Customer Reviews

The Trikon Deception

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

 

 

Plain and simple this book is a mystery. It is not really sci-fi. There is no weird science or unexplained alien threat. Written 10 years ago, the story takes place in 1998 and almost seems dated in its lack of technical innovation. But is is a darn good mystery. The first thing is to figure out the crime, then to figure out the criminal. I kept waiting for Bova to make it happen and eventually he did and it was exciting. But it was a shallow read, hardly one of his best. I get the feeling Bova can write a book like this almost as fast as I can read it.

I have mixed feelings about Bova. I did not like MARS, but I loved RETURN TO MARS. Trikon was stylistically a lot like MARS. I think he has put everything he has learned into RETURN TO MARS which I think is his best. TRIKON still has too many characters and too many subplots that really never go anywhere, they just clutter up the story and distract the reader. I keep a few notes as I read Bova until I can eliminate characters as nonessential to the plot. Trying to keep up with everyone is an unnecessary challenge.

A note about the ending... I liked the story, and was happy at the way things turned out. But I still thought the ending was kinda cheap. There were two appendices at the end that sort of updated the story and told what happened some of the characters. I do not like this technique of ending afterthought - but it was better than leaving the fate of those characters unaddressed.

This book got an 8 because of the start, I did not like it at all, but the second time I read it <not reading the start> I really liked it. Keep in mind this is Bova, so its just as good as the others. Perhaps you will not mind the start as much as I did