- Title:
- Revelation and Dust (Star Trek: The Fall)
- By:
- David R. George III
- Pages:
- 392
- Rating:
- 3
Welcome to the new Deep Space 9After the destruction of the original space station by a rogue faction of the Typhon Pact, Miles O’Brien and Nog have led the Starfleet Corps of Engineers in designing and constructing a larger, more advanced starbase in the Bajoran system. Now, as familiar faces such as Benjamin Sisko, Kasidy Yates, Ezri Dax, Odo, and Quark arrive at the new station, Captain Ro Laren will host various heads of state to an impressive dedication ceremony. The dignitaries include not only the leaders of allies—such as Klingon Chancellor Martok, Ferengi Grand Nagus Rom, the Cardassian castellan, and the Bajoran first minister—but also those of rival powers, such as the Romulan praetor and the Gorn imperator. But as Ro’s crew prepares to open DS9 to the entire Bajor Sector and beyond, disaster looms. A faction has already set in action a shocking plan that, if successful, will shake the Alpha and Beta Quadrants to the core.And what of Kira Nerys, lost aboard a runabout when the Bajoran wormhole collapsed? In the two years that have passed during construction of the new Deep Space 9, there have been no indications that the Celestial Temple, the Prophets, or Kira have survived. But since Ben Sisko once learned that the wormhole aliens exist nonlinearly in time, what does that mean with respect to their fate, or that of the wormhole…or of Kira herself?
If you’d asked me a decade ago whether I was a Star Trek fan I would have looked at you like you were batty. I enjoyed greatly the climaxes of Voyager and DS9 as they were aired; the concept of watching a show week-by-week, without recourse to timeshifts, pausing or online catch-up has eroded since.
and yet, things move on, don’t they? I picked up this book because David Mack’s Disavowed came out recently and, having enjoyed Section 31 a great deal both on screen and on the page I was keen to carry on with it. Reading that the events of the book follow “directly after The Fall”, made me pause for thought.
Now I am familiar, at least in very, very broad strokes, with the post-television era. I’m up-to-date with Peter David’s New Frontier series, I read the other Section 31 novel set aboard the post-dominion DS9 and I have dabbled, though not entirely happily, in the universe of the returned Voyager. But as to keeping up with everything else? The Typhon pact, etc? That just seemed hugely daunting.
So I decided to start with the opening of the Fall. I did feel of course that I’d missed a huge, gigantic slice of the happeningssince the Dominion were defeated, but were I to go chronological there’d be another Section 31 book out before I read this one! This way I think I can at least catch up somewhat, have some context.
It felt, in many ways, like a new series. Our familiar characters were overpowered by new blood, which is I think one of the reasons I’m not overwhelmingly attracted to these series (I don’t have a screen presence for the new people), and they were either surrounded by body guards and security because they’re so important or otherwise doing things that, in the era I’m familiar with, seem highly implausible (Ro? In charge of a huge starbase?)
There’s an almost overblown use of bathrooms (“refreshers”), and this opener was far heavier on description and milieu than dialogue and action than previous novels, either televised or set in that space. Whether this is a trend remains to be seen, of course, but I can’t quite decide if I like it.
The writing was very good, but for me it seemed to lack a little of the Trek magic. I put this down in the main to my unfamiliarity with what has gone before, and hope that by the time I’m done with the saga I’ll be back in the zone.