Have Tech Will Travel [Kindle Edition]

Keith R. A. DeCandido (Author), Kevin Dilmore (Author), Christie Golden (Author), Dean Wesley Smith (Author), Dayton Ward (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

HAVE TECH, WILL TRAVEL

STARFLEET CORPS OF ENGINEERS

Need a gigantic, marauding starship explored? Is your global computer system starting to break down? Call in the crack team from the Starfleet Corps of Engineers. Overseen by Captain Montgomery Scott from his office at Starfleet Headquarters, the S.C.E. can build, rebuild, program, reprogram, assemble, reassemble, or just figure out everything from alien replicators to doomsday machines. Just don't expect them to perform miracles -- unless they absolutely have to.

Captain David Gold, his first officer Commander Sonya Gomez, and the crew of the U.S.S. da Vinci put their lives on the line to save a colony world threatened by a deadly alien and rescue a ship trappedin the ravages of interphase.

Join Starfleet's miracle workers for a wrenching journey through the new frontier!

HAVE TECH WILL TRAVEL, SCE #1 contains the complete eBook editions of S.C.E. adventures #1-4.

About the Author

Keith R.A. DeCandido was born and raised in New York City to a family of librarians. He has written over two dozen novels, as well as short stories, nonfiction, eBooks, and comic books, most of them in various media universes, among them Star Trek, World of Warcraft, Starcraft, Marvel Comics, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Serenity, Resident Evil, Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda, Farscape, Xena, and Doctor Who. His original novel Dragon Precinct was published in 2004, and he's also edited several anthologies, among them the award-nominated Imaginings and two Star Trek anthologies. Keith is also a musician, having played percussion for the bands the Don't Quit Your Day Job Players, the Boogie Knights, and the Randy Bandits, as well as several solo acts. In what he laughingly calls his spare time, Keith follows the New York Yankees and practices kenshikai karate. He still lives in New York City with his girlfriend and two insane cats.

Still reeling from the knowledge that Star Trek was a live-action series before it was a Saturday-morning cartoon, KEVIN DILMORE is continually grateful for his professional involvement on the fiction and the non-fiction sides of the Star Trek universe for nearly a decade. Since 1997, he has been a contributing writer to Star Trek Communicator, penning news stories and personality profiles for the bimonthly publication of the Official Star Trek Fan Club. He has written for magazines including Amazing Stories, Star Wars Kids and FLIcK. Kevin’s interviews with some of Star Trek’s most popular authors appear in volumes of the Star Trek Signature Editions, published by Pocket Books. On the fictional side of things, his short stories include "The Road to Edos" in the Star Trek: New Frontier anthology No Limits and "Home on the Strange," the first installment of Reality Cops: The Continuing Adventures of Vale and Mist for Phobos Books. With Dayton Ward, he has written the Star Trek: The Next Generation novels A Time to Sow and A Time to Harvest, a story for the anthology Star Trek: Tales of the Dominion War, eight installments of the continuing e-book series Star Trek: S.C.E. and the short story "Enemy Unknown!" for Rocket League—The Thrilling Roleplaying Game by Playus Maximus. Kevin lives in Kansas City, MO.

New York Times bestselling and award-winning author CHRISTIE GOLDEN has written more than thirty-five novels and several short stories in the fields of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. Among her many projects are over a dozen Star Trek novels and several original fantasy novels. An avid player of World of Warcraft, she has written two manga short stories and several novels in that world (Lord of the Clans, Rise of the Horde, Arthas: Rise of the Lich King, and The Shattering: Prelude to Cataclysm), with more in the works. She has also written the StarCraft Dark Templar Saga: Firstborn, Shadow Hunters, and Twilight, as well as the most recent hardcover, Devils' Due.

Golden is also the writer of three books in the major nine-book Star Wars series Fate of the Jedi (in collaboration with Aaron Allston and Troy Denning). Her first two books in that series—Omens and Allies—are available now. Golden lives in Colorado. She welcomes visitors to her website: www.christiegolden.com.

Dayton Ward served for eleven years in the U.S. Marine Corps before discovering the private sector and the piles of cash to be made there as a software engineer. He got his start in professional writing by placing stories in each of Pocket Books’ first three Star Trek: Strange New Worlds anthologies. He is the author of dozens of Star Trek novels, many written in collaboration with coauthor Kevin Dilmore. He recently penned a tie-in to the cult classic television series The 4400, and is currently at work on a new Star Trek novel to be released in Fall 2010.

 

Though he currently lives in Kansas City with his wife, Michi, he is a Florida native and still maintains a torrid long-distance romance with his beloved Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

 

Readers interested in contacting Dayton or learning more about his writing, or who simply need proof that their website is cooler and better looking, are encouraged to venture to his Internet cobweb collection at www.daytonward.com.

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Product Details

• Format: Kindle Edition
• File Size: 559 KB
• Print Length: 416 pages
• Publisher: Pocket Books/Star Trek (January 2, 2002)
• Sold by: Simon and Schuster Digital Sales Inc
• Language: English
• ASIN: B000FC0PJE
• Text-to-Speech: Not enabled
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #234,527 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

More About the Author

If you're reading this, then chances are you've read one of my books or are considering doing so.

Or, maybe you just clicked on a link by mistake while on your way to something more interesting.

