Customer Reviews

Lesser Evil (Star Trek Deep Space Nine: Mission Gamma, Book 4)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

After being hooked by the second and third installments in this series, I was determined to read "Lesser Evil", the concluding installment. Although it is not nearly as densely written as the previous books, it does have its own share of surprises. Commander Elias Vaughn and the crew of USS Defiant stumble upon the wreckage of a Dominion warship and its pursuer, bringing back unexpected memories of a disastrous mission led by Vaughn years before. Colonel Kira Nerys resumes her Starfleet commission, joining forces with Starfleet in search of a cloaked ship and a Trill assassin heading back to his homeworld. Or does he? The search leads to the discovery of a conspiracy first unmasked by Captain Jean-Luc Picard and the crew of the USS Enterprise years before. And Lieutenant Ro Laren must come to grips with the assassination of one of Bajor's most important politicians during the ceremony celebrating Bajor's admission into the United Federation of Planets. Last, but not least, in a surprising conclusion, one of the major characters from "Star Trek Deep Space Nine" returns, bringing with him an exiled Bajoran religious leader.

The first three books in this series were superb, especially Book Two, MISSION GAMMA: THIS GRAY SPIRIT, by writing neophyte Heather Jarman (more! more!). Book Four seemed to have been written on the back of old scratch pads on a commuter train, as if the author couldn't wait to end it. The story moves along, but moves far too fast. There was little character development, and what little there was tended to be sketchily drawn or reflect negatively on characters like Vaughn.

And God forbid, they brought the Borg back in to assimilate what might otherwise have been a good novel. Haven't they learned? The Borg were the most snoring-boring of all Star Trek villains, among whom only Hugh on TNG and those semi-Borgs on VOYAGER remain somewhat interesting. I couldn't stand "Seven of Nine" and never again watched Voyager after Kes departed. The "Borg Queen" in the Star Trek movie FIRST CONTACT was downright embarrassing, the concept unworthy of intelligent life. As for Picard as a temporary Borg, give me TNG's THE INNER LIGHT any old time. The only good thing ever to result from the Borg was actress Alfre Woodard's comment in FIRST CONTACT: "Borg? Sounds Swedish." It cracked up the theater audience, including me.

Unfortunately there's nothing as impressive as that quip in this novel. The author's credentials are not given, and I am hoping he decides not to write any more DS9 novels.

The fourth book of the Mission Gamma series is, in my opinion, the weakest book of the series, and I was left feeling unsatisfied at the end. I also must warn people that this review does contain significant spoilers of the book itself.

The book continues from the previous books int her series, with the Defiant finally beginning to head home in this novel, yet even on their way home they are still passing through uncharted space.

There was also a rather large technical error at the beginning. The author claims that the Defiant and the probes it launched had charted over 1200 cubic light years of space. That figure is ridiculous, no ship the size of the Defiant could possible chart that much space in only 3 months. Even Voyager, which was faster than the Defiant, could only make 438 light years per year.

But to other things. The book launches into the Defiant picking up a strange signal in the Gamma Quadrant, a signal that the ship's commander, Elias Vaughn, has seen before, and he orders the ship to investigate the signal and also hides this form the rest of the crew.

Meanwhile in the Alpha Quadrant, we see two seperate story lines evolve, one centred on Joseph Sisko on Earth, and the other centred on the crew on Deep Space Nine. The first AQ (Alpha Quadrant) storyline shows Joseph Sisko settled into some sort of depression over the loss of both Ben and Jake, and the efforts of his daughter Judith to get him back into action. This plot line is fairly simple, yet the resolution involves an old series favourite, Miles O'Brien, and I found it to be the most enjoyable of the book.

The second AQ plot line is on DS9, and deals with the aftermath of the assassination of Shakaar and the hunt for the killer. At this stage, Colonel Kira leaves the station on a Federation starship following what they think is a cloaked vessel heading for Trill, which creates a third AQ storyline with Kira away from the station.

The Defiant storline in the Gamma Quadrant continues and shows the crew discovering the wreckages of both a Jem'Hadar and a Borg-assimilated ship crashed on a planet. The assimilated ship holds a link to Vaughn's past, which is interesting, and is later explained when Vaughn has a 'tell-all' session with Ezri Dax, revealing his full background and the devestating decision he made regarding Prynn's mother. While Vaughn's story is interesting, it is very simple and straightforward, and in some parts is very weak, although I did find the story of Prynn's namesake to be very touching. Personally, I was expecting something exciting, interesting and a downright throrough explanation of his past. Instead, we got a chapter with a very fast paced story showing the important points of Vaughn's life with regards to Prynn and Ruriko, which was disappointing.

