Not great...
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When I first heard about this book I was quite excited at the prospect of the return of the Borg despite their over exposure during Star Trek: Voyager's run and that terrible Enterprise episode.
And therein lies one of the major problems with this book. Despite the writer's efforts to introduce new elements to the Borg mythology the whole piece feels very stale and the quick discard of some of the earlier sub plots is somewhat confusing as I thought they would have some interesting bearing on the story.
J.M. Dillard does her best to keep it interesting and the action flowing and tense but in the end it just feels like a remake of "The Best of Both Worlds" with some of "Star Trek: First Contact" thrown in and it just doesn't feel as exciting as it should do.
Its a shame because the first three or four chapters where very promising.
There are many many other Star Trek novels I would heartily recommend long before this one.
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Almost entirely disappointing
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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.
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The Borg again ruined!!!
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Ok I bought this from the local bookshop and after reading the back synopsis I was really looking forward to reading the book.
First of all the story deals with a rouge Borg cube that somehow more bigger than anything seen before and somehow are making a new Queen.
The story lacks heart and any real danger, you always kinda feel throughout the book that everything is safe and no-one you like will die.
The new characters are plain cardboard cut-outs and you end up rooting for the Borg to put them out of their bad dialouge scene's.
The good points of the book are Worf's arc and tying nicely up with DS9 episode.
The new Vulcan character is also a good new main character but you have to get over the standard star trek Vulcan character syndrome that seems to have popped-up more recently.
Also Admiral Janeway is almost perfectly written, and the scene she was in were my favourite parts, she is cast as a by the book Admiral and was refreshing to see her bang heads with Picard rather than the sickly exchange from Nemisis.
Overall only by this book if you are an extreme trekkie and don't mind the Borg yet again being reduced to a big baddie that has had it's claws clipped.
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Resistance is Futile - Thank Goodness
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One of the better of the recent ST books, as it reads more like a plot for an onscreen adventure. And the Borg are back as pure baddies, which makes a welcome change from all the soppy Voyager nonsense where drones are becoming individuals and communing in cyberspace - for heaven's sake, the Borg are supposed to have been around for thousands of years and they haven't got over the issue of individuality yet? My only criticisms would be Crusher who, in this book, seems more than happy to come up with a method of neutralising the queen, and hence all the drones. This conflicts with the Beverley who argued so vociferously with Picard about introducing a virus into their programming on TV. Same effect, but this time she seems OK with it. Plus the method she finds to do it seems a bit odd squared against the hi-tech nature of the Borg. Other than that though, an enjoyable read.
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Great Book, but the ending could have used a little more work
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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.
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