CAUGHT BETWEEN KLINGONS AND THE CHATALIA

 

Name: World Without End   

Author: Joe Haldeman  

Publication Date: 2/1979

Publisher: Bantam Books

Page Number: 150

Historian’s Note:  Sometime after Planet of Judgement

Cast of Characters:  Captain James T. Kirk       Commander Spock              Dr. Leonard H. McCoy AKA “Bones”              Lieutenant Commander Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty”       Lieutenant Commander Andre Charvat           Lieutenant  Hikaru Sulu              Lieutenant Nyota Uhura              Lieutenant Martin Larousse                Lieutenant B. "Tuck" Wilson           Lieutenant Sydny          Lieutenant Gary              Nurse Christine Chapel          Ensign Pavel Chekov      Ensign Glak Sōn           Ensign Berry            Ensign Amstel         Ensign Parker Tinney              Ensign Fitzsimmons           Ensign Masters            Crewman Jakobs                      Captain Kulain                     Kal                          Karez                     W'Chaal                   T'Kyma        T'Lallis         T'oomi

Starships and/or Starbases: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, IKS Korezima, unnamed-crashed Klingon ship, Chatalia

Planets: none

My Spoiler filled summary and review: In their normal course of exploring space, the Enterprise comes across something that seems to resemble a generational ship.  Every now and again they find one of these relics that predates warp drive.  However, this one has not come from any Federation world but rather from a solar system that died thousands of years ago.  The vessel is huge, and sensors indicate there are millions of life forms living in a planet-like environment.  It has a problem with its current rate of deceleration, it should come to a complete stop nowhere near a star, and this will mean it will run out of energy to absorb and everyone will die.

The Enterprise finds something strange

Captain Kirk has always felt that extinction means a culture can’t develop anymore, therefore he decides the Prime Directive doesn’t apply and will mount a rescue.  He has a landing party organized under the banner of a “confrontation team” that consists of himself, McCoy, and a few security personnel.  Giving the strange metal that this thing is made out of they want to make sure their transporter will work first.   Spock and Uhura send down a beacon and when they can communicate with it, they decide to send the landing party.  Which turns out to be a huge mistake because although they can beam things in easily enough, they are unable to beam things out. “The confrontation team” is stuck.

When the landing party beamed down, they found that the natives are strange creatures that sort of resemble flying squirrels on Earth.  They have large towers, and the crew sees many of the locals flying from building to building. It is both their wings and the low gravity (lower than Earth’s moon) that gives them the power of flight or at least gliding.  Even after the Starfleet personnel materialized in the public square the landing party was ignored by the locals. It wasn’t until Kirk tried to talk with them that they screamed and scattered.  After a few moments an armed and organized group with a leader shows up.  This one is a little more open to taking, but not really listening.  This person cannot believe that there is an “outside” where people can come from.  He thinks they must be “magicians,” who are the ruling group on this planet.  Kirk and company cannot get the locals, known as the Chatalia, to accept the truth but McCoy convinces them that they might be magicians with amnesia.

The Enterprise is known to encounter bizarre aliens

They are taken from the public square and brought to “police headquarters” for lack of a better term.  There the landing party’s weapons are taken but they are allowed to keep their medical bag, tricorders, and universal translator.  There they learn about the society of Chatalia.  To explain this, I will quote from the book directly when Spock was entering a Captain’s Log.

“Every individual belongs to a family and a caste level assigned to him.  He may only speak to members of his own caste, or those immediately above or below him.  Isolation of the individual is further intensified by the fact that each family has its own language.  Thus, a second-class carpenter might be allowed to speak to a second-class baker, but they wouldn’t be able to understand one another.

“Therefore one of the largest families is the interpreter family.  Almost every transaction beyond the level of simple barter requires one of these Chatalia.

“The magicians, who are relatively few in number, are exempt from the caste restriction, and may speak to anyone, although they also require interpreters.  They evidently have only two castes, first and second, and the first-caste individuals are rarely seen.  Their main function seems to be reproduction, which the informer claims is done by magic.

“The population is strictly controlled.  When an individual dies, a replacement is delivered, after a lag time of about two years.

