Star Trek: Titan #2: The Red king
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| |||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Authors
Discover books, learn about writers, and more.
Product Description
Product Description
Following their harrowing mission in the first Titan novel, TAKING WING, in which they were thrust into the heart of the war-torn Romulan Empire, Captain Riker and the crew of the starship Titan join forces with a task force of former foes. Together they investigate an eighty-year-old mystery involving a strange offshoot of humanity known as the Neyel, introduced in the authors' best-selling Lost Era novel, THE SUNDERED. Catapulted to a distant neighbouring galaxy, the task force of Klingons and Romulans is devastated by forces that have apparently already brought about the destruction of the Neyel civilization. Titan's intrepid crew must learn what really became of the Neyel before the force that felled them sets its sights on the Federation.
About the Author
Andy Mangels is the USA Today best-selling author and co-author of over a dozen novels cowritten with Michael A. Martin. He is also the best-selling author of several nonfiction books, including Star Wars: The Essential Guide to Characters and Animation on DVD: The Ultimate Guide. Michael A. Martin has written numerous Star Trek books and e-books, including The Romulan War and (with Andy Mangels) the first two bestselling novels in the Titan series, the Enterprise novels The Last Full Measure, The Good That Men Do, and Kobayashi Maru, and the Sy Fy Portal Genre Award-winning Star Trek: The Worlds of Deep Space 9, Vol. Two. He lives in Portland, Oregon.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
First Sentence
"Behold," Frane said, unable to keep a slight tremor of awe out of his voice. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
"Behold," Frane said, unable to keep a slight tremor of awe out of his voice. Read the first page
Explore More
Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Mass Market Paperback
The Red King is the second book in the Titan series. The authors of the opening book: Taking Wing return to continue the adventures of Captain Riker and the crew of the new Luna-class vessel. Taking Wing was left with the interesting climax that a fleet of Romulan Warbirds, Titan and a cloaked Klingon vessel had been displaced 200,000 light years away from Romulan space by a spatial rift created during the events of the film Nemesis.
The displacement of the Titan into Neyel space provides the authors with an opportunity to revisit a interesting science fiction concept introduced in their Lost Era novel The Sundered. The Neyel being to humans what the Romulans are to the Vulcans. By chance two of the original members of Sulu's Excelsior crew who previously encountered the Neyel are on board Titan: Akaar and Tuvok. These characters take a prominent place on the artwork on the cover of the novel, the relationship of these characters forming an important subplot to this novel.
Having not read The Sundered perhaps my enjoyment of this novel suffered somewhat in the early chapters of this book. The fluency and pace of the closing chapters of Taking Wing and opening chapters of The Red King being brought to an abrupt halt as we are brought up to speed with the Neyel.
There is quite a bit to take on board here - as well as the continued task of getting your head around the diverse species within Titan's crew.
However perserverence with the detail is rewarded, this is a good science fiction book. The exploration of the Neyel is interesting, its mythological explanation for the phenomenon encountered in their space providing a counterbalance to the locking of scientific minds on Titan. There is a strong scientific theme running through this book: spatial rifts, emerging proto-universes etc with a solution to returning to Romulan space and preventing a full-scale ecological disaster firmly in the hands of the scientists.
Characterisation is good, and probably the highlight of this book. The Akaar and Tuvok subplot is interesting and intelligently concluded. The relationship between Riker and the Neyel character Frane providing a nice vehicle for exploring the differences and similarities between humans and Neyel, but the highlight for me has to be the Romulan Commander Donatra - a complex character with many layers packed with plenty of potential for later novels.
Mangels and Martin always cram a lot into their novels and this is no exception.
In terms of rating this novel, throughout much of the novel I would rate it as a solid 3 stars. Towards the conclusion of the novel as various storylines were tied up I was almost tempted to give it 4 stars. The storylines have interweaved well in the first two books and have been developed to a suitable conclusion rather than been left to hang and appear totally pointless.
The only problem I have with the novel is that in a years time I can't imagine that it will be particularly memorable. An enjoyable read that provides a satisfying conclusion to Taking Wing. The fact that the next Titan novel has been penned by my favourite Trek author Chris Bennett has left me eagrely anticipating what comes next, it is going to have be a good novel to keep me in the Titan saga for the long haul.
The displacement of the Titan into Neyel space provides the authors with an opportunity to revisit a interesting science fiction concept introduced in their Lost Era novel The Sundered. The Neyel being to humans what the Romulans are to the Vulcans. By chance two of the original members of Sulu's Excelsior crew who previously encountered the Neyel are on board Titan: Akaar and Tuvok. These characters take a prominent place on the artwork on the cover of the novel, the relationship of these characters forming an important subplot to this novel.
Having not read The Sundered perhaps my enjoyment of this novel suffered somewhat in the early chapters of this book. The fluency and pace of the closing chapters of Taking Wing and opening chapters of The Red King being brought to an abrupt halt as we are brought up to speed with the Neyel.
There is quite a bit to take on board here - as well as the continued task of getting your head around the diverse species within Titan's crew.
However perserverence with the detail is rewarded, this is a good science fiction book. The exploration of the Neyel is interesting, its mythological explanation for the phenomenon encountered in their space providing a counterbalance to the locking of scientific minds on Titan. There is a strong scientific theme running through this book: spatial rifts, emerging proto-universes etc with a solution to returning to Romulan space and preventing a full-scale ecological disaster firmly in the hands of the scientists.
