Publication Date:October 30, 2007 Availability:Usually ships in 1-2 business days Shipping:Expedited shipping available Shipping:International shipping available Condition:SOFTCOVER MASS Mkt PB , ,NICE/CLEAN,HAS JUST A TAD COSMETIC EXTERIOR WEAR - BINDING TIGHT,PAGES CLEAN,NO HI-LIGHTING/UNDERLINING
Product Description An enemy so intractable that it cannot be reasoned with. The entire race thinks with one mind and strives toward one purpose: to add our biological distinctiveness to their own and wipe out individuality, to make every living thing Borg.
In over two centuries, the Federation has never encountered a greater threat. Twice Starfleet assembled and threw countless starships to stand against them. The Borg were stopped, the price paid in blood. Humanity breathed a sigh of relief, assuming it was safe. And with the destruction of the transwarp conduits, the Federation believed that the killing blow had finally been struck against the Borg.
Driven to the point of extinction, the Borg continue to fight for their very existence, for their culture. They will not be denied. They must not be stopped. The old rules and assumptions regarding how the Collective should act have been dismissed. Now the Borg kill first, assimilate later.
When the Enterprise manages to thwart them once again, the Borg turn inward. The dark places that even the drones never realized existed are turned outward against the enemy they have never been able to defeat. What is revealed is the thing that no one believed the Borg could do.
Star Trek The Way It Ought To Be - Big Concepts, Great Characters, Grand AdventureNovember 12, 2008 Stephen B. O'Blenis(Nova Scotia, Canada) One of the biggest advantages for Star Trek novels and comics, now that there aren't any ongoing television Trek series and the movies are few and far between, is that there's a new freedom to go in new directions and make new changes with characters, ships' lineups, alien races, the inner workings of the Federation and the balance of power in the galaxy, without having to watch out for contradictions with what might happen next month on tv, or to save out certain 'big' ideas in case they want to use them for a season cliffhanger or a new movie. They're also 'mixing up' the characters a lot, where a book, regardless of its heading ('Next Generation', 'Voyager', etc.) can bring in characters from all across the Trek universe. And thus it is with 'Before Dishonor', which features (and this isn't a spoiler, I'm only listing characters who appear early on) Captain Picard, Seven Of Nine, Mr. Spock, Worf, the Borg, and the Q Continuuim, all in a truly epic tale penned by one of the best Trek authors, Peter David.
It's epic in more than one way - although there's massive space action this isn't just one big melee. There's a big story tying all the action together, and making it more potent, and there's humor, ongoing development of the characters and their relationship to one another (including on the bridge of the Enterprise, where there's real tension between different crew members now that some of the originals are gone and the new blood is sometimes in sharp conflict with old favorites and their decisions), familiar places and bits of Trek lore coming in when they're least expected, and a spiritual element that works extremely well (David has handled this expertly in previous Trek books). Much of that spiritual element is incorporated into a study of the Borg, with such questions as 'Does the Borg Collective have a soul?' and 'What happens to an individual's soul when the Borg assimilate them?'
Seven Of Nine is deeply troubled by a vision of the Borg that abruptly comes to her, and the feeling that something terrible is wrong with Admiral Janeway, who's currently leading an expedition to examine a dead-in-the-water, nonfunctional Borg Cube. When Seven brings her concerns to the hierarchy of Starfleet Command, they fall on deaf ears, but when she defies their cease-and-desist and tracks down Picard, he's inclined to have a much more open mind over anything the Borg may be capable of. And to ignore a Starfleet cease-and-desist himself, and take the Enterprise out to see if there really is anything amiss with this 'dead' Cube. Which there most certainly is.
I loved the Voyager tv show, but in its latter run it, along with the movie Star Trek - First Contact (Two-Disc Special Collector's Edition) were inadvertently watering down the Borg - they were getting defeated too often, and sometimes almost easily. In the Borg's first couple appearances on Star Trek Next Generation it always seemed like a one-time miracle that the Enterprise and the Federation managed to survive, let alone triumph. Later on, it wasn't so much any one single episode, it's that there so many times something gets pulled out of the hat to take them down. It felt like there'd always be something to bring them down, and they lost a lot of their element of awe. With their appearances in recent books, obviously they don't always win outright (otherwise there'd likely be very few subsequent Trek stories told...) but they're regaining that edge. The book writers seem to have acknowledged the Borg had lost something, and set out to bring that something back, starting out by having a Collective weakened by its recent defeats, and then letting them recover and then grow. And they're doing it through something they seemed to have stopped doing - adapting. They're supposed to be the ultimate adapters but that was lost for a while there. In 'Before Dishonor' they're not only adapting, they're evolving into something Beyond what they were in the original shows. And as this evolution unfolds, new revelations are coming out about the Borg that have apparantly been true for some time, but the Federation never realized. Even the Q seem unsettled about some of them...
