"You may call me Khan!"
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Star Trek: The Eugenics Wars Volume 1 is the 16th classic Trek hardback and one of the best stories written to date. Greg Cox deserves tremendous praise for the painstaking research that he's done to make one of the biggest events in Trek history blend seamlessly with events from the last 4 decades with stunning accuracy.
The story centres around Kirk's mission to the Sycorax colony, a world inhabited by genetically altered human beings and whether they should be allowed to join the Federation, causing a lift in the ban on genengineering. When Kirk arrives, he finds his old nemesis, Koloth has also been making overtures to the colony about joining the Empire.
However, this is merely the small B story to the primary one, Kirk's research into the Eugenics Wars on 1990's Earth.
Told through the eyes of Gary Seven and his partners Isis and Roberta Lincoln, characters that Cox obviously loves and writes so well for, the novel starts in the 1970's as Seven's investigations into missing scientists leads him to the mysterious Chrysalis Project and the creation of genetically engineered children, one of whom is the infamous Khan Noonian Singh.
When Space Seed was written in the 60's, the idea of global warfare by the 90's didn't seem so farfetched but we all know that it didn't happen. The book brilliantly matches up events of the story with actual historical events and gives subtle and alternate meanings for some of them, much in the same way that the excellent Dark Skies television series did in the 90's.
He writes all the characters with genuine passion and you can see the events playing out in your head as you read as he skilfully describes the scenes.
He also links in several anomalous events of Trek history caused by time travel and ties them together in such a way that makes absolutely perfect sense. With links to Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, Requiem For Methuselah, The Neutral Zone, Little Green Men, 12:01, Tomorrow Is Yesterday, The Changeling and of course Space Seed, Trek fans will find themselves grinning with all the nods to certain characters and missions.
The book has a fast pace which keeps the reader interested, indeed I did not want to put the thing down once I'd started.
I'd highly recommend this to any Star Trek fan, especially those of Classic Trek as one of the best examples of Trek fiction and a must have for any collection. Enjoy!
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Bring Back Ricardo Montelban!
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This book seeks to relate the tale of Khan's part in the Eugenics Wars. The main protagonists are Gary Seven and his assistant Roberta Lincoln who discover a secret well funded project in India to develope a superhuman race. They infiltrate the organisation and destroy the project but show mercy on the surviving children and arrange their adoption. Khan is recruited as a teenager by Seven and then has a falling out wherupon he sets of alone to change the world to his liking. Ricardo Montelban played the role in the original Star Trek series and a movie as a strong charismatic leader, but there is no trace of this in the book. The characters are wooden and one dimensional and the narrative is halting and difficult to read. The action scenes are slow and unconvincing and the dialogue just doesn't feel right. There are constant and annoying cross references to Star Trek episodes. This is unecessary and a character such as Khan should stand alone. What a wasted opporunity. Khan could have been given depth and emotion and a place in the real world. Instead he is portrayed as a musclebound arrogant B movie heavy.
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a great combination of sci-fi and thriller styles
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IT ALL STARTS WITH CAPTAIN JAMES T. KIRK LOOKING INTO ORIGINS OF HIS NEMESIS KHAN.KHAN AND HIS GENETICALLY ENHANCED HUMANS ARE CREATED IN SECRET FACILTY IN INDIA.THEN GARY SEVEN AN CHARACTOR APPEARED IN THE ORGINAL STAR TREK GOES & DESTROYS THE FACILTY. THEN HE GET TO KNOW KHAN THEN SEE THEIR PATHS CROSS OVER THE YEARS.THE STORY IS ALSO INTERWOVEN WITH THE REAL LIFE EVENTS OF KILLING OF THE INDIASN PRIME MINISTER INDRIA GHANDI AND BHOPAL TRADGEDY AS WELL AS A FICTIONAL ATTEMPTED ASSINATION ATTEMPT ON MIKAIL GORBACHEV AT ICELAND SUMMIT WITH RONALD REAGAN. GARY SEVEN FINDS TO HIS HORROR THAST KHAN IS A MADMAN TRYING TO GET TOGETHER THE OTHER GENETICALLY ENHANCED BEINGS CREATED IN INDIA TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD. A WELL WRITTEN BOOK COMBINATION OF A THRILLER AND SCI-FI.WELL RESEARCHED AS IT IS INTERWOVEN WITH REAL LIFE EVENTS OF 1970'S & 1980'S. A INTERESTING AND UNIQUE BOOK ABOUT CAPTAIN KIRKS MAIN NEMESIS Khan.
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