Tales of the Dominion War (Star Trek) (Paperback)

Keith R.A. DeCandido, editor of Tales of the Dominion War decided that these holes needed to be filled. Since there is a lot of Trek franchises bouncing around these days, why not have a book of short stories that tell some of these tales? You've got your title all made up for you, too, so you don't have to work very hard at that. DeCandido lined up the best and the brightest of the current crop of Trek authors to give us a sampling of the huge events that took place during this war. The stories are mostly good, but a few clunkers along the way as well as some good stories with questionable elements keep this from being a top notch book.

Probably the best story is "Safe Harbor," by Howard Weinstein. Weinstein is the elder statesman of Star Trek books, having been involved with them since the very beginning (though I think he's been away for a while). He tells the story of Admiral Leonard McCoy and Scotty, trying to get back to Earth in a clunky old ship. It begins with a chilling image of a horrible attack on San Francisco, with Jim Kirk and Spock dying horrible deaths. This image quickly moves to McCoy waking up and ultimately realizing that he's really old and that his faculties may be beginning to desert him. They find safe harbor on a planet that prides itself on its neutrality in the war. They're able to wrangle a few hours for repairs, but then they have to leave. Soon, however, a badly damaged Federation ship also shows up, with all of its senior officers dead. McCoy has to counsel the extremely young acting captain as well as deal with the news that San Francisco actually was attacked. Dominion ships are in the area, searching. Will they be able to convince a young engineer on the planet to let them stay long enough to finish all their repairs and hide from the Dominion? This story had wonderful characterization (it should, as Weinstein always gets McCoy exactly right, even when McCoy's 150 years old) and an interesting dilemma. McCoy is wonderful both with the captain as well as with the engineer, and Scotty isn't bad himself. The story did have minor problems, however, which wrenched me out of the narrative. The first was the lack of an explanation for the dream. The dream was too exact for my taste, the only difference from real life being the involvement of Kirk and Spock. Is McCoy suddenly a prophet? And why isn't it mentioned again? Secondly, the ending is a little bit too treacly for my tastes, almost drowning in patriotic sugar. Still, it is a wonderful story.

Of the rest of the stories, my least favourite was "Twilight's Wrath," by David Mack. This story involves Shinzon, from the movie Star Trek: Nemesis, and how he was able to gain some of his power. He and his fellow Remans are ordered to mop up a Tal Shiar base that's been attacked by the Dominion, retrieving some items and making sure there's nothing left for the Dominion to find. Of course, being Remans, they're seen as expendable, and they're not expected to survive (even going so far as to have them killed once they have accomplished their mission). Shinzon outwits his Romulan superiors, however, and steals the information for himself. Along the way, he finds out information about his past, including his birthright, which will propel him into the events of the movie. This story was overly violent with a lot of hand-to-hand combat, severed limbs and other gut-wrenching things. That's ok by itself, but Shinzon is not even the least bit interesting. In fact, there's not a character in this story that I wanted to follow. I was hoping they would all fall victim to a grisly death. It does explain a couple of the inconsistencies in the movie, however.

Finally, a story that just mystified me. "What Dreams May Come," by Michael Jan Friedman, is the story of a Vorta (one of the Dominion toadies who keep the footsoldiers in line) on an isolated Federation world conquered by the Dominion. It's a quiet little place and he's really set in his ways. He has made servants of some of the local populace, but one of them isn't who he says he is. He relates to the Vorta a dream that he had, one where his people attacked the Dominion base. A dream that turns out to be all too real. At its heart, the story is extremely basic, but that quality makes it really uninteresting. If Friedman was trying to say anything with the story or do anything with it, I didn't catch it. It just sits there. While it's only a few pages long and doesn't take any time to get through, it does begin the book on a wrong note.

Overall, I greatly enjoyed Tales of the Dominion War. It was interesting to see all the difference facets of the Trek universe and how they dealt with the war. There's even a couple of Deep Space Nine stories as well, which was nice. Most of the stories are worth reading with some real gems in there as well. Good stuff.

David Roy

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What can be said about the stories is the effective way in which the authors at some points convey the feelings of those at the homefront. Take 'The Ceremony of Innocence is Drowned' in which we see the Dominion attack on Betazed. The author really does succeed is conveying the sheer blindness of the population in believing that the Dominion wont attack. The scene in which Lwaxana home is attacked is trully something as is when she senses the thoughts of the approaching Dominion fleet and sensing the death of the orbital defence team. Other stories extend to other areas of the galaxy from Shinzon and the Remuns (who you could actually feel sorry for if you hadnt seen what they tried to do in Nemesis). To Spock on Romulas which is debating whether or not to ally with the Dominion.

What the book succeeds in doing is extending the war beyond the traditional realm of Deep Space Nine. Saying that some of the stories are pretty bland. Taking What Dreams May Come as an example the reader has to sit through three pages of a Ben Zoma (from Stargazer) dressed up as an alien pretending to the Vorta that he had a dream of Starfleet attacking the planet and defeating the Jem'Hadar. Althought the Vorta thinking he's just a simpleton - its a very lame story and the weakest of the bunch. It has the aura of a rushed job, Friedman doesnt look like he had his heart in it.

It a fantastic book overall and fun to read. Its through these stories that you really do get a sense of sacrifice and pain the Dominion War brought to the Star Trek universe, much better than brief references by the DS9 crew to the lists of war dead. Read on and enjoy...

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