IniciGrupsConversesMésTendències
Cerca al lloc
Aquest lloc utilitza galetes per a oferir els nostres serveis, millorar el desenvolupament, per a anàlisis i (si no has iniciat la sessió) per a publicitat. Utilitzant LibraryThing acceptes que has llegit i entès els nostres Termes de servei i política de privacitat. L'ús que facis del lloc i dels seus serveis està subjecte a aquestes polítiques i termes.

Resultats de Google Books

Clica una miniatura per anar a Google Books.

S'està carregant…

A Time to Kill

de David Mack

MembresRessenyesPopularitatValoració mitjanaMencions
282193,039 (3.78)4
On the cusp of their epic battle with Shinzon, many of Captain Jean-Luc Picard's long time crew were heading for new assignments and new challenges. Among the changes were William Riker's promotion to captain and his new command, Riker's marriage to Counselor Deanna Troi, and Dr. Beverly Crusher's new career at Starfleet Medical. But the story of what set them on a path away from the Starship Enterprise(tm) has never been told. UNTIL NOW. At the height of the Dominion War and unknown to all save those in the highest levels of command, the Federation secretly armed the neutral planet Tezwa with devastating weapons -- part of a contingency plan against the Dominion if the front lines collapsed. But Tezwa also lies near the border of the Klingon Empire...making the Federation's covert strategy in direct violation of their fragile peace treaties,and creating the potential threat of scandal and all-out war. Now Tezwa's power-hungry prime minister is all too eager to flex his newfound military muscle, menacing a nearby Klingon border world. Sent on an urgent diplomatic mission, Captain Picard and the Enterprise crew are caught in the crossfire as the crisis quickly escalates. With time running out and billions of lives at stake, only one man can avert the looming disaster -- Ambassador Worf, who must choose between his oath to the Federation and his loyalty to Martok, Chancellor of the Klingon Empire....… (més)
Cap
S'està carregant…

Apunta't a LibraryThing per saber si aquest llibre et pot agradar.

No hi ha cap discussió a Converses sobre aquesta obra.

» Mira també 4 mencions

Not long ago I rekindled my interest in the Star Trek tie-in novels thanks to the narrative thread concerning the shady Section 31 and its heavy involvement in Federation policies: through David Mack’s Control and Collateral Damage I learned of a dark event in the continuing story, one concerning a corrupt Federation president and the unavoidable conspiracy to remove him from office. At the time, most of the people involved in the situation, including Captain Picard, did not know that Section 31 had decided to later kill president Zife, which in the end caused the Enterprise’s captain to be prosecuted for his role in the whole sorry mess.

A Time to Kill, and its companion novel A Time to Heal, portray the circumstances that led to the massive interstellar crisis which later decreed Zife’s removal from office: these books represent a prequel to the ones I mentioned before, and they helped me put in better focus the overall story - they are also part of a longer series filling the blanks between the end of the Dominion War and the events of the movie Nemesis, which marks several changes in the composition of the Enterprise’s complement.

In the darkest hours of the Dominion War president Zife and his closest advisors (probably prompted by Section 31) decided to arm the planet Tezwa, lying close to the Klingon border, with a new kind of devastating weapon as a last resort against the invasion, although it was a choice in direct violation of the treaties between the Federation and the Empire. Now that the Dominion threat is no more, Kinchawn - Tezwa’s new Prime Minister and a power-hungry individual - threatens to encroach on Klingon territory, knowing that those same weapons would give him a formidable advantage. Picard and the Enterprise are sent to defuse this potentially explosive situation, but lack of knowledge of the powerful armament’s existence, or of the Federation’s higher echelons’ involvement, places him and his crew in a disastrous situation that looks more like a no-win scenario with every passing hour…

As I found out with the two previous Star Trek tie-in books written by David Mack, this is not the kind of story we saw in the televised episodes, where no matter how dire the situation, or how troublesome the political implications, at the end of the episode’s 45 minutes a solution is found and everything is tied up nicely: A Time to Kill is a thrilling mix of action sequences and behind-the-scenes machinations that combine to depict what is probably the worst diplomatic crisis ever faced by the Federation and make this novel a compelling page turner. The story also focuses on a good number of new faces among the Enterprise’s complement, which helps in broadening the narrative scope and gifting the novel with a definite choral feel by presenting these people with a depth of background, motivations and dilemmas that turn them into something more than cardboard characters to be introduced in one scene and killed off in the next.

One major thread in the story concerns the commando-style mission carried out by the crew to destroy the six weapons emplacements scattered across the planet before the guns can be used against the advancing Klingon fleet: the POV shifts between the various teams, and the problems they encounter in the mission, provide all the adrenaline one could ask for - and more - and offer a dramatic counterpoint to the equally difficult diplomatic situation faced by Captain Picard, who’s compelled to ask his former officer Worf, now the Federation ambassador to the Klingon empire, to perform a covert and dangerous operation on his own homeworld.

