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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
An interesting quick read, if a bit juvenile., January 8, 2002
This book is a sequel to the novel "Dreadnought"; it is somewhat better than that novel, in that the plot is a bit more original, if still an offshoot of the same old worn-out concept. Like Dreadnought, it is rather untraditional as a Star Trek novel, in that the main character is a young officer just out of Starfleet academy, and we only see Kirk, Spock, etc, through her eyes. It is an interesting and worthwhile variation, almost making up for the unoriginality of the basic storylines; Piper is transparently a female equivalent of the young Kirk, with just as much talent and potential as Kirk had as a youth, and just as much inexperience. So in a way, watching her adventures has the advantage of giving us some insight into the early development of the Kirk character, without the disadvantage that "flashback" stories have of being restricted to events that fit into what we know of Kirk's history, and without the guarantee that he will come through successfully (after all, we KNOW Kirk got through those early trials, but there's no guarantee that the next young hotshot officer will).There's something of the feel of juvenile fiction to these stories, with the young main character saving the day repeatedly, but to her credit, Ms. Carey doesn't limit the usual main characters to the sidelines; they take their full place in the plot, and are as amazingly competent as they should be. There's simply the addition of another main character, taking her turn at saving the day. Also to Ms. Carey's credit, she resists the temptation to include a romantic entaglement between Kirk and her heroine, a concept which would clearly be out of place, but which many authors would fail to resist (there's a talented, attractive female character; quick, have Kirk seduce her, or at least try.) (Oh, and Ms. Carey still hasn't learned the difference between a "niggling" doubt and a "sniggering" one, the difference being that there IS such a thing as a niggling doubt, but if there's such a thing as a "sniggering" one, I've never heard of it.) There's no lack of action in this story, nor any lack of fascinating character insight. It does seem that the attempt to make Piper a parallel for Kirk goes a bit overboard, though, in that her best friend and most trusted colleague is a Vulcan, and her next best friend and most trusted colleague has a southern drawl. It gets a bit forced, but the book is still worth reading for fans of Kirk and Star Trek.
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by Carey
by John M. Ford
by J.M. Dillard
by A.C. Crispin