“The word ‘child’ does not translate.  According to the informant, fully grown individuals are delivered by the magicians to the lan-Chatalia, who live in the rural areas surrounding the city.  There they are trained, and eventually delivered to their families.” (pg. 34-35)

The Enterprise finds something interesting near the surface of Chatalia.  It is a century-old wreck of a Klingon cruiser.  Upon expecting the wreck Lt. Sulu’s team discovers some bodies of a few dead Klingons, but not enough for the whole crew, and some recordings.  They listen to the recordings to find out that the ship was pulled to the surface of Chatalia and that attempted to flee causes ship’s hull to be damaged.  That their power was drained, eventually they used the last of their power to beam everyone down except the priests who all committed ritual suicide.  Shortly after discovering the fate of the Klingons, the bridge crew with orders from Spock checked to make sure the ship was at safer distance than the Klingons were when they were caught.  It turns out the Enterprise was already trapped and being pulled in. 

The Klingons causing trouble

The landing party gets to meet a magician, who is already angry with the regular Chatalia, named W'Chaal, for getting too friendly with them.  It turns out that unlike the regular Chatalia magicians get to keep their memories every time they are reborn. T'Lallis, the magician, access Kirk and his party of being Klingons.  This both offends and amuses the Starfleet officers.  They try to explain that they are not Klingons, but T’Lallis, isn’t having it. 

The Enterprise is going to have to be abandoned in a few days if the power drain continues.  They deactivate everything to slow it down.  Confident that Scotty can lead the ship through the necessary steps if they are to be evacuated, Spock decides to join the landing party.  He arrives to knock out T’Lallis and free the captured crew.  They realize that in order to save the ship they will have to make contact with those doing the actual running of Chatalia, the vessel. They reason that the first-class magicians are those very people.  

One of Chatalia trying to figure out how a phaser works caused an explosion in the lab killing himself and several of his fellows.  The landing party gather their remaining phasers to take both T’Lallis and W’Chaal prisoner and demand to be brought to the land where first-class magicians are.  Along the way they get to learn more about Chatalia society.  When they “borrow” a cart from a farmer they learn that they aren’t actually stealing it because all property belongs to the magicians.  More importantly the landing party learns that when making new replacement Chatalia sometimes they screw up the process and end up with deformed creatures who can’t be placed with the rest of society.  So, they are dumped in this area all to themselves where they live as predatory monsters.  The landing party is able to battle these poor creatures and get part them to the obstacle.

It turns out the Enterprise wasn’t the only ship trying to explore Chatalia.  The IKS Korezima has intercepted the Enterprise’s transmission to Starfleet.  Instead of getting too close to get caught like both their adversary and predecessors, Captain Kulain is going to attack from a distance with what they call a nova bomb.  To make sure the Organian Peace Treaty isn’t violated the send the Enterprise a warning, knowing full well that the Enterprise can’t do anything about it. 

Scotty makes a plan to shoot down the bomb by staying behind and manning the Enterprise’s phaser banks.  On the surface have come to a point where they have to fly to get where they want to go, which is Magicians’ Island.  Fortunately, in this low gravity they can do that with artificial wings.  Ensign Parker Tinney, who has lived on the moon and flies there all the time, is sent down to coach them how. They attempt it but are apprehended half-way by the magicians, which is just as well because that is where they wanted to go. 

With the Enterprise freezing with no life support on, Scotty is keeping warm with a fire.  It turns out the Klingon bomb is a dud because the Chatalia absorbs all of its energy at impact.  The Klingons decide they are going to have to get closer and physically build a bomb inside Chatalia even if it costs them their lives.

The Enterprise surrounded in darkness 

On the Magicians’ Island the phasers no longer work.  To the landing party’s disappointment, it turns out the first-class magicians don’t know any more about that Chatalia’s status as a world ship.  Spock tries to mind-meld with one and nothing happens.  They bring them to what they call the Father Machine, this is where the magicians are reborn.  One of the red shirts tries to get red shirted, but the Father Machine spits him out.  It speaks declares that humans are gross—which I guess they could have predicted as the Catalia’s couldn’t touch the humans because of salt in the humans’ skin—and it says it wants to eat some Klingons.  Spock goes in actual gets reborn that he describes as just a transporter set to “slow.”  He is able to mind meld with the Father Machine.  The Father Machine explains that it is the only sentient life on this place.  It knows all about the ship slowing down and is cool with the idea.  It already has the capabilities to survive under such conditions with its technology.  So, the Enterprise crew was really just wasting their time.  It says it will let the Enterprise go if they can get it some more Klingons to eat and consume—not replace.  Spock agrees.  When back on the ship Spock contacts the Klingons and explains without any deception what the Father Machine is, what it plans to do, what their odds would be if taking this challenge (not good) and waits for them to respond. The Klingons are excited for the challenge and will face it like warriors.   With that the Enterprise is allowed to go along her way.    

