Customer Reviews

Rising Son (Star Trek Deep Space Nine (Unnumbered Paperback))

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The long awaited "Jake" novel is finally here. We finally get to learn to what happened to Jake's ill-fated journey into the wormhole all the way back in "Avatar, Book 2".

This book is full of likeable new characters, the re-emergance of the long missing Kai Opaka, and answers to previously unanswered questions that have dominated this latest "season" of DS9. When it's not answering questions about prophecies, there is enough action and suprises to keep you wanting more.

The best part of "Rising Son", however, is that Jake finally gets some real character development. In the show, his development was usually second to that of his dad, which considering the nature of his destiny is understandable. However, Jake is now given an opportunity for some serious sef-evaluation and growth.

All in all, "Rising Son" is a worthy addition to the series, and leaves me excited for the new hardcover, "Unity".

I enjoyed this book quite a bit. Jake has always been one of my favorite characters, and one of the most under-used. I didn't think I would like the idea of him trekking around the Gamma Quadrant, but his new friends were interesting, entertaining and very well written. And Jake is eaten up by internal conflict during the entire story. It's nice to see him growing up, realizing that he has to be a man with or without his father. This story also brings to my mind some of the best DS9 episodes, like Explorers. Jake is a complex character, and now we get to see him shine. The prophecy that he was chasing is, of course, a major part of the book. I had the feeling after Lesser Evil that he had misinterpreted the prophecy, and it was nice to see that played out. His feelings of resentment towards the Prophets were right on target. And then there is Opaka. How nice is it to see her again? I don't understand why the character of Wex is even in the story. I assume that she has a major role to play in Unity, because she seemed kind of random to me here. It was also nice to see some of the more underused species like Tosk and the Wadi. I don't have a lot of negative comments on this one. I wish it was longer. I would have liked Jake and Dez to have a larger confrontation about the lies. I would have liked to know more about the Eav'oq and the Ascendants. And the conclusion was painfully short. I realize that this is all building towards Unity, which must be a major payoff for all of the relaunch books. I can't wait for that one. All in all, this book was very well done.

This book pick up where Jake Sisko disappears. Jake is lost in the Gamma Quad. and he is pick up by interesting assortments of Gamma aliens. S.D. Perry uses several aliens that we meet in the first season of DS9, such as Tosk and the Wadi. The book also deals with Jake's need to find his father. Also, Perry tells us about Kia Opaka and her life after being left on the moon in Gamma Quad from the first season. The best part is that Perry created a dog-like alien name Pif, who will make you laugh.

Well, I finished reading Rising Son. I fail to see what was the big deal in the book though and I'm failing to see why it was given positive reviews on Amazon as well as Trekweb.com.

The main problems with the book is this:
2/3's of the content is pointless. The only character that has any real impact on Jake is Dez, given the similarities with his father and himself. With that said, I'd find it hard to believe that we'll see Dez again unless S.D. Perry is writing the books herself (and if the Dominion is after them, I wouldn't count on it realistically either).

Another problem is that Jake was portrayed as a over-thinking,
over-feeling female. Yep, I'm know that harsh but this wasn't Jake. If you replaced Jake with "Jessica" and took Star Trek off the cover, I don't think anyone would have had a clue it was supposed to be a guy, nevermind trying to attack Jake's character correctly.

Yet another problem is repetition. S.D. Perry constantly reminds you that Jake is thinking about his father, and she doesn't really say anything new or enlightening that she never already stated in Avatar, let alone the 10 or so character reflection she has added in Rising Son. She constantly pushes this "love and lost theme", that is actually very apparant in the Avatar series and simply repeats that here again too. I find that it's fairly easy to replace Julian, Kira, Vaughn, Ezri, Jake, etc. in any of S.D. Perry's reflection moments and (surprisingly), it makes sense for Perry's version of that character. In Rising Son, it does the same for Jake.

Now, don't get me wrong, the book isn't absolutely crap or anything, however, I can see how people might become confused on the book "getting good" after page 100. By that time, the characters actually start to do stuff. So, the first third of the book is pure introduction, reflection and very little action. If you can get by that, then the story (finally) begins.

Jake joins the crew and they start their first mission. Unfortunately, Drang, the selling of the box and just about everything that happens here has very little if any real impact on the story. All this does is escalate other non-important events that nobody cares about. Maybe some of you care about this crew, but I didn't. Dez was the only interesting and tolerable crew member in the book basically at this point. If you cared about the other characters, I have to ask why: they won't be back in future novels and Jake isn't going to think about them ever anyway.

Then the crew goes off doing more stuff, which is all essentially meaningless until they arrive at Ee (a station). Now, I figured since the book was 2/3's done, S.D. Perry had to get on with the story. Knowing that Jake finds Opaka (from the cover and from the ending of Lesser Evil), I figured that can happen one of two ways: Either they visit the moon and free her, or they happen to find her on their journey. Sure enough, she was on Ee.

Now, at this point, everything - literally - that happened before was pointless. This is where the story actually starts in my opinion, but quite frankly, 210 pages later, was it really worth it?

