The Blue Fairy's Bookshelf

Star Trek Omnibus Volume 2: Early Voyages Dan Abnett & Ian Edginton, Patrick Zircher, Michael Collins, Greg Adams, et. al. Collection published by IDW in 2009 This graphic novel contains the entire run of the Star Trek Early Voyages comic book, originally released in 1997-1998. I previously looked at a couple of loose issues in this post: Star Trek Comics : the 90's . I really enjoyed the majority of these issues, and I'm glad to have the series in this format. I do have a few quibbles, though. The reproduction of the art was uneven. Sometimes the page art went all the way to the edge, sometimes there was a white border. Many of the issues were bright and gorgeous, but for some the art had an odd grainy quality. My only explanation for this is that perhaps for some of the issues they no longer had the original art, and so had to reproduce it from a lower quality copy. The stories were strong and interesting, maintaining a old-school Star Trek feel while playi...

Well, that's all for Star Trek Week. In case you missed any of the posts, here's the list again: Monday May 30:  Provenance of Shadows   (Novel) Tuesday May 31:   Beyond Uhura  (Memoir) Wednesday June 1:  Reading Star Trek Comics: The Past Thursday June 2:   I Am Spock  (Memoir) Friday June 3:  Harbinger:Vanguard  (Novel) Saturday June 4:  Up Till Now  (Memoir) Sunday June 5:  Reading Star Trek Comics: The Present I think the take away from this is that I really enjoy Trek comics, and the occasional memoir, but I'm not in the mood for licensed novels this year. Ah, well. 

Star Trek: Burden of Knowledge Written by Scott and David Tipton Art by Federica Menfredi Colors by Andrea Priorini and Arianna Florean Since my jump back into collecting comic issues last year, some of the books I've been interested in are IDW's Star Trek titles. Scott Tipton (better known by me for Comics 101 ) on the cover was an additional enticement to check it out. Burden of Knowledge is a four-issue miniseries that came out in 2010. The writing in this is generally very strong, it echoes the tone and characters of the original series beautifully, without quoting directly. The art is a little shakier. The half-cartoony style is sometimes elevated by the computer coloring, and sometimes severely undermined by it. There are some beautiful panels, which look like the actors without feeling the need to be photo-realistic, and there are some badly misshapen faces. The plot of Burden of Knowledge is quite enjoyable: a series of linked encounters with aliens with ...

Up Till Now William Shatner and David Fisher, 2008 Note: I was not originally going to read this book as part of this project. I was originally going to read a completely different memoir, by a different actor. My husband objected to my doing a Star Trek unit without something by Shatner. I decided he was probably right, and that the other memoir was out of tone for this week, since it had little to do with The Original Series. Still, stay tuned for my other review soon. (Here's a spoiler: the other book is better.) Hmph. This book was, on some level, precisely what I expected. Self-deprecating on the surface, while swinging wildly between charming, funny, annoying, boring, and revolting. It often felt like it was trying too hard to be funny, which has its own tinge of pretension. And I was put off by the style. It's full of constant tangents, like 'commercials' and a weird sense of the middle ground between fact and fiction. Sometimes openly the narration...

Star Trek Vanguard: Harbinger David Mack, 2005 Premise: Plots, espionage and secrets ride just beneath the surface at Starbase 47, aka Vanguard. The plot contains mysterious artifacts, smugglers, gangsters, lovers and the opportune arrival of the Starship Enterprise. Set near the start of The Original Series. I wanted to like this book a lot more than I actually liked it. The plot is very convoluted, without much of a solid through-line, and there were so many characters that it got a good way into the book before I could start to keep them straight. I could see this working well as a series of episodes on a television show, actually; there was a succession of small climaxes and interweaving plot-lines that built on each other. I'm just not sure it's the best structure for a book. There was a lot of solid character work, spread between intriguing new characters and reliable canon characters. It was just... so many characters got POV time that it held back any mom...