The Defiant plotline quickly continues, and we see an incredible seen where a Borg drone attempts to assimilate a Founder. I found this scene both incredible and bizarre, even more so as it served no real purpose to the development of the story. In the end, Vaughn is forced to make a devestating decision all over again, totally destroying any development in the relationship between himself and Prynn.

The AQ plotlines continue, and the crew on DS9 make a startling discovery about an old enemy from TNG, the parasites from 'Conspiracy', which are in some way related to the Trill species. They also learn that the parasites have taken control over someone on the starship Kira is travelling on, leaving Kira to eventually save the day. Relating the 'Conspiracy' parasites to the Trill was a very nice twist indeed, probably th best in the book, a real credit to the writer(s).

The book finishes with the Defiat nearing the wormhole, Kira heading back to DS9, and Joseph Sisko heading to Bajor to be with Kasidy.

Several plotlines/characters developments didn't reach any meaningful conclusion, they were:

-The Andorian problems involving Shar, a big part of the 1st two novels, were forgetten about.

-The relationship between Quark and Ro was barely mentioned.

-Commander Mathias, station counselor, was nowhere to be seen. A shame really, I liked her character, and there was also supposed to be some mystery surrounding the Bajoran ancestral roots of her husband.

-The issues between Nog and Taran'tar didn't really come to a conclusion.

-Vedek Yevir was virtually non-existent during the plot, which was unfortunate considering the large part he'd played in the last book.

Overall, I found the book had been written in a very simple manner with very quick plot developments and resolutions, some of which seemed totally irrelevant to the story. This resulted in a very short book with large print, and the more I read it the more I got the impression that the whole thing had been a rush job. The book seemed closer to one of those 'junior' Star Trek books than anything else.

The Mission Gamma opening book, 'Twilight', was much slower and far more detailed, and yet the final book in the series is a rush job with very simple, very basic plot twists. All the work done by the previous books to mend the relationship between Vaughn and Tenmei is undone, and at the end the reader is left unsatisfied. I believe the authors may have been trying to set the scene for the next two books, but setting the scene for the next book at the expense of finishing the last book is not only bad writing, it also dishonours the rest of the series.

I was also interested to note that there was no 'about the author' section at the end of the book. Virtually every Star Trek book I have read contains one of these sections, and I enjoy getting some insight into the author and his/her interests and background. This is simply more evidence to a rush job.

If you've followed the Mission Gamma series so far, you may as well buy this book. If you're just a casual fan, forget about it, as this book just isn't worth reading.

I thought that these four books would be a great space to explore the Gamma Quadrant, but the focus is on the characters rather than the quadrant. Fortunately, character development is one of Star Trek's strengths, and it's done well in these books. Trekkers will also appreciate the return of charaters like Akaar ("Leonard James Akaar?") and Weyoun. Also, the book does set up events for "Rising Son" and "Unity," two books to follow. This would have been a five-star book, but the "Mission Gamma" saga felt like it just ended, instead of climaxing.

I did not like this book, it was to short. I think that the writer could have add a lot more to it. I wanted to know more about Ro and how Starfleet sees her after she captures the killer. The part about the borg was boring. I still do not understand how the Borg-Starfleet got to the Gamma Quad.

Finished Lesser Evil this weekend. Good book with a killer ending. I noticed that each book in the Gamma series ended with a cliffhanger, and they escalated each time. This is, of course, the moment we've all been waiting for a year now, ever since Avatar. I think Vaughn was the best that I've seen him in this book, and I like how the events of Twilight played into this book so well. I am still wondering what exactly went down with Vaughn and Captain Harrimann, but that is another story. I wish the book had been longer, and that we could have seen more emotional build-up with the Gamma storyline, but it was nice to finally get some resolution on the Vaughn/Prynn storyline. And it is incredibly cool that Marco has been serializing these books. From a reader's point of view, it makes me feel much closer to the story and the characters. I am anxiously awaiting Rising Son and Unity. I get the sense in this book that big things are all about to come to a head. In my mind, the DS9 relaunch is the best series of Trek books ever. Go buy them!

Star Trek- Deep Space Nine: Misssion Gamma-Lesser Evil written by Robert Simpson is the fourth in a series of four books of Mission Gamma.

This series started out with "Twilight, then This Gray Spirit and Cathedral" all richly written with a very descriptive narrative. Now, comes the fourth in this series and it does tie-up some of the loose ends found in the first three books. But, this volume also sets up the continuation of the series relaunch by incorporating items that need to be resolved in the future.

