Jean LorrahRecensioni

They weren't super present in this one, but I really like Jean Lorrah’s Enterprise crew; she makes Kirk the sensitive diplomat I want, Spock the stubborn alien I love, and Bones the dry, capable heart of the Enterprise I need.

On top of which, she gives us happily married, snarky Amanda (all I ever want out of Trek novs is snarky Amanda), moral lynchpin T’Pina, and modern, nuanced villains against the backdrop of an interesting medical mystery.

Loved this particular episode and it’s very Trek-y core message.

The bit at Spock's family home where Sarek is playing the Vulcan equivalent of a lute (a song he played for Amanda on their wedding day, the SAP) while Kirk nods off on the couch and Bones sits with a drink to listen....That's my shit? That's my e n t i r e domestic bridge crew shit. Lorrah knows what the fans want.

I guess they don't have Ancestry.com in the future, or a way to replicate blood, or this book would have been a lot shorter.

Bizarre

Half of this is what I call bizarre fiction. I skipped over that stuff; i just can't get engaged with it. The other half were reasonably decent stories, though still on the strange side & somewhat loose with the plots. For a cheap read, it's just OK

I was not a huge fan of the Tasha Yar character on TNG. She seemed always a little bit over the top in some of her reactions on the bridge. I don't know, it's probably just me. I was only 8 years old when TNG first aired. I read this book to see if maybe I could see Yar in a new light, but nope, she's pretty much the same as she was on the show. If not more so. The story just seemed very by the numbers, if that makes sense. And Dares "ending" was for me to contrived and unbelievable. I missed the other members of the crew and and Data was off character to me. (I know this was an early story and the characters weren't fleshed out.)

Jean Lorrah is two for three: I didn't love "The IDIC Epidemic," but I really liked "The Vulcan Academy Murders," and she's back on form again here. The idea of dashing space pirates, etc. is a rather TOS vision of Star Trek, but I don't mind it here because it's combined with some geopolitical ideas, and underpinned with a really loving examination of Data and Tasha Yar's relationship. (Of course it doesn't cohere with the backstory Tasha is given later, but whatever.) Is it perfect? No, because how could it be when all of Tasha's emotional experience has to get jammed in with an adventure story? I would want to read a whole novel just about her trauma and recovery. But in my opinion it makes gestures in the right direction.

Not great, Bob... there were certain things I liked about this book, but it combined a weird licentiousness about "forced reproduction" with an implied critique of racial mixing. I'm not saying I don't think the themes in it could be dealt with well; they could, and I don't think every culture meshes easily with every other!! But it was not handled well here.

"Degenerative xenosis" comes from here—a very nonsensical ailment, but a good one for storytelling. And there's a lot here about Sarek and Amanda that I think is well-established in headcanons! But the mystery wasn't great.

A pretty good tale about Data getting his wish and becoming human. Maybe one of my favorite Trek novels because of how character driven it is, despite being chock full of plot. Data is just extremely compelling!

More or less neutral on some elements of the writing style, but the story is good fun. Interesting takes on some basic romance and mystery tropes.

I've read many things in my life, but I did not expect a pulp shared-universe Star Trek story to frequently pop into my mind as something outstandingly original, yet here we are: The IDIC Epidemic. One part '70s-style disease apocalypse, one part political thriller, one part mystery, with a view into the quiet "background" of Federation life.

This book is flatly good. If someone is hesitant about reading Star Trek books, this is the one I point to- the plot shows fascinating depth. On a UN-style research planet, a highly fatal disease is racing through the colony, ignoring fundamental biological differences like copper, silicon, or iron based blood. If weaponized, this virus would be an unstoppable weapon.

Its name derives from one of the sacral Vulcan maxims: Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combination. Will the combination of minds and skills prove equal to this fatal disease that ignores diversity?

Not only is the core story good, but the little bits of background tossed in add depth to the entire universe. At this research institute, even the Klingons have sent what they use instead of scientists- an engineer. Turns out, Klingon engineers are outstanding, view problems as opponents to be overcome, and value having a wide array of practical hard skills.

After a crewmember is crippled in a battle with the Klingons Captain James Kirk takes the Enterprise to Vulcan, where an experimental treatment under development at the Vulcan Academy of Science promises to return him to health. Also undergoing the treatment is Spock's mother Amanda, who is suffering from a degenerative nerve disease that threatens to end her life. As Kirk, Spock, and Leonard McCoy settle in for an extended stay on Spock's homeworld, an catastrophic failure kills one of the subjects undergoing the treatment. Then a second patient dies, raising an unthinkable question — could there be a murderer on Vulcan?

