Customer Reviews

The Tempest (Star Trek Deep Space Nine, No 19)

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

 

 

It's funny when Worf and Cali are fighting, and the part with Dax and Keiko are investigating the plasma storm is pretty cool too. Odo babysitting Molly is pretty amusing too. Pretty accurate too. A must-read for anyone who likes Deep Space Nine.

In the universe of Star Trek books that I have read (which is almost all of them), this is one of the worst. The primary story line is not bad, but there are sections of it which decend into nothing but technobable between Keiko and Dax for extended periods. The secondary story lines really go nowhere and and never really put into any real context. They're also too spread out around the primary story line to hold together. It almost seems as if the author got tired at the end of the book and since the primary story line was concluded they quickly wanted to close the book on the rest of it.
Save this one for after after you have read most other ST books.

"The Tempest" is author, Susan Wright's third novel in Gene Roddenberry's universe. While I enjoyed this story tremendously I wouldn't go so far as to say it was her best work in the Star Trek universe which was "The Best and the Brightest." As with every one of her novels I've read so far, her writing extremely well paced, the characterizations are dead on and the overall plot set up and execution are in good order.

What truly knocks this novel back a notch for me, is that it more or less falls into the category of common place within frameworks of early Star Trek Deep Space Nine stories, either in print or on the actual television show, as this type of story was done way too often.

While the author probably has little to do with the cover art, Pocket Books takes another hit on the cover art for this novel as with most at the time of this novels publishing. They just didn't seem to care too much for putting too much effort into the novels in this period.

The Premise:

A violent plasma storm rolls into the Bajoran system and Deep Space Nine suddenly finds itself over populated with people seeking refuge leaving Odo and Lieutenant Commander Worf struggling to maintain control on the station. The more interesting aspect of this novel reveals itself in the Dax and Keiko story where they must take a runabout into the heart of the plasma storm and what they discover there...

What follows from there is a well written story, as with most from this author, that only suffers in that this type of story has been done way too many times in the Deep Space Nine story line. I would still highly recommend this novel to any and all fans of Star Trek fiction for the sake of the author as I've found her stories to be among the best in the Star Trek universe. {ssintrepid]

You will like this book! Take it from me, it is never boring, a "don't put me down" book.

On the plus side, this book paid some interesting attention to some characters who generally don't get much attention, primarily Keiko O'Brien. On the down side, the story is pretty bland, with the side story involving Worf pretty much worthless. One of those Star Trek novels that is an exciting enough read, but which you won't be able to remember any details from a week after you've finished it.

Nice focus on Keiko and Worf who were new to the series but it was more of an episode filler than a full blown book. It had a good balance between characters that were associated from the past and the way in which they had grown and were embarking on a new relationship in a new place. The hard balance of these series books is that they can't change anything so they have to be static to a time and everyone may be challenged but can't have anything of massive signifigance happen to them. This is both an artistic limitation and inherent ST series in books flaw that unfortunately is only solved when the shows are no longer on. One reality must be sacrificed for the other.

The introduction of Keiko as a main character in this story is good, but I found the problem the crew were up against was not particularly interesting; a very dangerous situation, but not interesting. The political situation was not given the right detail to be able to understand the attitudes of Worf towards the Sattar crew.