Totally agree with putting How Much for just the Planet? on this list. Some people love it, but it just didn't do anything for me. Complete contrast to John Ford's other Stark Trek book (The Final Reflection) which is the first, and maybe even the best, deep dive into Klingon society and culture.
Collecting all the Trek novels is nearly impossible a better goal is to get all the Trek novels within a certain group IE TOS) which is also a huge task but not overwhelming
It’s great that you talk about Star Trek books, because as of last week, I own almost all Star Trek TOS books that were released in Germany (over a hundred in total) AND the Vanguard series, which I’m looking forward to read soon. Somehow, the TOS crew and timeline is my favorite (followed by DS9), probably because it’s the show I grew up with. It’s funny that „The Klingon Gambit“ is on that list … it was the first StarTrek book I ever read, and I still think it captures the characters and the whacky tone of some of the episodes very well. But hey, that’s just me. I‘m curious… what are your favorite TOS books (not counting the movie novelizations)? Now I have to check out your other Star Trek related videos …
I really like “The Antares Maelstrom” and “Child of Two Worlds” by Greg Cox, as well as the Legacies Trilogy by Greg Cox, David Mack, Dayton Ward and Kevin Dilmore. I liked Christopher Bennet’s “The Captains Oath”, but it’s not necessarily a favorite of mine.
Sir, may I direct you to Planet X by Micheal Jan Friedman. Yes, the X-Men/Star Trek crossover book. It’s very concept should ensure it’s place among any worst of list. Weird confession: Yes it’s bad, but I didn’t hate reading it. I think it was because I never took the concept seriously so I went in with some rock bottom expectations. It’s a decent read. Not great by any stretch, but it’s still an X-Men/Star Trek crossover book so, it’s pretty bad by default. Nuff said
How Much for just the Planet? was a fantastic comic Star Trek episode in the vein of The Trouble With Tribbles. The characterizations might be off but that happens whenever the characters play second fiddle to the plot; especially when doing a comic episode.
Oh listening to the musical score while reading is an interesting idea. I may try that sometime. I really liked this novelization compared to the movie, but yes, Roddenberry does have an annoying obsession with sex. That actually comes through in a lot more than this novelization 🙈. There aren't alot of BookTubers who talk about Star Trek novels, and I'm really enjoying yours ❤.
I have not read very many Star Trek books yet, but the one book I remember not liking at all was Uhura's Song. It was so boring I stopped reading after about 80 pages.
Until recently, even though I have been a fan since childhood, I only had a handful of Trek-Novels on my shelf (as opposed to Star Wars, of which I own almost all Expanded Universe-Novels). Late 2021, I decided to rectify that and compiled a long list of Books to check out. Since there are so many, I chose to concentrate on Novels that people recommend. There are various lists online, in addition, google compiles a list when I type in "Best Star Trek Novels/Books". And then I started to go through this list in order of publication. But before I started, I checked out one book often called the WORST Trek-Book, just to see how bad it could get: "Spock, Messiah" by Theodore R. Cogswell und Charles A. Spano. And yeah, it was pretty bad. Convinced that I had the absolute lowpoint out of the way, I started the journey... and came across something that was much, much worse not long after: "Black Fire" by Sonni Cooper. Oh boy... it was atrocious, easily one of the worst things I have ever read. Most of the Novels I have read since were good, some were excellent, others I really didn't care for: "Klingon Gambit", "Pawns and Symbols", "Killing Time", "Dreadnought" & "Battlestations", "Strike Zone", "Fortune's Light", "Imbalance"... to name a few. But "Black Fire" is still my least favourite.
I started reading about all the Star Trek books in chronological order a couple of years ago, along with re-watching all the TV series and graphic novels. Timeline Wise, I'm about half way through the original series, currently reading Twilight's End. I can honestly say that there has been only one book I didn't like so far, a Discovery novel named Dead Endless - it was so boring I simply couldn't finish it!
It's crazy how many Star Trek books there really are. I didn't care for I Q that much. I was so excited to get a hardcover copy in good shape, and all I remember is being letdown.
I agree with you on the 'A Time to' series. One book that was on my list was a next generation book called planet X. Is a crossover between the next generation series and the x-Men. Remember my sister giving it to me and telling me to read it. Have you ever read it? Came out in 2000 and I remembered properly
I remember reading Klingon gambit in 6th grade in about 1993. I didn’t like it then and the small type sucked! Like you, I loved the cover lol that’s what made me read it. Covenant of the Crown was the next book and I remember liking that a lot more even though it was small type too. I think there’s a Klingon ship on that one too.
