Product Description

Captain Jean-Luc Picard, his ship repaired, must now reassemble his crew. With the departure of both William Riker and ship's counsellor Deannna Troi, the captain must replace his two most trusted advisors. He chooses a Vulcan, a logical choice, and for his new first officer, Worf. But the Klingon refuses the promotion and the new ship's counsellor appears to actively dislike Worf. A simple shake-down mission should settle everything. Except that once again, the captain hears the song of the Borg collective. Admiral Janeway is convinced that the Borg have been crushed and are no longer a threat. Picard believes she is wrong, and that if the Enterprise doesn't act the entire Federation will be under the domination of its most oppressive enemy.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #182486 in Books
• Published on: 2007-10-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• 320 pages

About the Author
J.M. Dillard is the author of numerous Star Trek novels, including the movie novelisations GENERATIONS, FIRST CONTACT, INSURRECTION and NEMESIS, and the bestselling non-fiction pictorial history WHERE NO MAN HAS GONE BEFORE.

Customer Reviews

Almost entirely disappointing
After looking forward to reading this book, I was disappointed by almost every aspect of it. The story has a general interest to it, but it's marred by a fundamental misunderstanding of the established nature of the characters. None of the characters we're used to (Picard, Worf, Crusher, LaForge, even the Borg) have been written in a way that truly reflects their personalities and their behaviour. Picard especially is full of turns of phrases that you would never expect from proper Star Trek writers in a million years. This reflected on the characters original to this book, for me, as I couldn't believe the author was capable at all of portraying apt characterisations (with the possible exception of T'Lana, the counsellor).

Add to this some ignorance about the established facts of Star Trek, such as calling Picard's heart human (not artificial) and wrongly quoting a sequence of events from First Contact that appeared to be very important to the character internally describing them, this made for a book whose writing and continuity were poor. The only saving grace is a reasonably compelling story; although for it to be told, past Star Trek novels, films and television, and what they have told us, had to be battered.

Great Book, but the ending could have used a little more work
Ok, i ordered this from a third party, as i was unwilling to wait for it to become available on Amazon. And let me say i was not dissapointed, i loved Picard and Crushhers characterisation and their romance - finally happening - Worf was great and his arc in this book is wonderful, as it shows consiquences from DS9's "Change of Heart" it also gives us intelligent soultions to the Borg - just read an see.

And Janeway, i think Dillard got her arrogant attitude right on, just because she deallt a crippling blow to the Borg doesen't mean they are still not a threat, as we have seen in the show, the Borg are more dangerous in small groups then as a collective see "Decent" and all the Voyager episodes that deal with the Borg to know what i mean.

Now for the bad bits - though admittedly small - they still exist. The queens characterisation seemed off to me, and no where near how Susanah Thompson and Alice Krieg played her respectively. Also the book started out great and the pace kept you wanting to read, but when it came to the last few chapters, it seemed like the author had run out of stream and struggled to get it finished.

Also there were oportunities missed, liked bringing in Axum or any of the former drones from "Unimatrix Zero" who now retain their individuality. But besides thes minor flaws, it a good book, and i highly recomend it to any Trek fan, plus the snippet from "Before Dishonour" is ominous.

Be wary readers, be wary
Dillards atempts here are rather low at creating a sequel to death in Winter, released a few years back, dealing with the romulan reaction to the events of Nemesis, also seen in the first Tital novel. Dillards has gone off to the deep end writing her own fantasy story in the Star Trek world. He relies to much on what has gone before too much to establish what is going on with he characters. Also too many love stories here. Ok Beverly and Picard, which is kind of obvious. A Klingon and Vulcan and then a Helmsman after a lost crew man to the Borg, thats going too far. Nice use of the Admiral Janeway at Starfleet but again she relies too much on the Past events. The charcters don't seem right, In their mannerisms and how Beverly just simlpy follows orders of her Lover without putting up a fight, has she mellowed in the last 20 years on the enterprise? She tried to bring in too many characters at once in my opinion and couldn't work them well. Try to pu some more danger in their, I'd loved to have read more pages, a battle with the fleet, butwait we've had that before in films and TV. She needs to go back to the source material and make a few more notes. Always refer back to he episodes if you get stuck Mr Dillard. Although I liked his angle on the Borg fighting for survival, tieing up loose end of their origins which have gone unaswered for some ten years now.