24th May 2020

Eleven years after the 2009 Star Trek film, the first spin-off novel aimed at an adult audience has finally appeared (it was written back then, but then shelved by the publisher for a decade).

I’ll admit, it took me a little while to get into. I’m not usually a big Original Series reader, but thought that I’d have to give this a go given I’ve seen the three contemporary movies. For the most part, it feels like a good fit for the parallel universe characters we saw in their first film outing, although Scotty felt off, and there were some aspects of the inside of Kirk’s head that I wasn’t convinced gelled with the version of him in my head.

I think I struggled on two other related counts. Alan Dean Foster is a noted writer of numerous genres, including Science Fiction - and this felt a little bit too Science Fictiony for me. Almost a bit too old-Trek-novel too, and not quite fitting with the tone I feel I get from most modern Trek novels. He’s also a fan of describing aliens - and this also doesn’t connect with my imagination in the right way - I’m much more connected I feel to thought and emotion than physical, visual description, and I think Foster perhaps is wired the other way.

The plot is fairly solid, although perhaps a bit too simple in places. Perhaps this is by design, hoping to attract a new audience as did the 2009 film - but to me it felt like some events were too obvious coming, and some twists thus fell flat.

I’m interested to see what the second book from the same situation comes out like later in the year - that one is by David Mack, whose Trek novels on the whole I have personally found more targeted at my tastes.

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22nd May 2013

Alan Dean Foster's invitation to pen the novelization of JJ Abrams' second Star Trek film came as something of a surprise to me, as I was very disappointed with his version of the previous film. This book lives up to my recollections of its predecessor.

The novel follows the plot of the film almost exactly (a film which I enjoyed almost as much as the last one), and is a faithful description of what happens, but it is significantly lacking in detail, particularly in the action scenes. The pacing is poor and the writing doesn't grip anywhere near as well as the source material.

It seems as if the publishers have given Foster too much leeway - they've thrown the usual Star Trek novel styleguide out the window and replaced it with narration that feels patronising in how much it wants to explain. There are parts where it's as if it's writing for a small child. Rather than the usual style of aligning the third party narrative with one character at a time and following events from their perspective, we're given a more god-like overview with occasional glances inside the characters' heads. Altogether this makes for a lightweight presentation that removes a lot of the suspense and the relationship with the characters.

There are places where Foster has added missing detail to the plot that helps explain some of the things that puzzled me about the film, but not even to the extent of the scenes he retained/added in the previous book, and this doesn't make up for the book's faults.

There are other established Star Trek and novelization writers that could have added more to what feels like a rushed clone of the script. The book only managed to hold my attention by reminding me of what I saw in the cinema.

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28th May 2009

What a disappointing book to read, especially after the brilliance that is the film upon which it is based. Sadly Foster's novelization isn't up to the task, and presents us with little more than a prose version of the script.

I would have prefered to visit more of the characters' heads and seen their thought patterns, but instead, like the film, we stick with Kirk, seeing things from his narrow perspective and getting very little extra information about what's going on inside.

The only redeeming feature to this were the scenes that were deleted from the film... an excellent scene where Kirk as a child is cleaning his step-father's car, and a useful one where Spock is born, which would have been an excellent place to introduce the traditional Vulcan finger rubbing, which could then replace the most out of place scene later on.

Foster completely ruins all the jokes. It's almost as if he's gone through, found them all, and altered them just a tiny bit so they don't work. The most obvious example is when Kirk and McCoy first meet, and McCoy states that all that he has is his skeleton... instead of the correct 'bones'.

Overall, not good, but hopefully everyone who reads it will have already seen the film, which is fantastic, and not be put off by this poor showing.

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