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4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
ST: TOS Past Prologue: Janus Gate Book Three, July 9, 2002
Star Trek: The Original Series Past Prologue: The Janus Gate Book Three by L.A. Graf is the concluding book to this trilogy, "Present Tense, Future Imperfect, and Past Prologue," and what a conclusion it is.The book is fast paced and full of action revolving around the unanswered questions about James T. Kirk. The book fills in, clarifies and resolves the issues left in book two. We were left with a future and present Sulu and Chekov, a doppleganger paradox, and a 14 year old James T. Kirk. Spock was trying to bring the time distortion into alignment and alleviate the paradox but was interupted by the Shechenag, a cybernetic race of beings, hell bent to close the Janus Gate, and demanded that Spock and company to leave the Tlaoli system in ten hours as time rapidly counts down on the three day time bubble that was created on Psi-2000 after the cold start of the warp engines. As you can see, time is the weighing factor here and time is running out... will Spock and the Enterprise crew come through?
Will James T. Kirk live his life in his past or worse yet has he already changed the future. As I mentioned, in my reviews of the previous books, the key here is the time bubble. This bubble allows the Janus Gate only to replace those found to be in the life events around Kirk, Sulu, and Chekov as Spock unravels this mess. As mentioned, James T. Kirk is time-transported to a life changing event of his past and his past self is now in his present. Captain Kirk is on Grex as the Grexxen are in the middle of a civil war with his father George Kirk. George Kirk is a Commander with Starfleet and is posted on Grex of three months and brings his family with him. All hell breaks loose on Grex, as Captain Kirk has to remember his long forgotten past. It is interesting to read the interplay between Captain Kirk and his father. This could have been extended a little more in the book, but would make an interesting book in an of itself someday. As Grex was once under the control of the Orions, Starfleet got control of the planet through treaty, but as expected the Orions never give-up easy. As you can see there are a lot of things in play here. James T. Kirk has to be brought to his present and his childhood counter part returned to the past. This is the key to the whole time paradox. If you correct this, that resolves the future imperfect, book two. Spock has to work to bring this to a resolution, but will he have time and can he figure out how to do it in a rapidly collapsing time frame. The book gives us "a view" of the future Sulu and Chekov albeit an imperfect view, but the general qualities are there. Spock has always given himself and option to resolve contingencies and this book is no different... hence the way the book resolves the paradox... but remember this... if the Kirk parallel is resolved, then what we read about the future of Sulu and Chekov will change. If you read the first two books in this trilogy, you have to read book three, just as you can't read book three without reading the first two. The way this trilogy is crafted, it weighs heavy on what has been written and builds to and exciting conclusion, remember to pay attention as the timelines get involved. This is an interesting concept, to bring in the crew and their perspective to events as they happen... also this is, as noted on the title of the books, not just Star Trek, but Star Trek: The Original Series... so there is a clue there as well. This is borne out in the next series as well, The Errand of Vengeance : The Edge of the Sword... also a trilogy. I'll see around for that series as well... live long and prosper.
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by Dean Wesley Smith
by Dayton Ward
by Michael Jan Friedman
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