I've only read a handful of _Trek_ novels, and all set in the TOS era (I have very little interest in _Trek_ stories set outside that era, even though DS9's my favourite _Trek_ show, go figure). The only one I can say I hated was _Spock Must Die!_ by James Blish. It started off with promise, but degenerated into absolute garbage once the Spock One/Spock Two nonsense got rolling.
How Much for Just the Planet? is a *great* choice for number one. I'm a big fan of Gilbert and Sullivan, and I saw a review saying that this book was like "Star Trek Meets Gilbert and Sullivan"! And I read it, and ... no. Not even close. The "song parodies" or whatever they're meant to be are dreadful, and the story is just tedious. I'd put "Dragon's Honor" on my list. It's another attempt at a farcical/comedic Trek book. I found out after the fact that the authors were trying to do a TNG version of "How Much For Just the Planet?" And I was like, well, if I'd known THAT, I never would have bought the thing. It's possibly even worse than "How Much," but it's a tough call. They're both excruciating. After that, I'd probably fill out the list just with ones that were ... okay, I guess ... but just kinda bored me. "The Devil's Heart" by Carmen Carter is a bland TNG adventure. "Serpents in the Garden" is a terminally boring "Motion Picture"-era book. And "Catalyst of Sorrows" is a very boring book set in the "lost era" between TOS and TNG. I've read at least one boring book for every era, feels like!
I actually owned about 400 Star Trek books before we moved to a new home and we had a fire sale on everything in the house. A collectibles reseller took them off my hands kindly, but I’ve been getting them as Kindle Books and re-reading the first four series for the last year, so they’re much fresher in my mind than when I read them 25 years ago- I’d say the worst one I’ve read so far is Black Fire by Sunni Cooper. It’s a very bad fanfiction author given free reign. It’s a little scary, as a woman, to see just how sadistic some lady writers will be with their favorite characters for that hurt/comfort fix. Blegh!!
Drednaught! Egad. It’s like a precocious 12 year old who was never given anything other than praise wrote a 1st person Mary Sue epic. And they gave it a sequel!
i actually quite enjoyed i,q! it was sort of a psychedelic novel- i also really liked john delancie's q in it, it was probably among the better trek books ive read (if not among the top)
Well it’s all subjective in the end I guess. I actually like Dayton Ward and Kevin Dillmore’s books but that’s just me. My least favorite are probably all going to be in the post DS9 or post nemesis timeframe just because those are the ones I’ve read most recently: 1. This Gray Spirit-I thought it was a real chore to get through 2. Over a Torrent Sea-I just don’t like this book I don’t like the character’s actions and I think sometimes CLB gets too lost in the science and forgets he’s telling a story 3. Before Dishonor-thought it was too unbelievable and goes too big and the humor didn’t work for me 4. Spirit Walk 1&2 felt very forgettable and a chore to read 5. Brinkmanship-this was the letdown book for me in the typhon pact. Felt like the characters weren’t done correctly and was a disappointment after Plagues of Night and Raise the Dawn Great review. Really enjoyed it
I’m sad you didn’t enjoy This Gray spirit, which I thought was enjoyable, or Before Dishonor which is a favorite of mine, but I totally understand the others.
Dayton and Kevin are hard for me to read, too. Dayton by himself is better. I have the A Time To... series, after hearing your negative thoughts of Dayton and Kevin books, I am not sure I want to read the series.
Their books are for sure the weakest books in the series…but some of the others are good. I will say that “A Time to Heal”, “A Time to Kill”, and “A Time for War, A Time for Peace” are amazing books and well worth the read.
If you want to read an awful Star Trek book, pick up Shadow Lord. As for the anti-religion slant of Star Trek, which was one of Roddenberry's ideals (in that the future has progressed beyond the need for religion), I just watched this evening an episode from Season 4 of TNG called The Devil's Due. Talk about anti-religion--and what really chapped my hide was that the anti-religion rhetoric was coming from the well-respected Cpt. Picard himself.
I've only read like 10 star trek books, but the only one I disliked was Beneath the Raptor's Wing from the romulan war arc. I was really excited to read this since we didn't get season 5 of enterprise, but this book has the most boring war imaginable. Most of it is just political drama and journalism, and the space battles are sparse and anticlimactic.
Totally agree with putting How Much for just the Planet? on this list. Some people love it, but it just didn't do anything for me. Complete contrast to John Ford's other Stark Trek book (The Final Reflection) which is the first, and maybe even the best, deep dive into Klingon society and culture.
I remember reading “How Much For Just The Planet” and thinking it was quite funny. But I respect your opinion and please keep it up.