Most of what I've written about comes into the story in the first third or so, and there's a lot of new surprises later on that I think it's best not to mention. The characters - both the old favorites like Picard, Spock and so on, and new ones who've been introduced either here or in other Trek novels or comics, are handled with perfection. Overall, I think 'Before Dishonor' is one of the best works of Peter David's career, and one of the best Star Trek stories ever told.
Really really bad and so very disappointing.November 11, 2008 Lester Stegman(USA) Where did it go wrong? This book was part of a great series of TNG stories set after Nemesis. So far, every book in the series had been great and captivated my attention. This book was written by my second favorite Trek book writer, Peter David. He has always managed to impress me with his writing and storytelling ability. So what made this book so bad?
Well, first off, this book has HORRID character development. Most side characters, some that have actually appeared in the series and some that appeared in previous books in the series, all act out of their established characters. Characters that have been made to be extremely loyal to Picard and trust in his judgment quickly commit mutiny at the first sign of his disagreement with Starfleet. First off, Picard has disobeyed Starfleet numerous times (including a couple times in this very series) and very few have disagreed. Also, mutiny is... very out of character for anyone who is supposed to be a Starfleet officer. It just wouldn't happen.
The story's dialouge is laughable, but not at its lame attempts to be comical. Peter David attempts to make popular culture jokes that just don't fight into the story and setting. When the largest borg threat over to face the federation comes baring down on Earth, all that some of the characters in the conflict can think about is how Pluto has been changed from a plant to a non-planet in the past-300 years, an attempt at a joke at Pluto's recent change. It just felt wrong.
Finally, the story itself is horrible and unbelievable. Peter David has the borg cube actually "eat" a pluto and other planets. A borg cube EATS a planet. WHAT!? Does anyone find that even remotely plausable? How the heck does that happen? A borg cube is a machine... How in world would by "EATING" a planet would it get bigger and more powerful. But apparently, Peter David thinks thats how it should work. But thats just the beginning of the horrible plot development. In the end, Peter David actually kills **SPOILER ALERT** Katheryn Janeway. I know that David disliked Voyager (to be honest, I never really liked it either, though I did enjoy the characters) but at the very least he should have left her death for a Voyager novel and not a Next Generation one. It was just his excuse to get rid of her. This not only just hurts this book, but it may result is a weaker lineup for future Voyager novels in the Voyager relaunch series, which I have also greatly enjoyed. **END SPOILERS**
This book does have a few redeeming values, but that are completely outweighed by its faults. Normally, this book would have gotten a two, because it has some redeeming value, but it gets a one because its author, David, should have been able to write something so much better, but ended up crashing and burning. At least the next book in the series "Greater Then the Sum" actually puts the series back on track and attempts to pick up the pieces of this lame excuse for a story. If you aren't following the TNG relaunch series religiously, save yourself the time and skip this book. The only reason to read this is so that you know what has happened in the story so as to understand the next books.
TNG: A Bold New DirectionOctober 30, 2008 The Revolutionary(Goodlettsville, TN) I have not actually read this novel. The prior reviewers and their spoillers read it for me. I did just put down Resistance after having not picked up a Trek book since Rogue Saucer! lol. I really just picked up Resistance because I was eager to see if Data was being brought back yet. Much to my disapproval, he has not.
I even emailed writer DeCandido and he told me that they (the all mighty writers) had decided never to bring Data back "because too many characters come back from the dead". We as fans are subjected to every other idiotic idea they have, and they expect us to swallow THAT as an excuse?
I MIGHT go and read the A Time to...series only because I need to brush up on my Trek novel canon for what Im about to propose later :) All I hear from reviewers is how the writers, some "great" ones are messing up the franchise relaunch. As I told DeCandido in my candid email, the fans need to guide the direction of the franchise, not some small group of writers ticking us off at every novel release. Do they not realize that if they give us what WE want, they will sell more books?
