Starfleet Academy:
Survival is the last book of the series written by Peter David. The Starfleet Academy series will continue
for several other books leading to a total of 14 written by various Star Trek
writers. The books will focus of various other characters, most notably
characters of TNG during their cadet
years.
Survival is a
direct continuation of Line of Fire.
David recaps the story of the previous book in the first few pages of Survival and continues to tell the story
of how Worf and the others stayed on Dantar for two weeks. The titular survival
isn’t very difficult. Several buildings of the colony where destroyed in the
attack but many of them remain in a state that allowed the survivors to live in
relative comfort while waiting to be rescued.
While waiting for rescuers, the survivors spend their
time fighting amongst each other. Zak and the Klingons engage in fisticuffs and
tension runs high overall. Soleta finds a ship that crash landed on the planet
and investigates it only to find out it’s the ship that attacked the colony.
The story shifts focus and becomes about uncovering the mysteries that began in
the second book. Who attacked the colony and why? The colonist who left knew
they were leaving people behind, why is it that nobody has come to rescue the
remaining survivors? They’re not very good mysteries because the length of the
book (just above 100 pages) requires a quick resolution and David keeps the
pace brisk. It’s ok though because he’s taken the time to provide more
character moments than he did in the earlier stories.
I liked that even though the novel clearly focuses on
Worf, David gave the rest of the Dream Team their time to shine. Tania and Soleta are starting to feel like
real characters. There is a particularly nice exchange between Tania and Worf
where she expresses her discomfort and disappointment at Worf for treating her
unkindly in order to impress K’Ehleyr a scene that took place earlier. Zak is
given quite a lot of time in the limelight because of his dislike of Klingons
but he remains a flat character. He simply repeats the events of his first
encounter with Worf with other Klingon characters on Dantar. He eventually
comes around and makes peace with them but he’s simply copy the same character arc
from the first book. Mark also gets more scenes than in the first book but
David often uses them as a way to show off his status as a genius while also
using him as a source of comic relief. It’s not used excessively and has yet to
be tiresome but it contributes to the third and second books feeling of being
repetitive when it comes to how some of the characters act.
Part of me is glad that I’m done these books by David. Starfleet Academy sounds like a good
idea but the execution doesn’t live up to the potential. Even so, I have a
difficult time thinking about how these books could have been written better.
There aren’t very many great stories that can be told in just over 100 pages.
The style and tone of the young adult series doesn’t seem to allow for stories
with much depth. I appreciate that David took the time to create a few new
characters but he doesn’t have the opportunity to really develop them. As much
as I really like Worf, there is too much focus on him. I completely understand
why. From a publishing standpoint it’s difficult to envision that fans want to
read about new characters. You expect readers to want to read something
familiar, especially when considering tie-in media. I also think it’s extremely
important for new characters, new series and new stories. I appreciated what
David’s tried to do with his Starfleet
Academy book. Now that I’m done, I’m looking forward to reading his Star Trek: New Frontier series which has
many of the new characters in Starfleet
Academy as regular characters in the series. It will be some time though
since I’m still trying to find the first and second book of the series. In the
meantime I’ll read other Star Trek books by Peter David.
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