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4.0 out of 5 stars
An excellent novelization., Feb 1 2001
If you are familiar with the movie that this book was based on, I will say that this is one of the most faithful novelizations of a movie that I've ever seen; almost every scene from the movie is included, and most of the dialogue is faithfully kept as well. Ms. McIntyre satisfies her creative urge by filling in gaps in the storyline, adding internal dialogue and insight into the characters' thoughts as well as transitional scenes that further explain and clarify the storyline.If you are not familiar with the movie, there are a few quibbles you might have with the story, but for my money, the quibbles are all things that originated in the movie, and that Ms. McIntyre is not responsible for: the running gag of Kirk attempting to "fit in" to 20th century society by cursing, which he does clumsily, and Spock's even more clumsy attempts to follow Kirk's lead. I'm not certain whether this was supposed to be purely a humorous bit, or whether it was supposed to be a comment on how silly vulgarity makes one look, and how foolish it is to try to fit in in that way. If it was intended for humor value, its humor wore thin very quickly, and if it was intended for the latter purpose, I'm not sure that it was effective. But in any case, that, as I say, is not Ms. McIntyre's fault; it was part of the movie that she was working from. Similarly, any part of the plot that referred back to the previous movie, and Spock's tenuous grip on his memories as a result of being recently "reborn", do not sit well with me (see my review of "The Search For Spock" for my objections to that movie/book) but again, this is not the author's fault. I also do not believe that a bit of ambient radiation causes malfunctions in phasers, as happens in one scene, but the same disclaimer of responsibility applies. On its own merits, and outside of the consideration of how well it remains faithful either to the movie it was based on, or the Star Trek universe in general, or the previously established characters, this book is still quite good, and better able to stand on its own as a Science Fiction Action-Adventure novel than most Star Trek books, and it also does a better job of faithfully portraying the known characters than many. And as I said, it does a marvellous job of faithfully depicting the story from the movie while building on it plausibly and believably. All in all, by almost any measure I care to use, it is a very good book.
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