I Am Spock Leonard Nimoy, 1995 Reading this book has caused me to think a bit about my own perspective. I wonder what it's like to read a book like this, an actor's memoir, and not have a background in the performing arts. Does it help people understand what it's like to work in the industry, or do they come away from the book thinking they understand, but with the wrong messages? I do come at this book with a background in performing arts, and am familiar with actors of many types, so what I get from this book, especially when combined with Beyond Uhura (reviewed here), is a plausible portrait of actors who seem an awful lot like actors I've known. A great deal of the book is concerned in assuring the reader that Nimoy really does love Spock, and that the title of his earlier memoir ( I Am Not Spock ) was never intended to convey animosity. From skimming excerpts of that book online, I would say that he is not exaggerating. The earlier book has the same ...

So last year we went to an awesome sale at my favorite comic book shop: Jim Hanley's Universe. And we bought a huge box of cheap back issues. 6 of these issues were of Star Trek Comics published by Marvel/Paramount, spanning three titles, originally printed between 1996 and 1998 Here's a survey of these scattered issues: Star Trek Unlimited #1 (Nov '96) Writers: Dan Abnett and Ian Edginton; Pencilers: Ron Randall, Carlos Garzon, Jerome Moore, Mark Buckingham; Inkers: Al Williamson, Derek Fisher, Kev F. Sutherland Two stories in this double size issue, both nicely written, true to their source material and with pretty decent art. The first story is based on Next Gen, and concerns a conflict about first contact between the crew of the Enterprise-D and representatives of a race with a much more hands on version of the Prime Directive. The second story is Original Series: the Enterprise follows a distress call and ends up in a shooting match with Gorn warships. Both ...

Beyond Uhura Nichelle Nichols, 1994 This was an awesome memoir. The Trek stories were fun of course, but it was really the span of Nichols' career and interests that intrigued me most. She was often in the right place at the right time to meet important directors and performers, and it's always enjoyable to get new perspectives on important movements in theater and dance. I feel a little silly saying it, but it is more affecting to have some stories told by someone you feel like you know – even if you only 'know' them from being a fan. Stories like when she loses a big contract when she refuses to sleep with a producer. or is assaulted and threatened when on an out of town job alone. A personal account of sexism and racism is simply more moving than statistics. The chapters dealing with her family and her heritage were fascinating: both moving and highly entertaining to read. Her account of every part of her life seemed very fair-minded. Her verbal pic...

Provenance of Shadows (Star Trek Crucible: McCoy) David R. George III, 2006 These books have been tempting me from the shelf of the local library for a while now, and I finally broke down and borrowed this one. I used to read Star Wars novels, but I haven't read much licensed fiction in a while. Premise: During the episode “City on the Edge of Forever,” Doctor McCoy went back in time, and created an alternate timeline. Kirk and Spock restored history, but on some level, McCoy both returned to the Enterprise with his friends and lived out the rest of his life in the 1930's. This book started strong.  I really enjoyed the beginning; it was fun and fast, and the idea of following alternate McCoy was great.  The problem was, it couldn't sustain its pace. The book is split between alternate McCoy living in the past and standard McCoy (of course, no relation to 2009's New!McCoy) living in the 2200's.  The story following AltMcCoy is actually really strong ...

Okay all you lucky people, it's time for another game of "Lindsay reads way too many books on one subject and/or theme!" I love Star Trek. I've always liked Star Trek, but only in the past few years have I really grown to love it. So of course I attempted to destroy my young and fragile love by reading a flood of related media. I've got reviews coming up of a bunch of memoirs, a couple novels, plus I'm going to revisit my small collection of Trek related comics. Next week, my friends, is old school. Wall to Wall Original Trek. Here's the schedule: Monday May 30: Provenance of Shadows (Novel) Tuesday May 31: Beyond Uhura (Memoir) Wednesday June 1: Reading Star Trek Comics: The Past Thursday June 2: I Am Spock (Memoir) Friday June 3: Harbinger:Vanguard (Novel) Saturday June 4: Up Till Now (Memoir) Sunday June 5: Reading Star Trek Comics: The Present Book Blogging - The Final Frontier!