Customer Reviews

Death of a Neutron Star

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Although not the best ST:VOY book I've read (check out "The Nanotech War" for a great read), the plotline was interesting and suspenseful.

The entire book leads up to a final encounter, where Janeway and her team uses innovative and surprising methods to save their ship, their new allies, and perhaps the rest of the galaxy.

These types of situations aren't new to any Federation Crew, but Kotani and Smith provide a unique and great conclusion.

I couldn't put this book down -- lots of suspense, possible doom if Voyager couldn't use science to solve the problem of a warlike race using the explosion of a neutron star to destroy its enemies. This book was fun from a scientific standpoint, but also, all the familiar folks were there, and their relationships rang true for me (i.e. Janeway and Seven, Janeway and Torres, Janeway and Paris, etc.) I have read several Star Trek books, and this was one of my favorites!

While not being one of the best "Voyager" books, this is defintely not among the worst of them. In fact, it was pretty refreshing in that it wasn't the normal "Voyager" book which is typically based on the old "We need food from this planet and the bad guy's won't let us get to it." That said, I rather enjoyed the book, despite what some of the other reviewer's stated about the author focusing too much on Janeway's enjoyment of coffee and the ever present technobabble. Star Trek in and of itself is based a lot in technobabble, no big deal.
In my opinion, this was an extremely well done first foray into the Trek world by Eric Kotani. Hopefully we'll see some more trek stories from him in the future. Overall a well done book and I would recommend it to anybody who reads trek. Thank you to author for a good read.

Most of the Voyager books that I've read have been quite good--especially the ones by Christie Golden. She can really write. However, Death of a Neutron Star was anything but exciting. Eric Kotani's writing style was adolescent. Despite what others may say, I felt like I was reading a story that I might have written in sixth grade! The characters were not developed, though they blandly followed their early series-established outlines. The plot was dull, and every single event could be easily predicted. If you want to read a good STV book, read one by Ms. Golden, but for god's sake, don't spend a penny on this peice of junk!

This is by far the best Voyager book. My favorite Star Trek book is Double Helix #2 Vectors, Death of a Neutron Star came close to beating it. I did get a little annoyed with Janeway thinking and talking about coffee so much, but I got used to it. If you want a good Voyager book then read Death of a Neutron Star.

This book offeres interesting astronomical scientific information.

And why is that interesting?

Bacuse it was the cornerstone of the whole plot.

Like you might have guessed, this didn't work too well. It might have worked a lot better, but also a lot worse.

Good thing that I like seeing 'guest stars' in prominent roles since this book does that, and does it farely well, even if certain stereotypes can be detected in the case of the quest characters.

The problem is the plot, wich is uniquely unbelievable and slowly progressing, thus making the reader bored.

When you add absolutely no character exploration of the 'regulars', (although that was compensated by the original characters), the outcome isn't the best possible.

I liked the science, but the story left me dissapointed.

I have to tell you, I was really disappointed with this book. I had many of the same reactions as another reviewer, when I saw that the only thing that Janeway thinks about is coffee. I mean, come ON! She likes it, and people make fun of her for it, but this was a little extreme. she comes off as having a two track mind: coffee and must.save.ship. good lord!

and then there are those quavok people or whatever their race was called. all their names start with Q! i mean, not only is it difficult to follow when everyone's name starts with the same letter, but it's kinda stupid. i mean, how old are we???? we're not toddlers! this book could have been written a bit more maturely.

and all the characters were 2 dimensional. it was ridiculous.

and then chakotay! eric kotani gave him a completely different personality! i mean, i understand that lately in the shows he's kind of had NO personality (barring the ep "Shattered"), but this was a little much. the only thing chakotay does in this book is smile! SMILE! every action he does is followed by the word "smiling." or vice versa. and then he was CONSTANTLY making these little jokes. i understand that he can do that sometimes, but this is usually tom's forte and chakotay really comes off in the show as a much more serious guy.

ok. now about the plot. or shall i say, the joke of a plot. the first 60 pages or so were COMPLETELY boring, and i found myself desperately wanting to put the book down. unfortunately, i was babysitting, and i had nothing else to do but read. but this book was putting me to sleep!

the beginning is all technobabble, and stupid annoying technobabble at that. like, there were pages and pages of conversation about "inverse proportion of the star's gravitional field" or something like that. there was NO PLOT!

then the book picked up somewhere around the middle, but it was so predictable. from the start, i could figure out all the twists (which i won't say for those who haven't read it). and just for the record, janeway is NOT dumb. she would have picked up on those in a second too. i cant believe this kotani guy thought he could put that past her!

the book was boring, dumb, and stereotyped. the bad guys are ugly, have bad teeth, and smell rotten. what a surprise. it's like the original series (which i hate) all over again.

to sum up, i expected a lot more from a voyager book. i guess i shouldn't have. but this was seriously the worst i ever read. it's the kind of book i only read b/c it had voyager on the cover. dont waste your money. i dont recommend this to anyone. read "echoes" instead. now THAT was a good book.

I feel that this book is way too technical. I mean, I know that I'm still a kid but usually I can follow a story line without having to stop and try to figure out what they're talking about. I don't suggest buying this book.

I look forward to seeing more titles by Mr. Kotani. He wrote an excellent page-turner in Death of a Neutron Star. Despite some of the less-than-positive reviews by some, I believe this to be one of the better entries in the Voyager series. An plot-driven book to be sure, with very little focus on anyone except Janeway or the guest alien, Tyra, but nonetheless, it was great! And Janeway doesn't even drink any coffee in the second half of the book! Get over it, people!

Despite what the previous reviewers said, I have enjoyed the plot-driven character of the book. It has at least as much to recommend itself as the character exploration style. Both are present in the StarTrek TV series. The book might be predictable, but fun regardless.