Additional thoughts: This is a great story, fun to read, this strange world and its people are interesting that the reader will enjoy exploring with Captain Kirk and his crew.  And even though it was also good, I do like this story more than the author’s previous book: “Planet of Judgement.”  It manages to feel original even though this concept has been tried in the franchise a couple of times already.  The idea “let’s have some people in a spaceship who don’t know they’re in a spaceship they just think it’s their natural world,” was tried with first “For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky” and it was also for the Star Trek book “The Starless World.” In the later story the Klingons also poke their noses in.  I will state I liked this one the best out of the three, the alien world of Chatalia was a lot more fun to explore.  

There were a couple of science-y questions about some of the plot details like the whole issue of the pre-warp artificial world/generational ship decelerating?  I thought in space that would never happen that they would maintain whatever speed forever until they hit something.  Also, if life support is offline and Scotty is warming himself with the fire won’t the fire burn up all the limited oxygen that was left?  I am not sure about that last one, it was just a thought I had while reading the story.  The author decided to give Kirk a little bit of an origin story that would not line up with the rest of the series. I am breaking a little bit of my rule about not discussing future Trek and evaluate only by what existed at the time the work was created.  However, since Kirk was a Starfleet brat who followed his father into the service is so well known with the fandom, I couldn’t help but briefly mention it. 

So, Disney is still the 23^rd century?  And now they have a theme park on the moon!  I am really happy to hear that Disney is doing so well in the 23^rd century.  I bet the park on the moon is cool.  I wonder if other Federation worlds have a Disney resort?  I bet not Vulcan.

Okay I really don’t except the discovery at the end that the Chatalia are not really alive and just creations of the Father Machine.  Even if the Father Machine truly believes this and is responsible for their creation, they clearly have evolved beyond that.  T’Lallis and W'Chaal clearly had fully formed personalities.  W’Chaal was conservative but very intellectually curious.  He was eager to learn about these visitors and listen to their tales even though he might lose his life over it.   Even if he is replaced his new self wouldn’t have his memories.  T’Lallis is vain, full of himself, and entitled.  The very image of a born aristocrat.  It’s hard to reconcile that as being pieces of the Father Machine when T’Lallis was overly concerned with keeping secrets from W’Chaal.  It reminds me of Solipsism, a concept I have always rejected as being ridiculous in nature.  If true, every time I am talking on the phone, I am just talking to myself, for the purpose of amusing myself.  It makes my time working in a call center strange. I think the idea of the Father Machine being the only true living thing might have sounded great when it was a thought in the author’s mind, but after exploring the world it just comes off as weird foot note in the end of the story.

I really like how the Klingons were written here. When they were first introduced in “Errand of Mercy” they were shown to be a warrior race that loves combat.  Kor was salivating against the idea of facing Captain Kirk and hated his duty on Organia ruling over people who looked like farmers.  They also depicted this way under Kang in “Day of the Dove.”  For the rest of the series, however, they became rather sleazy fighting the Federation using cheap tricks.  The best example of that was “The Trouble with Tribbles” where the Klingons had a spy trying poison the Federation’s colony.  Most of the books reviewed for this blog so far have been the sleazy Klingons in almost every appearance.  These ones are warriors, and they are excited for the opportunity for a warrior’s death. 

 Spock compared the Father Machine to a transporter. The Father Machine uses saved patterns to recreate the dead.  During the Animated Series we often saw the Enterprise crew use the transporter for a cure.  Most notably the episodes “The Lorelei Signal” and “The Counter-Clock Incident.”  So, the story has clear precedent.  

Should it be canon: With exception to some minor details like Kirk’s farmer dad, I think yes, the main story would be a great addition to Star Trek canon. 

Cover Art: An odd cover, with Captain Kirk looking more like Ben Shapiro than William Shatner with his wrists bound. McCoy right behind him. Nothing but red background and picture of Chatalia in the bottom viewer’s right corner.