Jean Lorrah's novel, her first of several contributions to the Star Trek universe, is unusual in several respects. One is its setting, as it is the first to be set on Vulcan. This gives Lorrah an opportunity to offer readers an extended look at life on the legendary planet, and it is to her credit that she does not overdo it by making the novel about the arcana of one of the most popular cultures of the Star Trek universe. Given the location, it might be expected that Spock would take center stage in the novel, yet Lorrah surprises once again by making his father Sarek the primary Vulcan in the storyline. This further adds to the novel's appeal, as it gives readers an extended look at a beloved character who had yet to receive the extended focus he would in subsequent novels, movies, and TV episodes.

Finally there is the plot of Lorrah's novel, which is a rare bird indeed among Star Trek novels: a murder mystery. Here she develops her setting by introducing several new characters (perfectly understandable, as nobody is going to buy a murderer being one of the familiar faces of the bridge crew) and lets the plot unfold while developing them. This she does over the course of the first half of the book, letting suspects accumulate as the murders take place and the motivations are established. Yet all of this is ruined at the halfway point of the novel, when she tips her hand as to the identify of the murderer, after which the rest of the book lapses into a mundane pattern of chasing red herrings and identifying the guilty party at the very end. It's a disappointing ending for a novel that throughout much of its first half offered an engaging tale of mystery in an unlikely place.

The world of the Simes and Gens is teetering on the brink. Zeth Farris reaches adulthood just when things start to fall apart. When he finally understands the audacity of the social engineering experiment that his parents have set in motion, Zeth must build bridges with potential allies to hold the center together. But war comes anyway, and Zeth and his alliance must prevail. The price of failure?--the destruction of his family, his culture, even his world! Sime Gen, Book Five.

You might argue that this book is pointless: its central premise is that Data becomes a human being for real, which of course he never did on the show, nor even alluded to, so the whole thing has to be wiped from both history and memory. But Jean Lorrah is such a good author as to overcome this. I said in my review of Survivors that she excelled at capturing Data and Yar; extend that here to the whole Enterprise-D crew. Picard's speeches sound like ones Patrick Stewart would give on the show, Riker doesn't do much but Lorrah captures his openness to all experiences, and even Wesley comes across as smart, naïve, and eager in a way that's not annoying.

It's not just dialogue, either; when Data is transformed into a human, the two people who recognize him without any prodding are Doctor Pulaski and Geordi La Forge, which feels exactly right to me. Best of all is how she captures ways of thinking. When we're inside Data's head as an android, it rings true as the interiority of the character we see the exteriority of on screen. Even better is what she pulls off in the second half of the book: if Data was a human being, this is how he would think, trying to be an android but with only human mental capacities. I'd have loved to have seen Brent Spiner do any of this on screen, but the book gets by just fine without it because it gives us Data's actual thoughts in a way the television never could. The whole book might not have "happened," but if it Data were to become human, this is how it would be.

The only thing not to like is the kind of cursory way it wraps up: Data's motivations for undoing his humanity come out of nowhere, and after the middle of the book drives home that Data has value as a person, not just from his android powers, it's a little disappointing that the end kind of revolves around his android powers saving the day. Though I guess Lorrah undercuts that with the cute last line (which fortuitously foreshadows Data getting Spot in "Data's Day" on screen).

Anyway, this is an enjoyable book, one of the best Next Generation novels. Rereading Lorrah's two Next Generation novels has made me regret that she never contributed to Star Trek again after this.

You know, I've never seen "Legacy," the episode of The Next Generation where Tasha Yar's sister turns up, and we learn about the long-dead Tasha's backstory in more detail. Yet I have read Survivors, a TNG novel written during the first season (published during the second) that tells us about Tasha's childhood and early Starfleet career in great detail. In a bit of "head-canon," I suspect that even if I had seen "Legacy," I would still prefer this as the "true" backstory of Tasha Yar. Lorrah depicts the ideal Yar, the one TNG never actually gave us: a damaged woman from a damaged world, and thus someone who believes in the idealism of the Federation even more than those raised within it. The characterization of Tasha and also Data are really the book's strong points: I think Lorrah gets Data better than the show writers did at this point. (I really liked the touch that his rattling off of synonyms was a purposeful affectation.) You can see why Pocket commissioned Lorrah to write a Data-focused "giant novel" in Metamorphosis, because he just jumps off the page here, a perfect mixture of superintelligence and emotional inexperience. There's a lot else I could praise or say about this book, but suffice it to say that it's the best kind of tie-in fiction-- a story we couldn't have gotten on screen, but fitting in perfectly with the ones we did.

Interesting analyses of different philosophies/ points of view.?á Not just ideas about diversity but also about sacrifice, the value of education, science vs. soldiery, women's rights, tradition vs. innovation, etc.?á I really liked Korsal, the Klingon engineer... as I was meant to.?á I did NOT feel I was missing *anything* by not having read The Vulcan Academy Murders first, but now I do want to read that book by Lorrah.