Collecting all the Trek novels is nearly impossible a better goal is to get all the Trek novels within a certain group IE TOS) which is also a huge task but not overwhelming
I quit buying them after Nemesis. Just started back up buying them, but I have about 650 of them
I just ordered two more Q books because the one I'm reading right now (Q, Squared) is so good. Hopefully I like it more than you did
Really appreciate this review! And agree. Read most of the pocket TOS books in the 80’s (yep I am that old).
It’s great that you talk about Star Trek books, because as of last week, I own almost all Star Trek TOS books that were released in Germany (over a hundred in total) AND the Vanguard series, which I’m looking forward to read soon. Somehow, the TOS crew and timeline is my favorite (followed by DS9), probably because it’s the show I grew up with. It’s funny that „The Klingon Gambit“ is on that list … it was the first StarTrek book I ever read, and I still think it captures the characters and the whacky tone of some of the episodes very well. But hey, that’s just me. I‘m curious… what are your favorite TOS books (not counting the movie novelizations)? Now I have to check out your other Star Trek related videos …
I really like “The Antares Maelstrom” and “Child of Two Worlds” by Greg Cox, as well as the Legacies Trilogy by Greg Cox, David Mack, Dayton Ward and Kevin Dilmore. I liked Christopher Bennet’s “The Captains Oath”, but it’s not necessarily a favorite of mine.
@@jonathankoan Ah, the Legacies trilogy. That's another series I have to hunt down ;-) thanks!
Those are mostly okay ruined by intrusive Leftist politics
Sir, may I direct you to Planet X by Micheal Jan Friedman. Yes, the X-Men/Star Trek crossover book. It’s very concept should ensure it’s place among any worst of list. Weird confession: Yes it’s bad, but I didn’t hate reading it. I think it was because I never took the concept seriously so I went in with some rock bottom expectations. It’s a decent read. Not great by any stretch, but it’s still an X-Men/Star Trek crossover book so, it’s pretty bad by default. Nuff said
How Much for just the Planet? was a fantastic comic Star Trek episode in the vein of The Trouble With Tribbles. The characterizations might be off but that happens whenever the characters play second fiddle to the plot; especially when doing a comic episode.
Oh listening to the musical score while reading is an interesting idea. I may try that sometime. I really liked this novelization compared to the movie, but yes, Roddenberry does have an annoying obsession with sex. That actually comes through in a lot more than this novelization 🙈. There aren't alot of BookTubers who talk about Star Trek novels, and I'm really enjoying yours ❤.
I have not read very many Star Trek books yet, but the one book I remember not liking at all was Uhura's Song. It was so boring I stopped reading after about 80 pages.
Until recently, even though I have been a fan since childhood, I only had a handful of Trek-Novels on my shelf (as opposed to Star Wars, of which I own almost all Expanded Universe-Novels). Late 2021, I decided to rectify that and compiled a long list of Books to check out. Since there are so many, I chose to concentrate on Novels that people recommend. There are various lists online, in addition, google compiles a list when I type in "Best Star Trek Novels/Books". And then I started to go through this list in order of publication.
But before I started, I checked out one book often called the WORST Trek-Book, just to see how bad it could get: "Spock, Messiah" by Theodore R. Cogswell und Charles A. Spano. And yeah, it was pretty bad. Convinced that I had the absolute lowpoint out of the way, I started the journey... and came across something that was much, much worse not long after: "Black Fire" by Sonni Cooper. Oh boy... it was atrocious, easily one of the worst things I have ever read.
Most of the Novels I have read since were good, some were excellent, others I really didn't care for: "Klingon Gambit", "Pawns and Symbols", "Killing Time", "Dreadnought" & "Battlestations", "Strike Zone", "Fortune's Light", "Imbalance"... to name a few. But "Black Fire" is still my least favourite.
I started reading about all the Star Trek books in chronological order a couple of years ago, along with re-watching all the TV series and graphic novels. Timeline Wise, I'm about half way through the original series, currently reading Twilight's End. I can honestly say that there has been only one book I didn't like so far, a Discovery novel named Dead Endless - it was so boring I simply couldn't finish it!
It's crazy how many Star Trek books there really are. I didn't care for I Q that much. I was so excited to get a hardcover copy in good shape, and all I remember is being letdown.
I agree with you on the 'A Time to' series. One book that was on my list was a next generation book called planet X. Is a crossover between the next generation series and the x-Men. Remember my sister giving it to me and telling me to read it. Have you ever read it? Came out in 2000 and I remembered properly
I’ve seen it in bookstores but have never read it.
I remember reading Klingon gambit in 6th grade in about 1993. I didn’t like it then and the small type sucked! Like you, I loved the cover lol that’s what made me read it. Covenant of the Crown was the next book and I remember liking that a lot more even though it was small type too. I think there’s a Klingon ship on that one too.
