Month: May 2019

#085: Q-in-Law (TNG #18)

This week, it’s much ado about nothing aboard the Enterprise when our regularly scheduled Star Trek: The Next Generation gets preempted by an episode of My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding. But when Q arrives to observe the phenomenon of human love, he attracts the attention of Lwaxana Troi, and despite the better judgment of literally everyone else, she begins to fall for him. Soon enough, frustration gives way to chaos as a tiff between the young betrothed couple escalates into an all-out blood feud. Will we ever get to see what Guinan can do to Q? Which Star Trek novel has the strongest “dialogue you can hear in your head” factor? Exactly who was clamoring for a “Wesley Crusher gets a sex slave” subplot? All this and more in Q-in-Law, or, The Taming of the Q.

#084: Legacy (TOS #56)

This week, Kirk and a motley assortment of lower-deckers get swallowed by an Alaskan bull worm and Spock comes down with an overactive thyroid. Before Scotty can mount a proper search-and-rescue, however, the Enterprise gets reassigned to a pirate takeover at the Beta Cabrini mining colony. Spock refuses to use sick time in order to keep crew morale high, but when the pirate leader turns out to be an old adversary, he thinks the answers may lie somewhere in his LinkedIn profile. Does Scotty know how close he came to getting court-martialed? What does it mean when Chris Pike starts seeing glitches in the matrix? How much of this book actually has any bearing on anything? All this and more in Legacy, the book that reminds you why Kirk wears the captain’s stripes.

#083: Boogeymen (TNG #17)

This week, Wesley takes inspiration from his childhood nightmares to conjure opponents for command scenario practice. But when a scientist friend of Picard’s is desperate to go off the grid, his plan coincides with Wesley’s holodeck creations in the worst way. How often do they update the replicator drink list? Isn’t the Kobayashi Maru supposed to be a secret? And who among the crew needs to brush up on their Microsoft Word shortcuts? All this and more in Boogeymen, the book that gives new meaning to “brain power”.

#082: Renegade (TOS #55)

This week, some aliens want to see the manager, and unfortunately for Kirk, he’s the manager. But when Spock and McCoy go missing the second they beam down for negotiations, he has to figure out what’s causing his shields and sensors to go wee-wonky if he wants them back. Who wants revenge on Kirk this time? Do the Klingons know what they want? And how screwed would Starfleet officers be without tricorders? All this and more in Renegade, the book where nobody is who they seem.

#081: Vendetta (TNG event novel)

This week, an old gun destroyed by Kirk’s Enterprise turns out to have been meant for the Borg. But a new model is rolling off the lot, and its pilot will let Starfleet have it when they can pry it from her cold, dead hands. Meanwhile, a rescue team reclaims a lady Borg, and for once, Geordi’s interest in a woman comes across as sympathetic rather than creepy. How is Guinan involved? What’s Pulaski up to these days? What does an assimilated Ferengi look (and sound) like? All this and more in Vendetta, the event novel that dares the reader to wonder: maybe some of the species the Borg annihilate deserve it?

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