Describes Tasha Yar's childhood on a post-apocalyptic planet! Much darker and grittier than most Next Gen novels.

For the Sime-Gen completists among us; a series of related happy (modulo the whole Zelerod’s Doom-impending background) stories about a Sime musician and a Gen musician who literally make beautiful music together and also are matchmates.

I've always loved the way Lorrah portrayed Sarek and Amanda. This is her tale of how they met and became married (and all the stuff that goes with a Vulcan marriage - which means there's a lot of sex.). I got a little tired of the sex but the development of the relationship was interesting.

Epilogue was an early-ish Star Trek long-form fan fic from the late seventies published across two special issues of the zine Sol Plus. And when I stumbled across it in a used book shop a few weeks ago, I obviously couldn't leave it there. The writing and story are pretty good--I found the frame story a bit weak, but the stories the frame was used to tell were compelling and interesting continuations of the lives of Trek characters, particularly Spock and his mother, Amanda. Of particular note was the appearance of a Vulcan transferring his essence into another being just before the moment of death, since this idea also appears in Trek canon, but not until well after this fic was published, as far as I can figure. The artwork is also really neat. A very, very cool piece of Trek fandom history.½

In the far future a mutation develops and humankind is split into Simes and Gens. Simes "change over" at adolescence into vampire-like creatures that must suction off energy from Gens every month. Ordinarily, this causes the death of the Gen. But then "Channels" are discovered who could safely take energy from Gens and give that energy to Simes. Zeth is the son of the first such channel, Rimon, and a Gen mother, and born into a community struggling to find a new way for both kinds of humanity to live together without killing each other. Both Lichtenberg and Lorrah who write books in this series and wrote this book together are both good storytellers and create characters to care about. And since each book was written to be read independently, this one can stand alone.

In the far future a mutation develops and humankind is split into Simes and Gens. Simes "change over" at adolescence into vampire-like creatures that must suction off energy from Gens every month. Ordinarily, this causes the death of the Gen. But then "Channels" are discovered who could safely take energy from Gens and give that energy to Simes. But there are still "Sime" territories where Gens are kept like cattle, and "Gen" territories where a developing Sime would be shot on sight. Zelerod is a Sime who has predicted that the demographics mean that eventually if Simes continue their lifestyle there won't be enough Gens to keep them alive and civilization on both sides will collapse. Channels Klyd Farris from House of Zeor and Risa Tigue of Ambrov Keon team up to avert that collapse. Not my favorite of the Sime/Gen books--that would probably be Ambrov Keon--but definitely a good read in a series that's a favorite of mine. Both Lichtenberg and Lorrah who write books in this series and wrote this book together are both good storytellers and create characters to care about. And since each book was written to be read independently, this one can stand alone.

Although I've long been a fan of the Star Trek tv series and movies, "The Vulcan Academy Murders" was my first venture into reading Star Trek books. I found Kirk, McCoy, Spock, Sarek, and Amanda pretty much consistant with what I know of them. I had no trouble imagining them in their roles in the book and found the new characters developed enough to mesh smoothly. I enjoy light mystery novels and this worked well enough to keep both the ST:TOS fan and mystery fan in me engaged.

The book takes place almost entirely on Vulcan, in and around the city of ShiKahr and the nearby Vulcan Academy of Sciences. The settings were well dawn, and while you might not find any sweeping space battles, there is plenty of intrique and action, much like one of the ground-based tv episodes, except with the added intricacies a book allows for.

This is an early stand-alone ST:TOS novel. A very fun read!

A much better story for Tasha Yar than what they gave on the show.

Nostalgia led me back to this recent Sime/Gen book, though the romance set just after Unity made me feel about equally squicked and nostalgic. Squick: Jonmair, a newly established Gen, thinks she’s been bought as a Choice Kill for Baird, but that first he’s going to fuck her (note that puberty and Establishment roughly coincide), and she already feels tender towards him so she only hopes that the sex is good. Nostalgic: okay, I admit it, I do like the aspirational living in harmony stuff. Layering stereotypes across a new set of axes, with occasional recognition from some characters that they’re stereotypes, produced a whiplash effect for me. Baird was the traditional asshole hero who doesn’t want to be controlled by the heroine’s mysterious power over him and whose journey consisted of learning to accept it—but in this case he has a biological explanation for that power that isn’t her sex. At the same time, I read the book, perhaps against authorial intent, as Baird making excuses for himself that were enabled by his culture; there was plenty of ‘oh, well you can’t expect rational behavior from someone who’s post/junct/in turnover/in Need.’ (One occasionally wonders how Simes get anything done.) Anyway, it’s a variation on love taming the savage beast, with the background of huge—okay, I can’t help it—Tectonic changes in the underlying society. Best if you like power differentials and have good Sime/Gen memories.