When I was younger, living in Bermuda, back in 1986, I would hit the rather meagre offerings in the book racks of the American Exchange store which served Canadian, British and American forces as our mult-need department store. I would grab each Trek book I came across, and would tear through them, devouring the adventures…
Tag: starfleet
Star Trek: The Next Generation (1988) – Datalore, and Angel One
Captain’s log: stardate 41242.4 Ahhh, the melodrama trope of the evil twin. Datalore, written by Robert Lewin and series creator Gene Roddenberry from a story by Lewin and Maurice Hurley first aired on 18 January, 1988. This episode introduced two recurring creations of The Next Generation, while also giving us more of a history on…
Star Trek: Mindshadow (1986) – J.M. Dillard
The Human Adventure continues on the Book Shelf this week with some more non-canon Star Trek adventures. And for the first time in a long time, this was a Trek book I enjoyed. Dillard has a knack for the characters, and while some of the beats may not have been completely inline with Trek, I…
Star Trek: The Original Series (1969) & The Animated Series (1973) – Turnabout Intruder and Beyond the Farthest Star
Captain’s log: stardate 5928.5 The last live action television episode chronicling the adventures of Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner), Science Officer Spock (Leonard Nimoy) and Dr. Leonard McCoy (DeForest Kelley) is a bit of a mixed bag. It was the first time someone else besides Shatner played Kirk, but the story itself sure could…
Star Trek: The Original Series (1969) – The Way to Eden and The Cloud Minders
Captain’s log: stardate 5832.3 If there’s a worse episode than Spock’s Brain, then The Way to Eden has to be it. I knew, even when I saw it as a child that this was a terrible episode. The story and I did not reach, man. Written by Arthur Heinemann from a story he developed with…
Star Trek: The Original Series (1969) – The Lights of Zetar and Requiem for Methuselah
Captain’s log: stardate 5725.3 Poor Scotty (James Doohan). Unless your name is James T. Kirk (William Shatner), it seems your love life aboard the Enterprise is lacklustre at best and doomed at its worst. Scotty learns that in The Lights of Zetar. Written by Shari Lewis and Jeremy Tarcher, this episode first aired on 31…
Star Trek: The Original Series (1969) – Whom Gods Destroy and Let That Be Your Last Battlefield
Captain’s log: stardate 5718.3 Whom Gods Destroy was penned by Lee Erwin and Jerry Sohl and had it’s first broadcast on 3 January, 1969. The Enterprise arrives in orbit around Elba II, which serves as an asylum for the criminally insane. They have arrived on a mission of mercy, they are carrying a serum that…
Star Trek: Dwellers in the Crucible (1985) – Margaret Wander Bonanno
Before Star Trek V: The Final Frontier came along four years later with the concept of the Planet of Galactic Peace, Margaret Wander Bonanno presented a similar idea in her non-canon Star Trek novel, Dwellers in the Crucible, which finds its way onto the Book Shelf this week. Set before the events of Star Trek…
Star Trek: Killing Time (1985) – Della Van Hise
Hey look, it’s another non-canon Trek novel that features villains altering the timeline to change history, and allowing the author to play with established characters in their own way, with heavy slash tendencies (in this case, a Kirk/Spock romance… again). If you can get your hands on an ultra-rare first edition, there is actually more…
Star Trek: Shadow Lord (1985) – Laurence Yep
I dove into another non-canon Star Trek adventure from Pocket Books, and this one, I have to say, is a swing and a miss. It’s almost like it wants to be a bit of a fantasy tale in the vein of Dumas’ Musketeers, but it is actually just a big misstep, which doesn’t really fit…
The Mind Reels 