I found this to be very clever from the author's point of view too guarentee the continuation of the series. As you know from reading the earlier volumes in the Mission Gamma Series that there are two distinct plots within this series. One on Deep Space Nine and the other on the Starship Defiant. Colonel Kira Nerys in this book is in a dangerous chase into the heart of the Federation as she is in hot pursuit of a killer. The second plot revolves around Commander Elias Vaughn and the Defiant crew as they make it back through the wormhole to Deep Space Nine and makes a startling discovery. Vaughn's discovery shakes him to the core, as the truth is unvailed as to what was behind his tragic mission in the Gamma Quadrant. Now, you have Nerys and Vaughn both searching indepentantly for the truth.

This book has some really good set-up to continue the series and good action-adventure. The set-up of the characters was excellent in these first three books and it carried through to this volume making for some very interesting reading.

There is doubt cast on the final outcome of the Gamma Quadrant mission by Vaughn and Nerys' seeks to avenge a crime that has some very far-reaching implications... what is the secret that could divid the Alpha Quadrant?

This is an excellent well-written series and is highly recommended. The next books in this series are; "Rising Son and Unity" both written by S.D. Perry and the "Lives of Dax" written by various author's is coming out in Mass Paperback in January of 2003.

The next books to arrive at my door are the Star Trek "The Brave and the Bold" series of two books. Looks like I'll be reading TREK for awhile... See you around the galaxy... warp-on... engage.

...they do a story that flies in the face of the liberal banality that has ruled the Star Trek universe for nearly 40 years. Donald Fagen has an old song called "I.G.Y." that pokes fun at the whole I.G.Y. kitsch of the late 1950s/ early 1960s, the idea that some day we were going to have all sorts of gizmos given to us by scientists and engineers that would make life a breeze, the world was going to become peaceful, yadda-yadda. In a recent documentary, William Shatner pointed out that Star Trek anticipated a lot of the technology we have today--hand communicators (we call them cell phones), Romulan spaceship cloaking (we have two different "stealth" warplanes), and one thing that Shatner didn't mention--tricorders. We call those "laptops" and they're already being upstaged in capapbility by palm pilots that are smaller than anything Spock ever toted around. But one thing hasn't changed. We still kill people wholesale because we're us and they're them. Star Trek has made a few efforts to debunk the early Trek idea of there being groups who are 100% great folks. Like the Vulcans--there was a novel which depicted a Vulcan named Christopher who didn't fit the relentless nobility mold. He went around in his decommissioned Constitution class starship and raised all sorts of hell and had a grand old time. He didn't commit any evil, but mainstream Vulcankind thought he was scum nonetheless. In this series, we have to unlearn the DS9 propaganda that joined Trills consist of a symbiont who's a great person implanted into a humanoid who's also a great person. The result--great person squared. Look at Dax, for example. Its last two hosts have been real 10s. The lovely Jadzia, who could have been Charlie's 89th angel in the timeline. Cutesy cuddly Ezri, who's everybody's cherished kid sister--if they do a DS9 movie with time travel scenes showing Ezri in middle age, they should ask Sally Field. Gidget Goes Bajoran, hear what I'm saying? But let's not forget that Dax also had a host who was a psycho killer. They blew it on that match, Trill cultural pretensions to perfection in the joining process not withstanding. Over this series, we learn that Andorian marriage consists of four spouses. But what if one of those spouses is unbalanced to the point of self-destructiveness? It results in a dysfunctional marriage, no matter how many partners there are to try to balance things out. There are positive notes in this series to be sure. Like the estranged daughter of Commander Vaughan coming back into his life and there being a reconciliation rather than a resumed squabble. Like a Jem'Hadar soldier being sent by his new master Odo to Federation territory for an education. He no doubt knows that his old girlfriend Colonel Kira will do right by the kid. The DS9 franchise has always been the best because it presents a more realistic picture of humanoid nature than the leftover I.G.Y. contrived optimism ("What a beautiful world it will be...what a glorious time to be free!"--Donald Fagen) which has governed earlier Trek franchises. Now if only it didn't take four books to tell that believeable a story.

Compared to the first three volumes of Mission Gamma, this installment is thin in many ways. It's thin in that it's half the length of the first installment, it's thin in that the characters lack depth in what should be times of great tragedy. It's thin it that it looks for explanations for horrifying events OUTSIDE the pervue of Deep Space Nine's characters. Thus, since Deep Space Nine has always been character driven, Simpson's approach undermines the show's legacy with senseless and uninspired action and dashes hopes that the violent cliffhanger of the third book would lead to a better understanding of Bajor and its place in the Federation. The DS9 relaunch has steadily cranked its characters through various personal and professional ringers, stretching and challenging them in fascinating new ways in the process. This default to brainless conspiracies is deeply disapointing.

This book is very engrossing. While it doesn't have the epic feel of the previous Mission Gamma books, that's not really a bad thing. After the emotional turmoil in This Gray Spirit and Cathedral, this book is a breath of fresh air. No sweeping characterizations or descriptions, just a very good plot that keeps you turning the page and wanting more.