The number books have been some of my favorites they are like lost episodes
Have you read "Spock, Messiah"? lol. that's on the top of my Bad Star Trek Books list :)
I have not read that one yet
I've only read a handful of _Trek_ novels, and all set in the TOS era (I have very little interest in _Trek_ stories set outside that era, even though DS9's my favourite _Trek_ show, go figure). The only one I can say I hated was _Spock Must Die!_ by James Blish. It started off with promise, but degenerated into absolute garbage once the Spock One/Spock Two nonsense got rolling.
How Much for Just the Planet? is a *great* choice for number one. I'm a big fan of Gilbert and Sullivan, and I saw a review saying that this book was like "Star Trek Meets Gilbert and Sullivan"! And I read it, and ... no. Not even close. The "song parodies" or whatever they're meant to be are dreadful, and the story is just tedious.
I'd put "Dragon's Honor" on my list. It's another attempt at a farcical/comedic Trek book. I found out after the fact that the authors were trying to do a TNG version of "How Much For Just the Planet?" And I was like, well, if I'd known THAT, I never would have bought the thing. It's possibly even worse than "How Much," but it's a tough call. They're both excruciating.
After that, I'd probably fill out the list just with ones that were ... okay, I guess ... but just kinda bored me. "The Devil's Heart" by Carmen Carter is a bland TNG adventure. "Serpents in the Garden" is a terminally boring "Motion Picture"-era book. And "Catalyst of Sorrows" is a very boring book set in the "lost era" between TOS and TNG. I've read at least one boring book for every era, feels like!
Please never quit.
I actually owned about 400 Star Trek books before we moved to a new home and we had a fire sale on everything in the house. A collectibles reseller took them off my hands kindly, but I’ve been getting them as Kindle Books and re-reading the first four series for the last year, so they’re much fresher in my mind than when I read them 25 years ago-
I’d say the worst one I’ve read so far is Black Fire by Sunni Cooper. It’s a very bad fanfiction author given free reign. It’s a little scary, as a woman, to see just how sadistic some lady writers will be with their favorite characters for that hurt/comfort fix. Blegh!!
Drednaught!
Egad. It’s like a precocious 12 year old who was never given anything other than praise wrote a 1st person Mary Sue epic. And they gave it a sequel!
i actually quite enjoyed i,q! it was sort of a psychedelic novel- i also really liked john delancie's q in it, it was probably among the better trek books ive read (if not among the top)
Ugh, I listened to I,Q on audiobook... SO tedious.
Well it’s all subjective in the end I guess. I actually like Dayton Ward and Kevin Dillmore’s books but that’s just me. My least favorite are probably all going to be in the post DS9 or post nemesis timeframe just because those are the ones I’ve read most recently:
1. This Gray Spirit-I thought it was a real chore to get through
2. Over a Torrent Sea-I just don’t like this book I don’t like the character’s actions and I think sometimes CLB gets too lost in the science and forgets he’s telling a story
3. Before Dishonor-thought it was too unbelievable and goes too big and the humor didn’t work for me
4. Spirit Walk 1&2 felt very forgettable and a chore to read
5. Brinkmanship-this was the letdown book for me in the typhon pact. Felt like the characters weren’t done correctly and was a disappointment after Plagues of Night and Raise the Dawn
Great review. Really enjoyed it
I’m sad you didn’t enjoy This Gray spirit, which I thought was enjoyable, or Before Dishonor which is a favorite of mine, but I totally understand the others.
It’s ok I have really strange tastes with this stuff 😅
agree so hard about the Klingon Gambit!
Dayton and Kevin are hard for me to read, too. Dayton by himself is better. I have the A Time To... series, after hearing your negative thoughts of Dayton and Kevin books, I am not sure I want to read the series.
Their books are for sure the weakest books in the series…but some of the others are good. I will say that “A Time to Heal”, “A Time to Kill”, and “A Time for War, A Time for Peace” are amazing books and well worth the read.
Haven't watched the video yet but Dreadnought! and Battlestations! have to be two of the very worst I've ever read (out of at least 80 I've read).
If you want to read an awful Star Trek book, pick up Shadow Lord. As for the anti-religion slant of Star Trek, which was one of Roddenberry's ideals (in that the future has progressed beyond the need for religion), I just watched this evening an episode from Season 4 of TNG called The Devil's Due. Talk about anti-religion--and what really chapped my hide was that the anti-religion rhetoric was coming from the well-respected Cpt. Picard himself.
SLAYYYY
I've only read like 10 star trek books, but the only one I disliked was Beneath the Raptor's Wing from the romulan war arc. I was really excited to read this since we didn't get season 5 of enterprise, but this book has the most boring war imaginable. Most of it is just political drama and journalism, and the space battles are sparse and anticlimactic.