The thing is, any intelligent person before picking up this book
didn't need to know about the Even Odds and they could have predicted (in some fashion) what took place in this book. Now, to give S.D. Perry some credit, the last 90 or 100 pages were interesting. I actually cared about Opaka's story, the new sister aliens next to the wormhole, the path the Prophets laid out for him not only to find Opaka, but to help in the B'Hala excavation. It gave Jake a real purpose to be here, but everything else before this is simply fluff. It would have been nice to see some dependancies, but there wasn't any.

Anyhow, the importance of Tosk was a nice touch too, however I didn't care for Wex either. She still has little importance, but I guess Unity will answer Wex's purpose soon enough (never read it).

Another disappointment was the Wa - it really didn't have any purpose for being there. It could have been absent from the entire story and quite frankly, it wouldn't have changed the execution of the last third of the novel at all. It could have been very readable without the Wa or the Even Odds crew and their stupid adventures altogether.

In the end, Jake and Opaka were the only two characters I even cared about, as it should be I suppose. But I wish Opaka had been found much earlier since that wasn't much of a surprise finding her in the first place. In fact, the only real surprise (if you can call it that) is the importance of tosk and the new relationship of the planet to Bajor - that's it. Everything else could have been omitted or assumed, which doesn't make for an entertaining read unfortunately.

Oh, and Weyoun could have had much better dialog. That wasn't Weyoun either I'm afraid.

In the end, I'd give the book 2 1/2 out of 5 stars. There isn't enough payoff here to warrant anything higher. With inaccurate characterization of Jake and Weyoun, and a lot of unimportant events that take huge amounts of space, I just can't recommend this book unless you are reading it to complete the series. Frankly, I would have been happy to see the last 100 pages of the story be sliced into the Mission Gamma books. That would have been a lot better from my perspective.

I'm sure a number of you will disagree and will refuse to give this review positive votes. Too many people just want to see positive reviews on anything Star Trek when they are a serious fan. That's unfortunate, because this story really isn't that great as people claim it to be and even outside of Star Trek, I'm sure you could find something else better to read than Rising Son as well. What a shame.

"Rising Son" seems to be a good synthesis of what's been going on in the Deep Space Nine universe up to this point.

I like the way that the author showed Opaka's spiritual evolution. She begins, in the series, as knowing faith from a single perspective, the traditional Bajoran view of the Prophets. However, being away from Bajor forces her to make her faith something more universal and flexible. It ties in nicely with the schism of the Bajoran faith that was introduced in the "Avatar" books and continued in the "Mission Gamma" series. Opaka's experiences offworld have prepared her for what's happening on Bajor. However, I don't think it's a sure bet that she will become kai again when she returns. In fact, I have a sneaking suspicion she will choose not to be kai if it comes down to it.

I also liked the revelation that Bajor is not the only world that has been visited by the wormhole aliens. That dovetails with a mention made at the end of the "Gateways" series, where an Iconian comments to Kira on the worlds (plural) that the wormhole aliens watch over.

I am still waiting to see if Benjamin Sisko reappears. But even if he doesn't, the Deep Space Nine series still has legs.

It should be interesting to see what to do with "Unity," the next book in the series. The Ascendents and parasites are lurking in the background as some potentially nasty enemies.

This was the best DS9 book that I've read in some time. The story was engaging and the reader gets a chance to spend some quality time with Jake as he starts his transition into manhood. What really makes this story stand out is Perry's ability to create interesting characters along the way. She did a really good job of breathing life into the other characters in the story. This book does a good job of allowing the reader to really get into Jake's head. You get the chance to see what it is like being the son of the Emissary. Jake desperately wants to step out of his father's shadow - while not wanting to truly abandon his father to his fate. This dilemma is central to the story and Perry does a really great job of allowing the reader to share in Jake's frustrations as he thinks about what he should do with his life. The book has a really nice twist at the end when Jake come to grips with the real meaning of the prophesy and his role in its fulfillment. A nice set up for the next book in the series...Unity and it also sets the stage future adventures involving Jake's character. A very good read and I highly recommend it.

Rising Son is part of the post-television continuity Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Not only that, but it runs parallel with all of the other books except Avatar. It explains what happened to Jake Sisko after he disappeared into the wormhole during that book, and his experiences as he tries to get home (or tries to decide whether or not he even wants to go home). It's a very intriguing character study of young Jake and it includes an interesting plot as well. We've been waiting months and months to find out what happened to Jake, and it was well worth the wait.