Final Grade: Final Grade 5 of 5

 

A STRANGE PLANET, A STRANGER PEOPLE, AND A STANGE ADVENTURE

 

Name: Planet of Judgment   

Authors: Joe Haldeman  

Publication Date: 8/1977

Publisher: Bantam Books

Page Number: 151

Historian’s Note:  Sometime between The Counter-clock Incident and The Motion Picture

Cast of Characters:  Captain James T. Kirk       Commander Spock              Dr. Leonard H. McCoy AKA “Bones”              Lieutenant Commander Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty”       Lieutenant Commander Andre Charvat           Lieutenant  Hikaru Sulu              Lieutenant Nyota Uhura              Lieutenant Sharon Follett                Lieutenant Hevelin           Lieutenant Bill Hixon          Nurse Christine Chapel          Ensign Pavel Chekov      Ensign Bish Davoff            Ensign Frost            Ensign Octavio Hernandez          Ensign Alan Huff              Ensign Bill Johnson           Ensign Sikh            Ensign Rosaly Ybarra             Crewman Mark Moore          Dr. James Atheling           Captain Mohammed Tafari       Lieutenant Tabakow                Crewman Delacroix           The Arivne main voice       Irapina (three representatives)

Starships and/or Starbases: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, USS Lysander NCC-540, five unnamed shuttlecrafts

Planets: Anomaly

My Spoiler filled summary and review: The Enterprise is transporting Dr. James Atheling to take over the science department at Starfleet Academy.  In his short stay, Dr. Atheling, has become something of a celebrity among Spock’s department.  While on their way the ship encounters a rouge planet.  A rouge planet is a planet flying through space attached to no solar system.  Yet, this one is out right bizarre.  For it has an Earth-like atmosphere.  It also seems to be orbiting a black hole as its “sun” despite the fact that such a system should be impossible.  Since their primary mission is to explore strange new worlds, Kirk decides to take a detour and explore this little world.

They plan to transport to the service but when Kirk has his landing party available it is discovered that the transporter, for some reason, is not working. So, the Captain instructs Scotty and his engineers to get to work on the transporters in the meantime he will take his party to the surface via shuttlecraft.  They take a shuttlecraft to the surface and while the trip was fine the landing party discovers as soon as they land that the shuttlecraft suddenly stopped working.  The engine is off and the communication system is out.  As far as their individual equipment goes everything but the communicators are working. 

Shuttle stuck on the ground

With the landing party not communicating with the ship, it made Mr. Spock wonder if his they were still alive.  This is kind of extreme scenario to jump to as there may be many things keeping the landing party from communicating however Spock says that would be the most logical.  They find the shuttle on the planet but the sensors do not indicate any life forms. Spock sends a security team on a second shuttle and when as soon as they touch down the Enterprise loses all contact with them. Spock decides that instead of having just two shuttles trapped on the planet he might as well have all five. He organizes a much larger landing party to make use of the three shuttles. He decides to lead the mission himself and leaves Scotty in command of the Enterprise. Spock orders the Chief Engineer to take the ship to the Academy planet for support if they are unable to maintain contact. (We learn that Starfleet Academy has a whole planetary campus that we never heard about, more on that later.)  With that the three shuttles leave the Enterprise and head down to the planet.

Now with all shuttles down on the planet and stuck the combined landing parties organize and form a perimeter to best defend themselves against whatever might be out there.  The team is caught between the Prime Directive and its own survival.  Among the landing party is Dr. James Atheling.  It turns out the Academy professor is actually a commodore in the Starfleet reserves, and pulled rank to go on the mission.  Kirk sends out scouting teams to search for food in case they run out of rations. Over the next two days however they lose two crewmen.  They discover that the native life forms, who were responsible for one crewman’s death, have hair all over their bodies and they don’t have anything that looks like eyes or ears.  Their mouths have no tongue their hands have four long fingers.  However, things really hit the fan when Lt. Bill Hixon gets attacked and begins to physically transform into one of the planet’s native inhabitants.  When they find him his eyes and ears are missing, but he has gained the ability to communicate telepathically.  Everyone in the landing party is horrified by what happened except for Nixon himself.  The mutated human seems to think the changes are great and he is better for them.  I almost wanted to say “where we’re going, we don’t need eyes to see” but that is in a different science fiction story.

