Now the haggis is in the fire for sure

"Tales Of The Dominion War" is an anthology of stories related to the Dominion War, which was chronicled for the last two years of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

Most of the stories range from good to excellent. I enjoyed each one to varying degrees, the worst being (in my humble opinion) "Field Expediency," a Starfleet Corps of Engineers story, the best being "Safe Harbors," a story starring Admiral McCoy and Captain Scott.

I especially enjoyed "Mirror Eyes," a story about a female Tal Shiar agent working in Deep Space Nine's infirmary as a Vulcan nurse during an outbreak of a Vulcan-specific viral infection created by the Dominion. It's told in the first person, and I really enjoyed the agent's sense of humor (translation: I laughed a lot while reading this story ... especially when the agent describes her Vulcan roommate's imagined reaction to the agent eating a raw steak).

In "Safe Harbors," Admiral McCoy and Captain Scott need repairs and set down on a neutral world where they are not welcome because of the repair yard's supervisor's fear of Dominion ships finding them there, and are given a mere three hours for all repairs to be completed. Eventually they are found by the Defiant class Saladin, whose captain was killed in a skirmish with a Dominion patrol. The Saladin is given the same time limit for repairs, and when they are about to leave, a Breen patrol is found on long-range sensors. The deputy supervisor literally ties up the supervisor and asks that the two Starfleet ships land on the planet again, this time to be hidden from the patrol in subterranean caverns. Needless to say, their repairs are completed this time, and they are warmly welcomed by the alien engineers, who have a welcome spread laid out for the two weary crews. Later, Scotty and McCoy fly over NYC on their way home and look for the Statue of Liberty, which survived the Breen attack on Earth.

In "Eleven Hours Out," we find Picard and Deanna Troi at Starfleet Headquarters during the Breen attack on Earth. Picard takes charge of the just-graduated cadets and moves them all to an underground shelter/command center (not unlike the one we have at Stratcom here in Omaha) while the crew of the Columbia, stuck behind the deadened doors of Starbase One, try to get out and defend Earth against the Breen attackers. The Enterprise gets there just in the nick of time, helping both the Columbia and Picard defend Earth from the Breen. The names of the crew of the Columbia are the same as the crew of the Challenger disaster, and I find that a kind, wonderful tribute to those men and women.

Both of the stories about the attack on Earth had me in tears.

In "The Ceremony of Innocence Is Drowned," we have Lwaxana Troi's experience of the invasion and fall of Betazed to the Dominion. It interweaves characters from the book, "The Battle of Betazed," by another, different author, quite nicely.

I have only spotlighted the stories that made the greatest impression on me, but all the stories have memorable parts, and, all in all, I enjoyed this book very much. If you want to get into more of the Dominion War than just what was shown on STDS9, this is the book for you.

More war stories

One of the unique (as far as Star Trek TV series go, anyway) things about Deep Space Nine was the two-year "Dominion War," where the shapeshifters from the Gamma Quadrant allied with the Cardassians and waged war on the other Alpha Quadrant races. Of course, being a television series about Deep Space Nine, the series couldn't really delve into what was going on in other parts of the Federation. We get no clue what the crew of the Enterprise was doing, for example. We hear about some things, of course, but mostly in the background.

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

Missing War Correspondents

Where was the rest of the Star Trek characters during the Dominion War? What was Captain Picard doing? Keith R.A. DeCandido did a brilliant job editing and collecting the stories for this anthology.

I enjoyed the tale spun by DeCandido delving into the attack on Betazed and the aftermath. He did an incredible job weaving the strings of the novel about the liberation of this world and the young Andorian that was introduced in the Deep Space Nine novels.

Captain Picard was on Earth during the attack of the Breen and his story was interesting if not overly staged. The idea of the story was good but so constructed it was hard to believe.

Suprisingly one of my favorite stories was the tale of DeCandido's character Klag. The Klingon Captain was constantly dealing with the lost of his arm, and now we truly hear the tale of the great battle Marcan V. This was one of the best tales of Klag and not even written by DeCandido.