Doesn't matter. Welcome!

So...about me...yeah. Well, you see, it's like this:

When I'm not writing, I'm a software developer, having become a slave to Corporate America after spending eleven years in the U.S. Marine Corps. Why did I join the military? Pretty simple, really. I'd gotten tired of people telling me what to do all the time, and was looking for a change.

Whoops.

Though I've written a few short stories and novels on my own, I've written a lot more in collaboration with my friend and fellow author, Kevin Dilmore.

What types of stories do I like to write? Pretty much the same kind I like to read: Engaging plots with interesting characters. Whether I actually succeed in crafting stories which meet those criteria are for you to decide.

Though I was born and raised primarily in Tampa, Florida, fate and circumstances have seen to it that my wife and I now call Kansas City home. My wife spends a great deal of time and effort as a volunteer K-9 handler and search & rescue tech, training along with one of our dogs in order to assist law enforcement when searching for missing persons. As you can imagine, there are a few story ideas to be gleaned from that.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My Kind Of Reading., February 17, 2002

By 

Diane Bellomo (Baltimore, MD United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Have Tech Will Travel (Star Trek) (Starfleet Corps of Engineers 1-4) (Mass Market Paperback)

Can't say enough about what a good idea was the Starfleet Corps of Engineers. Heck, since the beginning - since *before* the beginning - even *I've* loved the engineers, and my life is so far removed from engineering as to be laughable, nevermind the fact that I couldn't write technobabble if you paid me.

But I'll tell you what, the adventures they find themselves in make for highly entertaining reading. And the beautiful thing about it is, there really could be no *end* to the adventures. Certainly, there's going to be an S.C.E., and even more certainly, there's always going to be a situation or two where they will be sorely needed.

In this, the first of the eBooks in print, we get four very different stories from five different authors, including three of my all-time favorites: Christie Golden, Keith R.A. DeCandido, and Dean Wesley Smith. We are introduced to the flagship of the S.C.E., the *da Vinci,* and its intrepid crew, which includes, in a wonderful nod to continuity, Sonya Gomez, the painfully-green ensign from The Next Generation, who unceremoniously spilled hot chocolate all over Captain Picard in the teaser of the episode, "Q Who."

In the ensuing decade or so, Ensign Gomez did, of course, mature into Commander Gomez, first officer aboard the *da Vinci.* As such, she does her job very, very well. This, however, makes little difference to those around her, who still tease her at every opportunity about what has come to be known as "the incident." The fact that this is carried over at all is one of the reasons the S.C.E. is so believable. You already feel as though you *know* these people - that the S.C.E. has simply always been there.

I'll leave it to other reviewers to tell you about the rest of the crew or describe the specific adventures if they so desire. As for me, I'll just say I'm LOVING these stories. I've already bought Book 2 and look forward to future editions.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Rousing Good Star Trek, January 14, 2002

By 

K. Havis "avid reader" (Sandy Ridge, NC USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Have Tech Will Travel (Star Trek) (Starfleet Corps of Engineers 1-4) (Mass Market Paperback)

This was a fun Star Trek book. I enjoyed reading it very much. Good character building, interesting plot. It was a very enjoyable read. After several book series that have left me cold (and yearning for new S.T. books), it's refreshing to read something decent. I'm really looking forward to the next book in the series. It wasn't deep, it wasn't revolutionary, but it was enjoyable.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars And we were doing so well!, June 17, 2003

By 

James Yanni (Bellefontaine Neighbors, Mo. USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Have Tech Will Travel (Star Trek) (Starfleet Corps of Engineers 1-4) (Mass Market Paperback)

This is the first book of a new series of Star Trek books, focusing on the "Starfleet Corps of Engineers", basically a group of troubleshooters who go in whenever there's a mechanical or alien technology problem that either can't be handled by a regular starship, or (more rarely) that COULD possibly have been handled by the regular starship, but there's actually enough time to call for specialists (usually, these things are sufficient crises that if the regular ship CAN handle them, they have to.)

This book was composed of four mid-length stories (longer than "short stories", but not novel-length) each written by a different author, which together follow a continuous time-line and thus more or less make up one book's worth of story. The writing is surprisingly even, given the different authors; the handoffs from each author to the next are seamless, and the writing itself is quite good. The characters are well-developed, a good mix of minor characters from various episodes on TV and new characters (although the first book begins with the Enterprise-E and crew for an introduction, and Geordi LaForge continues through the first three stories.) The plots, while not the MOST original I've ever seen, are good, workmanlike concepts, and the basic SCE concept is in many ways a marvellous return to early science fiction concepts, where there may be action and combat, but the ADVENTURE is in the discovery and the science.

So why is the rating only four stars, given how much good I have to say about the book? (And in fact, I thought harder about whether to knock it down to three than I did about granting it five.) Because the "ending" ISN'T one; they cut the last story off in mid-action in order to make a "tune in next week" cliffhanger to attempt to manipulate the reader into continuing to buy the following books of the series. I will do so, because I enjoyed the book as a whole, NOT because they left me hanging. I consider that a sufficiently cheesy scam to be worth the loss of AT LEAST one star, and demonstrates that they had no confidence in the quality of the series themselves (or they wouldn't have needed to use such a cheap scam.)