Written by Michael A. Martin
Copyright 2009 by CBS Studios Inc.
STAR TREK and related marks are trademarks of CBS Studios Inc.
All Rights Reserved.
In Beneath the Raptor's Wing, the first novel of The Romulan War series written by Michael A. Martin, the Earth-Romulan War is in full swing. With the Romulan Star Empire's ability to remotely take control of other alien race's starships, the other races of the Coalition slowly pull out of their commitment to the Coalition of Planets - leaving Starfleet alone to deal with the Romulans as it turns out that the Starfleet ships resists the Romulan takeover programming better than the others ships in the Coalition. Captain Jonathan Archer was very upset at being abandoned by the Coalition, while the news media escalates both sides of the story.
I was disappointed that the Vulcans had refused to have an active part of the war. While I understand the Vulcans non-involvement in the war, especially with their racial connection to the Romulans, it was very disconcerting to me to watch the Vulcans just stand by and let Earth handle the war mostly by themselves and the Andorians. The Vulcans offer of a detection grid in Coalition space hardly makes up for the Vulcan's lack of support - especially when the detection grid seems to be ineffectual to any type of detection of the Romulan ships as the Romulans continue to get through the grid and launch sneak attacks on the various planets.
I was sad that Travis Mayweather was so pissed off with Archer over what had happened with the freighter the Kobayashi Maru - that Mayweather packs up and leaves the Enterprise. I can understand how Mayweather would feel - in that Archer would have treated his family's freighter the same way under the same circumstances, and that he can not work with Archer anymore. With Archer trying to form an alliance with the Klingon Empire in order to have the Klingons to join Starfleet against the Romulans - it shows how the reader of how desperate the situation is becoming for Earth in this first year of the Romulan war.
Having the Romulans undergoing a Machiavellian power struggle amongst themselves in the middle of the war was interesting. It was like a comeuppance to the Romulans for me. Meeting Captain Dunsel for the first time in the Star Trek series was anti-climatic for me as I expected a more incompetent person to be the infamous Captain Dunsel, and I did not feel that Dunsel had deserved his infamous reputation that he had amongst the midshipmen at Starfleet Academy.
Pancho
All people smile in the same language.