Characterisation is good, and probably the highlight of this book. The Akaar and Tuvok subplot is interesting and intelligently concluded. The relationship between Riker and the Neyel character Frane providing a nice vehicle for exploring the differences and similarities between humans and Neyel, but the highlight for me has to be the Romulan Commander Donatra - a complex character with many layers packed with plenty of potential for later novels.
Mangels and Martin always cram a lot into their novels and this is no exception.
In terms of rating this novel, throughout much of the novel I would rate it as a solid 3 stars. Towards the conclusion of the novel as various storylines were tied up I was almost tempted to give it 4 stars. The storylines have interweaved well in the first two books and have been developed to a suitable conclusion rather than been left to hang and appear totally pointless.
The only problem I have with the novel is that in a years time I can't imagine that it will be particularly memorable. An enjoyable read that provides a satisfying conclusion to Taking Wing. The fact that the next Titan novel has been penned by my favourite Trek author Chris Bennett has left me eagrely anticipating what comes next, it is going to have be a good novel to keep me in the Titan saga for the long haul.
Format:Mass Market Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Andy Mangels and Michael A Martin's follow-up to their first "Star Trek: Titan" novel, "Taking Wing," does little to build upon the success of its predecessor. Whereas "Taking Wing" was a promising, if a little indulgent, offering that had "Trek" television pilot stamped right through it, "The Red King" tries to be innovative and intelligent science fiction - and sadly it falls flat.
The cliffhanger ending to "Taking Wing" saw both the Titan and an entire fleet of Romulan Warbirds catapulted into the Small Magellanic Cloud, some two hundred thousand light years away from the Alpha Quadrant. Whilst the move reeked of "The Next Generation" episode "Where No-One Has Gone Before" and, of course, "Star Trek: Voyager," it was nonetheless a tantalising one, and seemed to encapsulate the new series' pioneering spirit. What's more, it offered the authors the chance to revisit and expound upon the potentially fascinating culture of their Neyel - an offshoot of humanity once encountered by the Excelsior during Tuvok's days on board. However, it only takes a few chapters for the momentum of "Taking Wing" to slow to a gentle gambol as we are drawn into a slow and derivative, science-heavy tale of proto-universes and macroscopic consciousnesses that seldom threatened to grab my attention.
Even "Titan" readers who prefer the harder stuff in terms of plot will be let down by aspects of the characterisation here. As the eponymous "Red King" is so abstract a conceit, the authors try to personify some peril in the hitherto-helpful Romulan Commander Donatra, neatly undoing much of their earlier good work with her character. Worse still, exciting newcomers such as Dr Ree are almost completely overlooked in favour of the likes of the comatose Commander Keru, whose prosaic exploits leave one in a broadly similar state. Of all the Titan's crew, only its captain and tactical officer are handled even reasonably well here, but in the case of both they're left holding up the interesting end of their respective double acts.
Extremely ambitious, "The Red King" is a novel that might offer something to Trekkers who invest more heavily in their science than they do their fiction, but for most of us I fear that it's going to prove a major misstep - and not just sixty thousand parsecs out of the Alpha Quadrant.
The cliffhanger ending to "Taking Wing" saw both the Titan and an entire fleet of Romulan Warbirds catapulted into the Small Magellanic Cloud, some two hundred thousand light years away from the Alpha Quadrant. Whilst the move reeked of "The Next Generation" episode "Where No-One Has Gone Before" and, of course, "Star Trek: Voyager," it was nonetheless a tantalising one, and seemed to encapsulate the new series' pioneering spirit. What's more, it offered the authors the chance to revisit and expound upon the potentially fascinating culture of their Neyel - an offshoot of humanity once encountered by the Excelsior during Tuvok's days on board. However, it only takes a few chapters for the momentum of "Taking Wing" to slow to a gentle gambol as we are drawn into a slow and derivative, science-heavy tale of proto-universes and macroscopic consciousnesses that seldom threatened to grab my attention.
Even "Titan" readers who prefer the harder stuff in terms of plot will be let down by aspects of the characterisation here. As the eponymous "Red King" is so abstract a conceit, the authors try to personify some peril in the hitherto-helpful Romulan Commander Donatra, neatly undoing much of their earlier good work with her character. Worse still, exciting newcomers such as Dr Ree are almost completely overlooked in favour of the likes of the comatose Commander Keru, whose prosaic exploits leave one in a broadly similar state. Of all the Titan's crew, only its captain and tactical officer are handled even reasonably well here, but in the case of both they're left holding up the interesting end of their respective double acts.
Extremely ambitious, "The Red King" is a novel that might offer something to Trekkers who invest more heavily in their science than they do their fiction, but for most of us I fear that it's going to prove a major misstep - and not just sixty thousand parsecs out of the Alpha Quadrant.
Format:Mass Market Paperback
I have to say that I really did enjoy this book, It had good character development and a decent plot line. I did find the pace of the book to be on the slower side, but over all a fun read. I would recommend this book :)
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Finding the new characters hard to get my head around
An interesting second book in the series by M+M. As well as a sequel to the first Titan book it serves as a sequel to their previous novel in the Lost Era series based on Sulu's... Read more
Published on 14 Jun 2009 by J. R. Johnson-Rollings
hmm alright
Compared to Taking Wing, this was not as exciting, in my view. It's still worth reading if you have read Taking Wing.. and Taking Wing is quality! Read more
Published on 1 May 2007 by T. Crawford
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