Going to the rescue

They learn from the mutated comrade they learn that the people who live on this planet are the Arivne. (Arivne is actual a Vulcan term but these people think term explains them so they adopt it.) The Arivne want to test their visitors but they do not clarify the reason.  Then through some unknown power they are able to transport all those of the landing party and the shuttlecrafts back onto the Enterprise. The only people they keep are the science and medical officers.  When the remaining party realizes that their companions and transports are going, McCoy accuses them of murder.  The Arivne explain what they actually did and begin their tests.  They force the remaining party to relieve some of their most unpleasant memories.  Spock relives the events of “Amok Time,” McCoy relives the day his wife and child left him and he decided to join Starfleet in response, Atheling revives a moment of guilt when cheated in college, and the others also experience equally unpleasant things.

Back on the ship the crew is relieved to have its Captain back no matter how strange it is, but they want to know what the Arivne plan to do with their missing colleagues.  Lt. Uhura also discovers that the Enterprise is repeatedly sending out a message to Starfleet designed to look like it comes from Captain Kirk.  The message states that they have encounter a virus that has wiped out a third of their crew, and caused the survivors to hallucinate.  The message was so convincing that for a moment they wondered if maybe they were hallucinating and did an attendance check to find out that the crew who were listed as dead were actually alive. Kirk then orders the Enterprise to return to the Anomaly planet.

At this point the Arivne confess to the remaining Starfleet crew.  They are aware of a malevolent alien race bent on conquest called the Irapina.  These nasty creatures are insectoids whose elite rulers use the lower classes for involuntary organ donation to make themselves immortal.  The Arivne became aware of them do to their extreme telepathic powers, and were able to communicate. At first the Arivne were hopeful that Irapina would just ignore them and instead conqueror the rest of the Alpha Quadrant. However, the more they “talked” to them the Arvine came to the conclusion that they could not trust the Irapina at to leave them alone.  So, they decided to scare them off by telling them of the Federation.  In order to scare the Irapina, they built up the Federation to be far powerful than it actually is.  The Irapina now want to test in contest wills the Federation and their Starfleet officers.

The Enterprise’s trip to the Anomaly planet is delayed when they are stopped by the USS Lysander.  The Lysander has been ordered to bring the Enterprise in.  Not wanting to fire on a Federation starship, Kirk surrenders.  That is when the Arvine arrive, they now want the Enterprise back, so they let Captain Tafari of the Lysander know the truth of the matter and demonstrate their abilities to alter perceived reality.  Tafari agrees to let the Enterprise go with the understand that he and Kirk will need to be witnesses in each other’s court-martial. 

Not being patient, the Arvine use their powers to bring Kirk back to the planet before his ship can get there.  They sent everyone else back but quickly recalled McCoy because he was needed.  The Irapina has sent three representatives to perform in the challenges.  It turns out these challenges take place on a plane of illusion where all six members were put into a trance and their minds were linked in a simulation.  McCoy’s simulated competition was a poker game.  Despite all the normal rules being ignored McCoy wins and his opponent is killed by his other two comrades.  Kirk and Spock compete with their opponents at the same time but on different fields.  Kirk is a battle of old wooden ships on the high seas. (Since Kirk is based off Horatio Hornblower, I wonder if this is an intended easter egg by the author.)  Spock is completing with science knowledge.  The Irapina are cheating but Kirk and Spock beat them anyway.

Kirk fighting in a different type of enviroment than he is used to.
1743 oil panting by Samuel Scott

The Irapina end the simulation and attack them in real life.  However, the bugs learn that Captain Kirk is greatest fighter in the known universe whose skills always leave his opponents spell bound.   Spock is not a bad fighter, either.  In addition, the Arvine augmented the strength of the two officers, allowing Kirk and Spock to throw entire trees at their opponents.  

The Irapina gave up.  They decided that when they get to this sector of space, they will go an invade the Romulans instead because the Federation was far too dangerous an opponent.  With that it was time for the crew of the Enterprise to leave.  As they left the Arvine removed from Enterprise’s computer banks the location of the Anomaly planet.  So that in the future they will be left alone.  

Additional thoughts: When I first read the back cover to this story, I thought we were going to get something similar to “Shore Leave.”  I like “Shore Leave” nevertheless I was pleased that this book was nothing like that.  I thought the claim from the back cover of “Never before had their systems, instruments and weapons failed to respond” as false. I can think of a number of times that has happened for different reasons.  However, since I started this blog to begin my own personal re-journey through the franchise of Star Trek, this story is much better written than all the ones that preceded it.  I have read a number of Star Trek books so I know this won’t remain the case as this journey goes on but it is my favorite one reviewed so far.

