Twisted Kingdom

Date Completed: August 13, 2007
Pages: 284
Publication Year: 2004
Book One in the A Time to... series

Reason for Reading: I stopped reading Star Trek a few years ago, but I remember when this series came out. I almost resumed reading Star Trek right then and there, but there were so many other books that I wanted to read I didn't. When I recently found the first five books in the series at the second-hand bookstore, I picked them up.

On the cusp of their epic battle with Shinzon, many of Captain Jean-Luc Picard's long-time crew were heading for new assignments and new challenges. Among the changes were William Riker's promotion to captain and his new command, Riker's marriage to Counselor Deanna Troi, and Dr. Beverly Crusher's new career at Starfleet Medical. But the story of what set them on a path away from the Starship Enterprise™ has never been told.

UNTIL NOW.

The site of one of the Dominion War's fiercest battles, the Rashanar Sector now contains a vast interstellar graveyard littered with the lifeless hulks of hundreds of devastated starships. The explosive destruction of so many varied warp drives has severely distorted the space-time continuum in this region, resulting in dangerous unleashed energies and bizarre gravitational anomalies.

The Enterprise has been assigned to patrol the perimeter of the danger zone, while other vessels carry out the difficult and highly hazardous task of retrieving the bodies of the dead from the wrecked warships.

To some alien races, the former battleground is hallowed space. To others, including the rapacious Androssi, it is a scavenger's paradise, ripe for salvage. None expect this ship's graveyard to hold a deadly secret that will force the android Data to make a heart-wrenching decision about the path his life will take -- and that will endanger not only the Enterprise, but Picard's future in Starfleet.

This is a series of books that I believe many Star Trek fans will want to read because it explains all that happened between the movies Star Trek: Insurrection and Star Trek: Nemesis. A lot changes, and with this series of books, people can understand why. For starters, I was very happy to see Wesley Crusher return to the cast. I would not call myself a big fan of him, but it was about time he reappeared. I was mostly just curious what happened to him and what he was doing during those years that he was off with the Traveler. This book fills the reader in.

I will have to read book two in this series soon, it has a cliff-hanger sort of ending and I want to know what happens next. Mean writers. At least when this series came out they came out one book a month, but for some reason the sixth book in the series is out not available on amazon.ca. Anyways, unlike the last book I read, the Dominion War is over in this book. The Federation is left to pick up the pieces, and the Enterprise is sent to a particularly bad spot to salvage the bodies and send them home to their families. This battle was particularly bad and is full of mystery. It seems that the mystery did not end with the destruction of all those ships, though, the Enterprise and its crew find itself in the middle of it.

This was a rather interesting way to explain all the changes that the crew go through, and I am enjoying learning why things turned out the way they did. The problem with the show not being on television anymore is that things are not explained each week, so when they make a new movie there are often big gaps. Writing books to fill them in is, I think, a great idea.

There is one scene in this book that I do not think I will ever forget. It is between Geordi and Data, and honestly, it was such a perfect scene. Not perfect in how things were dealt with, but perfect in how it was orchestrated. Another good book in the Star Trek series.