If you're a fan of Deep Space 9, especially the post-television continuity, this is a must-own book for you. I've only read a couple of the newer books, but I've wondered when the Jake story would be told, and I'm glad they waited until the tenth anniversary of the show to tell it. Perry writes a very satisfying book, with interesting characters and a good story to go with it. I enjoyed reading about Jake and the touch decisions he has to make in it. Perry really portrayed well the tug-of-war between Jake's new friends and his ideals. The crew is not the most honest bunch around, and they make some of their living by doing illegal things. They don't do things out of the goodness of their hearts and helping people is only a priority if they are getting paid. This goes completely against how Jake was brought up and he finds himself doubting. Should he stay with these people who have accepted him? Should he build his own life, away from the Federation and from being "Ben Sisko's son?" Is sacrificing his ideals worth it? And then when the prophecy rears its ugly head again, Jake is even more torn. It seems like, even this far away from home, Ben Sisko is reaching out to grab him and pull him in. Jake's final decision looks more and more obvious as things progress (Dez can't understand why Jake is having a problem with the way they do things, and thinks he needs to grow up), but it's still heart-wrenching to see him go through it. I think this would be a marvelous vehicle for Cirroc Lofton (the actor who played Jake) if a TV movie ever got made (not that it will happen of course). I think that's the highest compliment to the book.

Dez is an good contrast to Jake. He desperately wants Jake to like him, to give Jake the opportunity that he never had with his own father. He is baffled by Jake's ethical code that has a problem with the way he does things. He finally decides to pretend that they will become a more altruistic crew while Jake becomes further immersed in the crew's life. Then, when Jake is unable to get himself out, he'll force Jake to realize that what they do is not a bad thing. While you don't like what Dez does, you can understand it and almost sympathize with him. It makes him a sad character in a way, and as you watch Jake agonize, you know that there is no real good or bad side in this conflict. There are only a couple of times where the character doesn't ring true, as he goes just that little bit further to convince Jake and seems to go over the top. It's not often, though, and Dez turns out to be a fascinating character to read about.

The crew of the Even Odds is an eclectic bunch, with a few familiar Alpha Quadrant races (2 Ferengi and a Cardassian) and one Gamma Quadrant race we're familiar with (the Wadi). Thus, Perry can wrap her other, unfamiliar characters in a sheet of familiarity that Trek fans can handle. I'm a bit disappointed in that aspect, but Perry does a good enough job with them that it's not a bad thing. The Caradassian is fairly non-descript, though he does learn some things during the course of the story. The Ferengi are stereotypical, but it's the new races that are so very interesting. The best of the bunch is Stessie, a joined being with numerous different facets. Only one can talk, but all the facets have their own personality even as they are part of the whole. While this sort of thing has been done before (even in Trek), Perry imbues the character with an interesting personality that makes her (it?) a wonderful piece of work. The other crew members aren't really that interesting, fulfilling their roles admirably but not doing much else. Facity, the Wadi first officer and Dez's lover, provides an interesting viewpoint as she watches the interplay between Jake and Dez, but I didn't find much of interest in her personally. She serves almost as a spectator, viewing the game between the two of them and commenting on it.

The writing is standout for a Star Trek book, with no real waste or padding visible in the book. The only pointless point of the story is the ending, where a surprise personality from the television series meets up with them, adding a slight bit of tension but then quickly dissipating it. The story also ends with a "To Be Continued," but in itself it is fairly self-contained. If you're just interested in what happened to Jake, you will find that out and don't have to continue further if you don't want to (but what DS9 book fan will not want to continue?).
The book is well-written enough that if you're not a fan, you would probably still enjoy it. If you are a fan, though, you should check it out. The book is marvelous and it is a fine addition to the DS9 library of books. Bring on Unity!

Rising Son has been described as "Deep Space Nine meets Firefly", although it is more than that. Jake Sisko was a character who got a bit lost towards the end of DS9 itself, so a full novel dedicated to him is overdue. The new characters are excellently fleshed out and the writing style is engaging.

As usual, the many and varied plot lines were complete and held my interest throughout the novel. The author took pains to match details and fill in gaps from previous story lines. For a DS9 hard core fan, I found this book to be ver Satisfying

Star Trek - Deep Space Nine: Rising Son written by S.D. Perry is a well-written book about Jake Sisko and his adventures in the Gamma Quadrant as he makes his way back home.

This book is richly written and carries the character of Jake Sisko right along. Even though Jake wasn't one of the best characters in the Deep Space Nine series, by that I mean he wasn't one of the primary driving force characters as he was young and the son of Captain Benjamin Sisko which in and of itself made him more of an adjunct than anything else.

Perry does the character of Jake well and gets the character's personallity and especially the mindset right... along with the journal enteries makes Jake come alive. As the story goes Jake is found in the Gamma Quadrant by a rag-tag bunch of space faring salvagers and favor runners... all in it for the profit. As they make stop after stop and exchange cargo they get leads on other "jobs." After joing them, Jake learns that his voyage is a search for the truth and that the truth will lead him to find the last thing he ever expected.

The book eludes to great things coming for Jake, but only time will tell. I found the book to be interesting reading as the story moves right along and towards the ending the book's pace really kicks into gear. So from the ruins of B'hala, to the far reaches of the Gamma Quadrant, and finally back to the wormhole Jake grows up and we get a better picture of the true character of one Jake Sisko.

The ending to this book is a mild suprise, but it will carry us into the next installment well. This is a solid 4 star book that is well-written with mild action-adventure, but mainly it is a book that shows us a young man growing up... maturing into a personallity all of his own. This is a good book for the fleshing out of the character known as Jake Sisko.