Nonetheless, even though these sections offer a compelling read, I found that what happens on Earth in the rarefied heights of politics represents the true backbone of the story, mostly because I discovered that the infamous president Zife looks little more than a front for his Machiavellian chief adviser - a man gifted with great strategic skills but cursed with a chilling lack of empathy - and that the Section 31 masterminds are the real movers and shakers of the whole scenario. What I find fascinating here is the strong House of Cards vibes I derived from this part of the story, where cut-throat politics and scheming feel very unlike what we have been shown of the Federation so far, while making me wonder how much of its flawless public image was really just a façade. It all fits with what I’ve learned so far about Section 31’s involvement in the management of Federation politics, and it also shows the author’s skill in developing this concept of the darkness at the core of the utopia, and expanding it in the later books.

Character-wise, A Time to Kill offers some intriguing angles on the ones we know best, showing how recent events plagued them with some insecurities which weigh heavily on the choices they have to make: in a sense this makes them more sympathetic and helps to show they are normal people trying to deal with extraordinary issues, rather than larger-than-life heroes. Oddly enough, I find I like these characters more when they are less heroic and invincible, because they end up feeling more real.

As the first part of a duology, this book ends with something of a cliffhanger and I count myself fortunate to have had the possibility of reading the sequel back to back, because the wait would otherwise have been hard to bear… ( )
  SpaceandSorcery | Aug 27, 2021 |
Sense ressenyes | afegeix-hi una ressenya

Pertany a aquestes sèries

Star Trek (2004.08)
Has d'iniciar sessió per poder modificar les dades del coneixement compartit.
Si et cal més ajuda, mira la pàgina d'ajuda del coneixement compartit.
Títol normalitzat
Informació del coneixement compartit en anglès. Modifica-la per localitzar-la a la teva llengua.
Títol original
Títols alternatius
Data original de publicació
Gent/Personatges
Informació del coneixement compartit en anglès. Modifica-la per localitzar-la a la teva llengua.
Llocs importants
Esdeveniments importants
Pel·lícules relacionades
Epígraf
Informació del coneixement compartit en anglès. Modifica-la per localitzar-la a la teva llengua.
The last temptation is the greatest treason: to do the right deed for the wrong reason.
--T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral
Dedicatòria
Primeres paraules
Informació del coneixement compartit en anglès. Modifica-la per localitzar-la a la teva llengua.
The blaster pulse stretched with a surreal, elastic quality as it missed Commander William Riker, who had been pushed out of harm's way at the final moment by his father, Kyle Riker.
Citacions
Darreres paraules
Informació del coneixement compartit en anglès. Modifica-la per localitzar-la a la teva llengua.
Nota de desambiguació
Editor de l'editorial
Creadors de notes promocionals a la coberta
Llengua original
CDD/SMD canònics
LCC canònic

Referències a aquesta obra en fonts externes.

Wikipedia en anglès (1)

On the cusp of their epic battle with Shinzon, many of Captain Jean-Luc Picard's long time crew were heading for new assignments and new challenges. Among the changes were William Riker's promotion to captain and his new command, Riker's marriage to Counselor Deanna Troi, and Dr. Beverly Crusher's new career at Starfleet Medical. But the story of what set them on a path away from the Starship Enterprise(tm) has never been told. UNTIL NOW. At the height of the Dominion War and unknown to all save those in the highest levels of command, the Federation secretly armed the neutral planet Tezwa with devastating weapons -- part of a contingency plan against the Dominion if the front lines collapsed. But Tezwa also lies near the border of the Klingon Empire...making the Federation's covert strategy in direct violation of their fragile peace treaties,and creating the potential threat of scandal and all-out war. Now Tezwa's power-hungry prime minister is all too eager to flex his newfound military muscle, menacing a nearby Klingon border world. Sent on an urgent diplomatic mission, Captain Picard and the Enterprise crew are caught in the crossfire as the crisis quickly escalates. With time running out and billions of lives at stake, only one man can avert the looming disaster -- Ambassador Worf, who must choose between his oath to the Federation and his loyalty to Martok, Chancellor of the Klingon Empire....

No s'han trobat descripcions de biblioteca.

Descripció del llibre
Sumari haiku

Debats actuals

Cap

Cobertes populars

Dreceres

Valoració

Mitjana: (3.78)
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5 1
3 9
3.5 2
4 13
4.5
5 5

Ets tu?

Fes-te Autor del LibraryThing.

 

Quant a | Contacte | LibraryThing.com | Privadesa/Condicions | Ajuda/PMF | Blog | Botiga | APIs | TinyCat | Biblioteques llegades | Crítics Matiners | Coneixement comú | 203,225,192 llibres! | Barra superior: Sempre visible