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Title: A Hard Rain (Star Trek, the Next Generation) by Dean Wesley Smith, S. P. Somtow, Gene Roddenberry ISBN: 0-7434-1926-X Publisher: Star Trek Pub. Date: 01 March, 2002 Format: Mass Market Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
Average Customer Rating: 2.36 (14 reviews)
Rating: 2
Summary: More like "A Light Drizzle"...
Comment: It was an excellent idea--Picard visits the holodeck for a Dixon Hill mystery, accompanied by Bev Crusher, Data, and Whelan, the ship's historian, but things go terribly wrong and it becomes a race against time or dire consequences will ensue...wait, they already did that one...
Which was part of the problem--the book's plot was too similar in basic outline to the episode "The Big Goodbye"; the spatial anomaly and the countdown until it destroys the Enterprise merely replaces the Jarada and their probable destruction of the ship if Picard doesn't cough up their ritual greeting a.s.a.p. I know there's a saying that there are only six or eight basic plots in Hollywood, anyway, but perhaps Mr. Smith should have chosen one of the others instead. And, as other reviewers have pointed out, spatial anomalies and technobabble are as worn as the soles of a beat-cop's shoes.
That metaphor is another reason this book failed to impress me. The problem with writing a pastiche of those cliche-ridden
"hard-boiled" detective novels is that...one ends up sounding like a cliche-ridden "hard-boiled" detective novel. If that were a good thing, no one would want to write a pastiche of the style in the first place. And I really wasn't blown away by the revelation of the "culprit"...but perhaps I'm just being catty...
In addition, I found it difficult to "place" this story in relation to the TNG timeline. The absence of both Wesley and Worf would seem to put it after the events in the film "Star Trek: Insurrection", but Data is still acting like his pre-emotion-chip self, with no mention made of his either turning the chip off or removing it for the investigation on the holodeck. Picky, I suppose, but it irritated me.
Still, the characters were well-drawn, the villains aptly and imaginatively named, the chapter and section titles amusing--although the various ways of saying "stolen" felt more than a little forced--and many of the events (shorn of their cliches) were attention-grabbers. Thus the two stars instead of just one.
Rating: 3
Summary: Cover art easily the book's best feature
Comment: Having never before read a Star Trek novel, I was a bit reluctant to buy "A Hard Rain". However, I like Dr. Crusher, and I like Picard, and I love seeing them play characters on the Holodeck, so I went through with the purchase. I wasn't expecting Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, but I wasn't exactly prepared for a writing style seemingly aimed at preteen adolescents. Perhaps the most annoying aspect of the book was the author's overuse of similes. I just wanted to get through one page without something being "like a...". Additionally, the relationship between Crusher and Picard was never clearly defined. It appeared that the author wanted to convey a sense of romantic feelings between the two, but he just could not bring himself to do so. I wouldn't call the book a waste of time, but I wouldn't recommend it either.
Rating: 2
Summary: A PC game in disguise?
Comment: I am a fan of Piers Anthony's "Xanth" series, so the horrible cliche's and the many ways of saying "stolen" was amusing to me. "Xanth", by the way, is a world loaded with some very *bad* puns that can have you busting out with laughter on occasion. However, "A Hard Rain" suffers from excessive repetiveness. I got tired of reading the same lines over and over. Then there were the "clues" listed at the end of each chapter. I wondered if I was reading a children's book by mistake at first. Sometimes children's authors write things like that to help the young reader keep track. But then I got the idea that this is written like a PC game. You have the characters, the set-up, everything you need to play the game. Each chapter is a different section in the game that you can't get to until you gather up all the clues and can move onward. Unfortunatly, it didn't translate well into book form. The writing is too stilted and skimpy. Maybe the author should have gone on and made it into a game. It might have been more of a success.
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Title: The Battle of Betazed (Star Trek: The Next Generation) by Susan Kearney, Charlotte Douglas, S. P. Somtow ISBN: 074343434X Publisher: Star Trek Pub. Date: April, 2002 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Immortal Coil (Star Trek, the Next Generation) by Jeffrey Lang ISBN: 0743405927 Publisher: Star Trek Pub. Date: February, 2002 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: The Genesis Wave Book Three by John Vornholt, S. P. Somtow ISBN: 0743463838 Publisher: Star Trek Pub. Date: 01 February, 2003 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: This Gray Spirit: Mission Gamma, Book 2 (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine) by Heather Jarman ISBN: 0743445627 Publisher: Star Trek Pub. Date: September, 2002 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Rising Son (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine) by S. D. Perry ISBN: 0743448383 Publisher: Star Trek Pub. Date: 31 December, 2002 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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