A very different adventure

I like the use of both Star Trek’s actual past in the series as well as making new content to tell the story.  When the Arvine were making the landing party relive their past, is the best example.  Spock was forced to go the memory of getting rejected by T’Pring, having the challenge issued, and the battle where Spock thought he killed Kirk.  Haldeman’s description gives the reader a “re-watch” of “Amok Time,” but there are added parts as well.  Such as Spock’s internal thoughts on the matter of the rejection.  The challenge is viewed as old fashioned even though it is still law.  Most Vulcans who don’t want to marry their parents’ choice usually go through the ceremony and get an annulment later.  However, the annulment is a shameful embarrassment to both families but it is still better than the challenge.  Here the reader can see how deep this rejection really was to Mr. Spock.

The only thing I didn’t like was the added dialogue.  In this re-telling T’Pau tells T’Pring that once this marriage is complete, she will be like chattel to the winner, with no rights at all.  This baloney Vulcan society does not treat its women like that.  They are equals.  Now, in the episode it did say she would be the “property” of the winner.  I never took that to mean in the literal sense.  I always assume it was just some vestige term from a time Vulcan had a more patriarchal society.  Like “the father ‘giving’ his daughter away” in Western society.  It meant something different along time ago, but nowadays it is just a loving tradition between father and daughter not a property exchange.  However, T’Pau’s new dialogue rejects my interpretation and hammers home the woman-as-property status.

McCoy’s trip to the past made him relive the day his wife and daughter left him.  McCoy’s work obsession kept him at the hospital so long that his marriage fell apart. Once dumped he finds an ad for Starfleet medical officers.  It was some nice background into one of Star Trek’s most popular characters and I enjoyed it. 

I thought what the author did with the other characters was interesting too.  Lt. Follett re-living her decision to get an abortion so she wouldn’t have to postpone a career in Starfleet was a daring decision.  Roe v. Wade was only four years old when this book came out, and the author chooses to include but not make that big of a deal.  By the 23^rd century a woman’s right to body autonomy is a given.  Too bad that is not true in the 21^st century.

Modern Star Trek fans might find a bit of a shock that prior to Star Trek IV it was common to hear Starfleet officers to talk about money.  Dr. Atheling talked about how he used to have to work in order to cover expenses that his scholarships weren’t paying.  It had its benefits because it allowed him to cheat on an exam.

I also enjoyed when they went for a second round of bad memories, Spock had a moment where he was rejected by his human cousins, who tried to frame him for something they did.  This ended the relationship of Amanda and her sister.

I though the Arvine reminded me of the Talosians.  They had similar powers and they needed the less evolved species to help them do something they could not.  Unlike the Talosians, the Arvine were also highly intelligent.  I do like when it was mentioned that the Arvine tried to contact the Organians for help.

The Arvine just as powerful and more intelligent than these three!

So, Starfleet Academy has its own planet?  Why? So, they have a San Francisco campus and a second campus that takes up an entire planet. If you have a planetary campus then what do you need the smaller one for? Not to mention the massive distance between the two would make the set-up seem improbable.

Lastly, I want to talk about Kirk’s willing surrender to Captain Tafari of the Lysander.  This is such a difference from the traditional Star Trek troupe of defying any order that the characters think is wrong. In a typical story Kirk would have been “sorry I know my friends are in danger, I can’t let you stop me.”  And he might even go so far to engage in battle with the other vessel to the point of crippling it.  Afterwards they would just ask for forgiveness that they always seemed to receive off screen.  In this little story once Kirk realizes that Tafari’s orders of genuine he just complies.  There is even no sign in Kirk’s internal monologue about breaking free and getting back to the Anomaly planet.  

Should it be canon: I would have no problem having this story as official canon in Star Trek lore. It fits all my normal standards.  Like most episodes of the classic series, the book is a self-contained adventure, where everything has returned to the status quo for all the main characters. No major event or discovery effects any of the traditional alien cultures such as the Vulcans, Klingons, or Romulans.  There are some continuity conflicts such as the book’s instance that Starfleet Academy has its own planet. I don’t see these being any different than the many later contradicted statements in the original series. 

Cover Art: The cover features the USS Enterprise as seen from slightly below the port side. The ship appears to be flying over some skyscrapers.  The viewer cannot see much below the skyscrapers because of clouds that obscure it.  Behind the starship is a moon.  Overall, it’s a striking image.

Final Grade: Final Grade 4 of 5