Ian McLean

Andorian fans should love this!, May 25 2004

I haven't finished Una McCormack's "Cardassia: The Lotus Flower" yet, but as a diehard Andorian fan, I turned to Heather Jarman's "Andor: Paradigm" first...

I'm floating on air. Overall I'm am thrilled and fulfilled by "Paradigm", not only an exciting continuation of "Deep Space Nine" after its so-called "eighth season" (see "Mission: Gamma", "Unity", etc) but this is an Andorian-rich Star Trek story - at last. "Paradigm" drew me in and kept me there. I had a ball; always trying to second guess the action and motivations and being thwarted by Jarman's clever plotting all the way.

In "Paradigm",… Read more

An interesting and different Star Trek collection, Oct 10 2003

Three fun Star Trek stories in one meaty trade paperback!

"N-Vector" is by KW Jeter, not my favourite Trek novelist, but this comic story is most enjoyable. It was our first hint at a "Deep Space Nine" without Captain Sisko - and the new character of Commander Jast, a female Bolian introduced here, is carried over into the DS9 Relaunch novel, "Avatar". The artwork of this comic story is quite bizarre, but it does grow on you.

Peter David's crew of the USS Excalibur, commanded by the alien Captain Mackenzie Calhoun, has been extremely popular in the original Pocket Books saga, "New Frontier". So "Double Time", now out of print in its… Read more

Fun for fans of Star Trek's aliens... and for RPGers, Jun 29 2003

Decipher's latest RPG guide, "Aliens", is another attractive volume in the familiar style, well worth picking up even if you never play the roleplaying game itself. There are 58 alien races here, lots of non-canonical elaboration about Star Trek aliens' planet names and (rather overly stereotypical) physical and emotional traits from all live-action incarnations of Star Trek. Most entries come with at least one colour photo.

As with Last Unicorn Games (LUG), the previous RPG licensee's efforts, "ST: The Motion Picture " is represented by Betelgeuseans and Zaranites, but this time there are no photos for these guys. Ilia represents the Deltans.

Some other ST races are conspicuous by… Read more