Belle Terre (Star Trek: New Earth, Book 2)

Much better than the first in the series, thanks to the fact that Dean Wesley Smith doesn't torture the language the way Diane Carey does. Just as in the first installment, the plot and characterization, the pacing and the general idea are all very good to excellent. Unlike the first installment, this author understands how to use the language to best effect. Highly recommended; it doesn't even seem to me that it would be hard to follow this book without having read the previous episode, the backstory is filled in unobtrusively and as thoroughly as needed, but no more than that.

I can't help but repeat what i done worte i love star trek books. Rondall Banks

After trudging my way through the first book in this series, Star Trek #89 "Wagon Train to the Stars," I found "Belle Terre" to be somewhat of a welcome relief. As stated in my review for the first book in the New Earth series, the whole concept of the New Earth series is a very interesting and intriguing one but "Wagon Train to the Stars" just didn't execute on this extremely interesting premise very well. "Belle Terre" does pick up on the pace of the story quite nicely though. There are points in which the pace still seems to drag, thus causing the novel one star.The cover art for this novel is much better than previous novels and it lends to the story quite well.The premise:At the conclusion of Star Trek #89 "Wagon Train to the Stars," Captain Kirk has successfully guided the colony and its sixty two thousand members and ships through treachery and attack from outsiders to Belle Terre.As "Belle Terre" begins we learn that the Quake Moon, which had been focused on during the first novel of this series, is a moon that contains a large quantity of Quantum olivium which is an extremely rare and valuable substance to the Federation and other civilizations. Captain Kirk is elated to find this out as this rare substance will greatly help the new colony but those hopes are quickly dashed as Spock reveals that the moon is under so much internal pressure that it is going to explode and destroy Belle Terre in the process.Captain Kirk, the crew of the Enterprise and the colonists must now find a way to stop this massive explosion or be prepared to evacuate the colony and hope to make it back to Federation space before they run out of supplies.What I found even more interesting about this novel was the subplot in which Captain Kirk asked one of the pathfinder ships and its captain to find a suitable planet that the colonists can be taken to in the event that they cannot prevent the destruction of Belle Terre. Captain Sunn and hid small crew take their pathfinder ship, the Rattlesnake and an extremely intriguing jaunt and find a very interesting world that was once populated but is now approximately one hundred years barren.What follows from there is a Star Trek numbered novel that far outweighs the leadoff book in this series. The one unfortunate thing about it is that the subplot is much more interesting than the main plot.I would recommend this novel and New Earth series more as a collectors/completists type read. While they are by far not the best in Trek fiction, they're not the worst either. {ssintrepid}

My main concern going into this book was after "WagonTrain to the Stars" that the next four books would stall out withmajor developments until Diane Carey came in to wrap things up in August. The good news is that, for now, that hasn't happened. "Belle Terre", while considerably shorter than "Wagon Train to the Stars", packs no less of a punch. As was hinted in book one, things aren't going to be peaceful when the crew arrives at the planet--and they're not. An imminent disaster will happen in just eight days--the destruction of a moon that will destroy the lush world the colonists have come to settle. It's up to Kirk and company to pull another miracle out of their hats and save the day. The book works nicely because it allows the crew to fail and to work through it to come up with an answer. It also introduces some nice supporting characters and gives the ma bit of character depth as well. In addition, it's a nicely plotted and suspenseful book that really takes advantage of the crew working against the clock to save the day. I've got to admit I'm hooked now on New Earth. Having devoured the first two books, I find myself anxious for the next four. It certainly makes June seem a bit longer as I wait for parts three and four.My only major problem with the book is that it drops some of the interesting storylines from part one. No mention is made of the traitor's fate nor do we get any confirmation that the Orions are still a threat. Also, with the Enterprise and the colony in a disputed war-zone, there should have been some development there. I'm willing to overlook these sins of omission for now, simply because we've got four more books to go and develop these.

Pocket's Star Trek publishing program seems to have shifted in focus over the past several months: rather than publishing stand-alone novels, we've seen a number of multi-book series ranging from the excellent ("Millennium" for Deep Space Nine) to the, mmm, not-quite so-excellent (not mentioning any names!). I'll frequently pick up a Trek book based on the author ("Millennium" was written by the always-entertaining Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens), but in the case of "Belle Terre" I bought it mainly because of the intriguing concept of this multi-book series: Kirk and company are assigned to escort a group of colonists to a deep-space planet for colonization. I haven't had a chance yet to pick up the first book in the series "Wagon Train to the Stars" (I will, because it's written by another of my fave Trek authors, Diane Carey), but #2, "Belle Terre", is a fun read and intriguing enough to make me look at the rest in the series as well. When the idyllic world the colonists land on threatens to be destroyed, Kirk and the Enterprise crew must race against time and exceptionally long odds to save the planet. Characterization is dead-on, always a plus when dealing with characters based on real actors (the grumpy, argumentative, but humanist McCoy is so authentic you can hear the late De Kelley in your head as you read). I've also got to commend Smith and Carey for the character of the colony's governor...it's a long-running Trek cliché that colony governors are thick-skulled, selfish diplomats, butting heads with Kirk and endangering themselves and others. This character rises above that cliché with a much more interesting personality--he's an individual with different ideas and goals than Starfleet, but he's willing to do everything to help Kirk and Spock's dangerous plan to stop the planet's moon from exploding. The conclusion is no happy-ending cop-out...the planet is saved (did you doubt it?), but at incredible cost...and, as befits a decent book series, a cliffhanger subplot featuring a scout ship investigating a nearby dead planet obviously leads into book three without taking the attention away from the plot at hand. In short, a decent Trek novel, nothing exceptional, but very good suspense, characterization, and an intriguing plot that's different enough from the usual Trek storylines to make me check out "Star Trek: New Earth #3: Rough Trails" next month.