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When the Starship Voyager enters a peculiar part of
space and literally runs into a Monorhan refugee ship, it
sparks off a chain of events which trap Voyager in
a fold of subspace. Meanwhile, on a mission of mercy B'Elanna
and Seven of Nine's shuttle is caught in the same shock wave
that affected Voyager and they crash on the Monorhan's
home planet. Can Voyager get out of the fold in time?
Can B'Elanna and Seven overcome their mutual animosity to
solve the mystery of the shock wave? Who in their right mind
keeps buying these crashing shuttles...?
Cohesion
is the first book of the all new String Theory
cycle. Written by Jeffrey Lang, who has written and co-written
a number of Trek novels, the story takes place between
seasons four and five.
As
a reviewer I'm kind of getting freaked about the lack of imagination
a lot of the Trek writers seem to display. The same
old plot twists turn up over and over again, so its usually
with a heavy heart that I approach any story where another
shuttle crashes. Luckily, for the reader, the inevitable shuttle
crash is disposed of fairly quickly when it does happen.
So,
that gripe aside, what we have here is a no nonsense, straight
forward, good old fashioned story. I was a bit put off by
the quote from George Bernard Shaw, not that I have anything
against that great bastion of Irish literature, rather I'm
usually suspicious that any writer of a Trek novel,
who uses such quotes, is trying to justify their genre writing
by adding a bit of an intellectual sheen - as if they were
embarrassed to be writing in this medium. But read the book
and the quote is relevant and well chosen.
So,
given some of the trash that is published there are few such
worries with Cohesion. Plainly speaking the book was
so well written and such an effortless read that I read it
cover to cover in a single sitting. The story is short on
scientific gobbledegook and long on characterisation and tension.
I especially liked the explanation of the Monorhan society
and the doom which leads them to throw their lives, thousands
at a time, into space to escape their dying world. The alien
characters are well drawn, believable and elicit both the
Voyager's crew and the reader's sympathy.
Being part one in a series the main job of this book is to
set up the characters and the situations which imperil the
main characters, the mid section and resolution is left up
to later instalments. It does its job well.
So,
buy it read it, I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did.
I look forward to the next instalment with the hope that the
author of part two - Kirsten Deyer - doesn't drop the ball
on this one.
 
Charles
Packer
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