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Dec. 8th, 2009 11:36 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsI kind of want to play a drinking game with Diane Duane's Star Trek novels. Every time she mentions entropy: sip! Every time she references Hortas just because she thinks they're loltastic: sip! Every time she does a hilariously blatant crossover over with the Young Wizards books: drain the glass!
Which is to say, I finally read the two other Star Trek novels that![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
genarti lent me this summer, The Wounded Sky and Spock's World.
The Wounded Sky . . . okay, it really is hilarious just HOW MUCH of a Young Wizards crossover it is. The crew teams up with an alien glass spiderwizard physicist who explains that their physics work by defining something, and then changing that definition! Then they have a jaunt through Timeheart, end up in an alternate universe, and offer a brand-new alien consciousness The Choice. I'M NOT EVEN KIDDING. I honestly kept expecting Kit and Nita to show up with their manuals.
Also, I kind of shipped Scotty/Alien Glass Spider Physicist, and I don't think I'm wrong to do so.
Spock's World is less of a blatant crossover, but the word entropy still shows up often enough that you could get relatively tipsy if you chose to play my drinking game with the book. Premise: Vulcan is debating whether or not to secede from the Federation. Sarek gets called back to argue for secession, Kirk and McCoy and Spock to argue against, and Diane Duane basically takes the whole premise as an excuse to point out "HEY YOU KNOW PLANETS ARE COMPLEX PLACES AND NOT ALL VULCANS ARE THE SAME," which is a thing very much worth pointing out, and it's kind of adorable. She also intersperses the narrative with short-story snippets from along the course of Vulcan's development, most of which are full of TRAGEDY, except for the Sarek/Amanda one which is basically the book wavig its ship flag high. It's all a lot of fun, except for one thing . . . Not only was T'Pring the Evil Villainous Scheming Woman, she was an Evil Villainous Scheming Woman whose motivations made NO SENSE. NATURALLY she would be angry at Spock for spurning her, right? Except . . . she is the one who dumped him and happily married someone else, so . . . what? And OF COURSE the best way to ruin his life is by BREAKING UP SPOCK AND KIRK OH NOES with a massively successful one-woman campaign for Vulcan to secede from the Federation! And then she monologues about it. I really kept waiting for her to say, "My plan is sheer elegance in its simplicity."
But Becca, you may say, just last week you were gushing all over Gelis in the Niccolo books, whose life is essentially a one-woman campaign to make Niccolo miserable! Where is the difference here? To you, I answer: first of all, Gelis has a legitimate reason to hate on Nicholas, namely, the fact that he is in large part responsible for ruining her sister's life and then getting her killed. Second of all, Gelis quite sensibly confines her revenge to Nicholas, and not to an entire planet (although I am aware that this probably changes in the later books when their feud escalates to involving the economies of entire nations, but . . . um, if I remember right he started it! LOOK OVER THERE IT'S PRINCESS TUTU) Third of all, GELIS IS AWESOME, and the text acknowledges it, which does not happen with T'Pring - all her scheming, everything she does, is reduced to "a woman scorned." There certainly were several awesome lady characters that popped up over the course of the story, so it's not like it ruined the book for me, but . . . it did make me sort of depressed. Problematic portrayals of ladies: like Kate Beaton's pony, in a way.
Also, something that made me the opposite of depressed: receiving all those lovely snow cookies! Every time I look at my profile now I make a :DDDDDDDDD-face. Thank you guys so much! <3
Which is to say, I finally read the two other Star Trek novels that
genarti lent me this summer, The Wounded Sky and Spock's World.The Wounded Sky . . . okay, it really is hilarious just HOW MUCH of a Young Wizards crossover it is. The crew teams up with an alien glass spider
Also, I kind of shipped Scotty/Alien Glass Spider Physicist, and I don't think I'm wrong to do so.
Spock's World is less of a blatant crossover, but the word entropy still shows up often enough that you could get relatively tipsy if you chose to play my drinking game with the book. Premise: Vulcan is debating whether or not to secede from the Federation. Sarek gets called back to argue for secession, Kirk and McCoy and Spock to argue against, and Diane Duane basically takes the whole premise as an excuse to point out "HEY YOU KNOW PLANETS ARE COMPLEX PLACES AND NOT ALL VULCANS ARE THE SAME," which is a thing very much worth pointing out, and it's kind of adorable. She also intersperses the narrative with short-story snippets from along the course of Vulcan's development, most of which are full of TRAGEDY, except for the Sarek/Amanda one which is basically the book wavig its ship flag high. It's all a lot of fun, except for one thing . . . Not only was T'Pring the Evil Villainous Scheming Woman, she was an Evil Villainous Scheming Woman whose motivations made NO SENSE. NATURALLY she would be angry at Spock for spurning her, right? Except . . . she is the one who dumped him and happily married someone else, so . . . what? And OF COURSE the best way to ruin his life is by BREAKING UP SPOCK AND KIRK OH NOES with a massively successful one-woman campaign for Vulcan to secede from the Federation! And then she monologues about it. I really kept waiting for her to say, "My plan is sheer elegance in its simplicity."
But Becca, you may say, just last week you were gushing all over Gelis in the Niccolo books, whose life is essentially a one-woman campaign to make Niccolo miserable! Where is the difference here? To you, I answer: first of all, Gelis has a legitimate reason to hate on Nicholas, namely, the fact that he is in large part responsible for ruining her sister's life and then getting her killed. Second of all, Gelis quite sensibly confines her revenge to Nicholas, and not to an entire planet (although I am aware that this probably changes in the later books when their feud escalates to involving the economies of entire nations, but . . . um, if I remember right he started it! LOOK OVER THERE IT'S PRINCESS TUTU) Third of all, GELIS IS AWESOME, and the text acknowledges it, which does not happen with T'Pring - all her scheming, everything she does, is reduced to "a woman scorned." There certainly were several awesome lady characters that popped up over the course of the story, so it's not like it ruined the book for me, but . . . it did make me sort of depressed. Problematic portrayals of ladies: like Kate Beaton's pony, in a way.
Also, something that made me the opposite of depressed: receiving all those lovely snow cookies! Every time I look at my profile now I make a :DDDDDDDDD-face. Thank you guys so much! <3
no subject
Date: 2009-12-08 07:36 pm (UTC)... whut. The thing I liked about the craziness that was "Amok Time" was that even though T'Pring basically made him kill Kirk, Spock was all, "that's some impressive logic" about it and left it at that. She was allowed to not be interested in Spock and even manipulate him to a point that it results in Kirk's death, and still not really be cast as at the bad guy. That kind of retelling comes off as... really weak, and I mean, if you're outdoing TOS in terms of problematic gender tropes? Really?
no subject
Date: 2009-12-08 07:55 pm (UTC)(And Spock is all, "That is truly an impressively logical plan," and I am like, "NO. NO IT'S NOT. Aside from everything else, that plan is the ANTI-LOGIC.")
no subject
Date: 2009-12-08 08:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-12-08 08:21 pm (UTC)(And then Spock and Kirk and Bones get to go be magnanimous at her when she goes to Vulcan prison, because they are Good, Heroic People, and. SIGH.)