Glass Empires -- thoughts?

[Tricky]

^ The second book, Obsidian Alliances, is much the same way. The VOY story is ok, the New Frontier story is kinda blah, and the DS9 story rocks.

I'm 2/3 of the way through, and I guess I have to agree with Ineti (congrats on your published story,btw!): I know nothing about New Frontier (ok, I know who Peter David is, who Robin Lefler and Liz Shelby are, I've read something about hermites, but that's about it), so alot of it was lost on me. Imho, it would have been more interesting to spend more time looking at the MU Romulans. Perhaps they conspire to use the rebels to bring down the Alliance.....but hey, it's not my book.

Going to be starting the DS9 story tonight. I've heard it's good.

[Hirogen Alpha]

Started reading Obsidian Alliances, and already I've found somthing that sorta bothered me:

Chakotay's Native American ancestors were apparently totally free of the 'evil' of the Terran empire. The snuck out to a far away planet and lived free of the brutality of the empire.

So, of all the peoples of the MU Earth, only Native American's were 'evil-free'? I mean it works story wise, giving you a slightly darker Chakotay who has the same strong moral core, but in a way it's saying that one group, in this case Native Americans, is better than another.

I have another rpg book, and in it's old west setting, it has a section about how despite revisionist history, Native American's were just like everyone else: they fought against each other, warred, committed atrocities and took advantage of each other, as well as had a very honorable way of life. Despite Hollywood's opinion, they were just people, no better, no worse.

I hope I don't come off racist; I just don't like it when a socio-political veiwpoint gets rammed down my throat.

end rant here.....

I haven't read these yet... I've seen 'em, and will probably pick them up when I get closer to Fearful Symmetry so as to have a bunch of mirror universe stories to go together. But... is it just Chakotay's tribe that escapes the evil of the Terran Empire, or all of Native Americans. Because if it's just his tribe, I don't think that's the same thing as what you're saying. They're just a small cross-section of the overall Native American population.

But, I do think Chakotay and his Native American tribe were usually handled with PC gloves on Voyager. It was nice to have a Native American crewmember on the ship, but after a while it didn't mean anything, and then a while after that he didn't even do anything. They didn't even use a real tribe!

[Tricky]

They seem to infer that several tribes settled the planet. But I see your point.

Anyway, Finished the book. The MU DS9 story was nice; Intendant Kira could be the best Trek villian since Khan: she schemes, plots and betrays like no other. I'm assuming that this is a lead into Fearful Symmetry, which I might actually have to read now. I think I love the MU,maybe even more than the usual TU.

I'm even coming up with a weird MU trek campaign idea. It's really weird and has some unexpected twists and turns.

But that's a tale for another time......

[Hirogen Alpha]

Actually, I'm not sure this will have much to do with Fearful Symmetry, beyond being set in the mirror universe. I'm assuming Fearful Symmetry will have more to do with Warpath, but I haven't actually read any of these books yet... hell, I've only read seven books in the DS9 relaunch so far (counting A Stitch in Time), so I've got quite a ways to go.

[Ineti]

On a related note, I was at the Shore Leave convention a weekend or so ago, and there it was announced that there will be a follow-up anthology including 12 more MU short stories related to the six longer stories contained in Glass Empires and Obisidan Alliances.

Authors of the 12 stories include Keith RA DeCandido, Christopher Bennett, and myself. The anthology should be out in early 2008, and will be a trade paperback like these two MU books. Tentative title for the anthology is "Shards and Shadows."

As soon as the final cover is posted, I'll post it here. We saw a preliminary cover at Shore Leave and it was sweet. Thematically similar to these two books, but with green being the dominant color.

I can't say much about my story at the moment, though I will say that if you liked the DS9 story in Obsidian Alliances, and if you're a fan of DS9 in general, you'll probably like my story.

[Tricky]

Coolness!

I can't wait. Like I said, I've come to really like the MU: especially in the NG/DS9 period, it's so much like other types of Sci-Fi (Serenity and SW), but with Trek as its base.

And I really liked how the authors have sprinkled the stories with characters from the shows/books/movies. It was actually fun for me to see a name (like Sito Jaxa, or Sloan) and try to remember where they were in the 'real' Trek Universe!

[First of Two]

I tell ya, I read a posting of the schedule of books for the next year, and...

I nearly peed.

Man, oh, man... You got "Forged in Fire" (Sulu, Curzon, Kang, Kor, Koloth, and the Albino), a Terok Nor trilogy, "Fearful Symmetry," the MU anthology, "Destiny," a mega-series-crossover trilogy, and "Myriad Universes," two "Glass Empire" style three-in-one books, but this time all set in OTHER alternate universes besides the Mirror one. And a load of other stuff.

Here's a page with the list as it stood at Shore Leave.

Even at the risk of losing my soul to everlasting fragecution for using "leet speak," I gotta say, this PWNS.