TNG deserves better than this. They deserve a solid universe that is not afraid to go in new directions and has to rehash the Germans ERRR Borg and Q every other novel. No, the famous Seven do not have to all stay aboard the Big E forever, but some should. Star Trek use to make a habit of hinting at actual human history, lessons learned, etc. It should get back to that most of the time.
Here is my revolutionary proposal. We fans hijack the series! For Free! I did a little research on what novel writers potentially make on books. Basically, you might as well write it for free if you're just starting out IMO. We can't be sued by Paramount of whomever if we never make a cent off our work, right? I believe there are enough gifted writers out there who could write circles around the folks they officially use now. I, like most, don't have time to fully commit to writing a novel, but together, with shared knowledge, we could. We gather at a free website, and divide ourselves into two parts. Those who want to write and contribute to the actual novels, and those who just want a vote in the direction of the franchise, offer knowledge, yet remain in the dark until they read our material. We will make free novels and make it available as a free Word doc for download and distribution. Im not in this for 1 red cent. I care enough about these characters to turn the ship around and take a new direction. But, the direction has to start from somewhere. I feel like we should accept everything written up to Nemesis, including the prequal book series A Time to.., including the movie Nemesis itself because we fans view movies as official, and take over from there. Together we can show how the franchise should have went afterwards. Who's with me? Comment here. Let your voices be heard and jointly lead us into a bold new direction with equal opinion acceptance by all who care. Let us make it so!
Peter David does it again... This book may not be his usual brilliants but it is still a must read.September 26, 2008 Tiberius(Alpha Santeria) 1 out of 2 found this review helpful
This book had everything... Peter David, The Borg, and the next great adventure after Nemesis were the ingredients of this novel and I couldn't wait. The reviews were mixed but I was sure that I was going to enjoy it. I have read three Peter David novels before this one and that has equaled two five stars and one four stars almost flawless.
This novel starts out with Admiral Janeway thinking about her position on Captain Picard from the events of "Resistance", and she finally comes to the conclusion that even though Picard disobeyed a direct order that since he had "once again" saved humanity that he should be excused. She was on the U.S.S Einstein and was on her way to the remains of the Borg ship. She just had to see it for herself. She was then visited by Lady Q who tells her that going to the Borg ship will be the biggest and the last mistake that she will ever make. She decided to go anyway and shortly after that she was enveloped by the ship as well as several other key members of the Einstein. That is when the reader realizes that the Borg is no longer assimilating information but is actually enveloping it (eating it) and taken its energy. The crew of the Enterprise along with Ambassador Spock and Seven of Nine Enterprise makes there way to intercept the Borg ship, as the Borg ship is making it way toward Earth it is destroying everything in its path. It is then that the crew of the realizes that the Borg ship is getting bigger and they must figure out how to stop it soon. They come up with two ideas; the first is two get control of the Doomsday Machine. In the novel "Vendetta" it was discovered that the Doomsday Machine from the Original Series episode "The Doomsday Machine" was actually originally built to battle the Borg and it was a shot in the dark that it could be used for that purpose again. The second option was to implant project Endgame into Seven of Nine. Project: Endgame was first thought up when Huey came aboard the Enterprise in the Next Generation episode "I, Borg". It was decided that if the program was put directly into Seven of Nine when they assimilate her that the virus will destroy the Borg. As the Enterprise heads toward the Doomsday Machine there is also a mutiny on board. To know more you'll have to read the book.
This felt like a movie. All the familiar characters that were brought in, Spock, Seven, Lady Q, and Janeway, as well as all the regular characters were a lot of fun. Resistance just felt like a really good episode, this felt like Star Trek X1. The other important thing was that the characters didn't feel like they were thrown in. They felt like they should be there. Another thing was that the Borg felt dangerous again. With the new trilogy on the way and considering the Borg is suppose to be the main antagonist it makes since that they are building up steam to be a major threat.
So-soSeptember 3, 2008 David B Brawley(Baltimore, MD USA) 0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Peter David is one of the best Trek authors ever. That said, this was not his best showing.
Picard is one of the longest serving, most decorated officers in Starfleet history, and yet the admirals who have been his commanding officers for years are once again upset with him for not listening to them and in the process saving Earth. Again.
I think Spock showing up helped a lot, and 7 was pretty well written. I am really really disliking the Vulcan counselor. Seriously, how many Vulcans would go against something Spock said??
With Janeway has been taken care of, we don't have to see authors struggle with what to do with her, aside from making her be "angry admiral".
I'm glad I read it, but I'm also glad to be done with it and on to the next book.
