The last of the Star Trek: Vanguard books I read as they came out was book five, Precipice, so from this point on, all my Vanguard reads will be new to me. Precipice came out in 2009, and the next Vanguard book, Declassified, came out in 2011. But 2022 saw the release of Harm's Way, an original series Star Trek book that takes place during Precipice and ties into the Vanguard saga. So, coming to the second half of the series as late as I was, I decided to read Harm's Way where it takes place chronologically, not by publication date. (Roughly, anyway. I didn't read it in the middle of Precipice, that would have been silly!*)
I seem to recall that, as originally designed by writer David Mack and editor Marco Palmieri, the premise of Vanguard was supposed to be flexible, to allow for any number of side stories from the saga's "main" story. (I think, perhaps, James Swallow pitched one, for example.) This ultimately didn't happen: each of the series's installments advanced the main story forward, instead of being just set against its backdrop.
Star Trek: The Original Series: Harm's Way |
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Published: 2022 Read: July 2026 |
Harm's Way possibly demonstrates why. The premise of the book is that three different ships end up investigating the disappearance of both Federation and Klingon scientists on a planet possibly containing traces of the Shedai meta-genome: the Enterprise, the scoutship Sagittarius from Vanguard Station, and a Klingon battlecruiser commanded by Kang from "Day of the Dove." (Interestingly, the book establishes that Kang and Kirk have met before, drawing on Michael Jan Friedman's My Brother's Keeper: Enterprise... a novel that presents an account of what the Enterprise did immediately after "Where No Man Has Gone Before" that totally contradicts Vanguard: Harbinger!) Kang and Kirk play cat-and-mouse games in space, while landing parties from the Starfleet and Federation vessels try to track the missing scientists on the planet.
The thing is, that for most of the book, the Vanguard stuff feels like set dressing. Most of the main characters of Vanguard are tied up by the events of Precipice, so the ones that put in substantive appearances here are minor, forgettable ones. We have a couple scenes of Admiral Nogura, one with Ming, one with the Andorian who replaced T'Prynn, but mostly it's the crew of the Sagittarius, who are pretty insignificant players in the saga of Vanguard and most of whom I barely remember even though I'm in the middle of reading the series. And since the book can't advance the plot of Vanguard, there can't be any new developments or discoveries when it comes to the meta-genome, that mean it's largely a maguffin: yes the crew has to track down this dangerous thing, but really it could be any kind of dangerous thing of the kind you're always tracking down in Star Trek stories.
I did think in the last third or so this changed a bit, for the better. The Vanguard series has consistently portrayed Shedai technology as something Starfleet is willing to go to untold lengths to either obtain or destroy, and so as events come to a climax, the characters on both sides make compromises I think they might not have otherwise. That I did find interesting and very much appreciated. Most of the planet-based stuff is your typical David Mack hard-action writing; if you like that kind of thing, it's well done, though I find contemporary idioms in the mouths of 1960s characters like Chekov and Sulu jarring.
The space stuff I wanted more out of. This is set shortly after "The Doomsday Machine," and Mack introduces an emotional conflict for Kirk: he's wondering if he would have made the same mistakes as Commodore Decker, and so second-guesses himself. This is an interesting idea, but I felt it didn't really go anywhere. Kirk is weirdly passive most of the book. I think Star Trek ship combat can support interesting inaction (see my second-favorite original series episode, "Balance of Terror"), but here, Kirk makes few interesting decisions and has few interesting ideas and few inspirational moments with his crew. Weirdly, the character to come out the best in the ship plotline is assistant chief engineer DeSalle. I just sort of feel like you've screwed up your original series novel if that happens. (DeSalle sucks, though I find him funny.)
Speaking of characterization, this book features the Vanguard characterization standby: a scene where a character is constantly annoyed by another character yet doesn't say anything to the extent that the annoyed character comes across like the asshole, not the one doing the annoying. Here, it's the Sagitarius's captain, who gets all precious about eating his breakfast pastry undisturbed when DeSalle wants to talk to him. You're the captain, put on your big-boy pants and say, "Let me finish my coffee first!"
So anyway, this is fine, but ultimately kind of inessential. Anyone reading (or rereading) Vanguard would never miss it.
(This my third week in a row reviewing a David Mack novel on this blog. Clearly he is my number-one author!)
* Though I have been prone to such silliness in the past.
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