Chains of Command (Star Trek The Next Generation, No 21) (Mass Market Paperback)

~ Bill McCay (Author), Eloise Flood (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

While exploring a group of devastated class-M planets in a remote sector of space, the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise ™ is shocked to discover a group of human slaves on a forbidding, glacial world. When the slaves revolt against their human overseers, Captain Picard and his crew sympathize with the slaves plight but cannot interfere in the conflict.

After the revolt is a success, Captain Picard learns that both the slaves and the overseers were controlled by a mysterious bird-like race called the Tseetsk, who are coming to reclaim their property. With the time running out, the rebels kidnap Captain Picard and Counsellor Troi -- drawing the U.S.S. Enterprise into the middle of their deadly plan of vengeance.

From the Publisher

While exploring a group of devastated class-M planets in a remote sector of space, the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise^TM is shocked to discover a group of human slaves on a forbidding, glacial world. The slaves' revolt against their human overseers, and Captain Picard and his crew sympathize with the slaves plight but cannot interfere in the conflict.

After the revolt succeeds, Captain Picard learns that both the slaves and the overseers were controlled by a mysterious bird-like race called the Tseetsk, who are coming to reclaim their property. With time running out, the rebels kidnap Captain Picard and Counselor Troi, drawing the U.S.S. Enterprise into the middle of their deadly plan of vengeance.

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 278 pages
• Publisher: Pocket Books; 1St Edition edition (April 1, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0671742647
• ISBN-13: 978-0671742645
• Product Dimensions: 6.6 x 4 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,068,235 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars STNG #21 Chains of Command - A well told early STNG novel!, September 14, 2003

By	K. Wyatt "ssintrepid" (St. Louis, MO United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This early Star Trek The Next Generation numbered novel can certainly be counted among the best. This is also the only novel by these two authors, W.A. McCay and E.L. Flood, which is too bad considering that with this early STNG novel, they set up an intriguing, well paced plot and carried it through to fruition quite nicely, which was somewhat rare with the earlier STNG numbered novels.

As cover art goes, for the early Star Trek The Next Generation novels, this is a decent but not too remarkable one, although it is among the rare ones with Dr. Beverly Crusher on it.

The premise:

The Enterprise is exploring a remote and devastated group of Class M (Munshara) planets when they receive a distress call from a group of what they find to be human slaves on a remote and quite forbidding glacial planet. When the slaves revolt, Captain Picard is unable to help them but they succeed despite the lack of Federation assistance. With the revolt over and the overseers successfully put down, Captain Picard and the slaves soon learn that the true controllers are coming to reclaim their property.

What follows is an extremely interesting and well told story, to include an Avian type race. I'd definitely recommend this particular early STNG novel to any and all fans of Star Trek fiction as it will make an excellent addition to your Star Trek library. {ssintrepid}

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars ST-TNG: Chains of Command, June 29, 2003

By	Joe Zika "Khemprof" (Cincinnati, Ohio) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

Star Trek - The Next Generation: Chains of Command written by Bill McCay and Eloise Flood is an interesting story as the U.S.S. Enterprise and her crew explore a remote sector of space, they run acrossed a group of devastated class-M planets and wonder what had happened.

As the story progresses the Enterprise receives as distress call from a glacial world... and the call is from humans. Human occupation is not supposed to be this far out in remote space, but nevertheless, humans are calling for assistance. Now, the Enterprise crew becomes involved and finds out that there are human slaves on the forbidding world. But the ultimate slave masters are a big yellow avian race... known by the slaves as chickens but they are known as Tseetsk.

It seems that the Tseetsk have been in this sector of space for a very long time and have digressed throughout the years due to an ongoing war that has pretty much devastated this sector of space. All in all, this story will captivate you as you become engrossed into the story and the resolution to this story is quite novel.

This is a solid 4 star book and has some unique parts as the Enterprise and her crew fall into the middle of a conflict.

3.0 out of 5 stars Not of tension in the build-up and the resolution is too quick, July 29, 2008

By	Charles Ashbacher "([e-mail])" (Marion, Iowa United States([e-mail])) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)

The Enterprise encounters a sequence of planets that have undergone mass destruction. Worf correctly surmises that the massive damage they see is the scars of war. When they come up on another planet that is similarly scarred and ice-bound, they make contact with a human that is astonished to see humans in command with a star ship. He only has time to challenge Picard and ask him who his overseers are before he is cut down. The Enterprise has come upon a planet where humans are slaves to the Tseetsk, a species of large, intelligent birdlike creatures and the humans have just revolted. The man that was killed was an overseer, a human boss over the slave gangs.
When he realizes who they are, Koban, the leader of the human slaves tries to enlist Picard's help in his battle with the Tseetsk. Although they have lost the ability to maintain it, the Tseetsk are in possession of a technology vastly superior to the Federation's. A tachyon based messenger missile was so powerful that it's mere passage proximate to the Enterprise knocked out several primary systems.
When Picard refuses to immediately take sides, Koban has Troi and him kidnapped and taken to a remote outpost. Their captors then battle with a species indigenous to the planet and learn that all of the planetary damage the Enterprise has encountered was due to a war between the Tseetsk thousands of years before. When two giant Tseetsk ships answer the messenger missile, Riker is forced to try to negotiate with them. Fortunately, in the nick of time, the Enterprise crew is able to locate Picard and Troi, beam them back to the ship with the leader of the indigenous Tseetsk and they manage to reach a peaceful accord.
I found very little tension in this episode, while Picard and Troi are in danger while they are being held captive, it is the slave humans that are nearly all killed. The ending was much too brief, there was not enough buildup to create the suitable tension and everyone was very eager to reach a solution. There was no significant posturing on the part of the slave humans, indigenous Tseetsk or the Tseetsk that arrived in the ships. Everyone put aside their thousands of years of hatred and differences in a matter of minutes, which is very unlikely.