only part of the convoluted plot line in this one.

What makes these books so obnoxious is that Marshak and Culbreath use the characters of Kirk and Spock as a springboard to expound on their post-feminist theories of what the meaning of masculinity is. They go on and on with their "philosophy" until you want to scream "WHO CARES?? Where's 'Star Trek'?" . The characters of Kirk and Spock are so distorted by this that they are almost unrecognizable. The "Enterprise" and the rest of the crew barely exist in their work, probably because they would interfere with the ability of the authors to express their "deep thoughts". The plodding prose makes the book a tedious read. Furthermore, the writers ended up boxing themselves in so much with the problems inherent in the premise is that the only way they could handle it (spoiler alert)is to have two of the major characters just disappear at the end.

Marshak and Culbreath ended up writing one more short story ("The Procustean Petard", in which Kirk is transformed into a woman and Spock gets an extra Y-chromosome!) in which they continue their not-so-fascinating treatise, and then disappeared after a few more, less unconventional novels. Can't say I miss their writing, since it was terrible, more sociology than "Star Trek." This is deservedly out of print and becoming more obscure, not even worth the cheap used paperback prices. There are so many better "Trek" novels out there, don't waste your time with any of Marshak and Culbreath's early work.