Q-Squared

Q, a mysterious, omnipotent being, once again wreaks havoc on the Enterprise when he returns to challenge his archenemy Trelane, another being from his continuum, and their confrontation could spell the ultimate disaster for Captain Jean-Luc Picard. 150,000 first printing.

It's deja vu all over again in this predictable entry. Star Trek fans will delight in identifying "obscure" references to episodes and characters from the TV series: they will cheer not only the rapacious Q from The Next Generation but also Trelane (the eponymous "Squire of Gothos" from The Original Series). The story involves the Enterprise crew through three alternative timelines with, of course, The Fate of the Universe hanging in the balance. David ( Imzadi ) limns a Trek-enamored multiverse in which Tasha Yar's "bad haircut" is as important as the massacre of Klingons at Narendra Three. The novel is fast-paced and the prose sloppy. Characters from the first two TV series appear exactly as they were: David scrupulously adds nothing to extant characterizations as he juggles several subplots and intrigues. Certain to delight the converted are appearances by Jack Crusher and all the myriad Wesleys, among others, as well as relationships between Beverly and Picard, Troi and Riker. While the pulpy action makes this is a Trek-lovers paradise, anyone else will wonder what all the fuss is about.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

A complicated Star Trek: The Next Generation novel that springs from a TV episode of the old series, in which Captain Kirk is held captive to the whims of a little boy named Trelane, the son of gods from the Q Continuum. The character Q from The Next Generation series is his guardian. Trelane gets out of hand in his adolescence, scattering pieces of Q throughout time and inventing a machine in which all the dimensions of the universe chaotically intersect. He continues the campaign begun in his childhood, to play with human beings as toys, by collapsing three parallel Enterprises into one. A madhouse ensues, with such quick cuts between scenes that overlapping, slightly different Worfs and Tasha Yars and Will Rikers, all bent on killing or rescuing one another, bring to mind a Marx brothers movie. The most intriguing of these alternative plot lines involves Beverly Crusher's long-dead husband, Jack, who is captain of the Enterprise; Picard is his disgraced second-in-command. In this "reality," Jack, and Beverly's son, Wesley, is dead, and Picard and Beverly are having an affair, until Trelane informs Jack, and he explodes in rage, murdering Beverly and killing himself. Purists may not enjoy the fact that every crew member on every "track" is helpless before Trelane, although the correct Picard, with the aid of a restored Q, eventually saves the universe by turning on Trelane as if he were a spoiled child. John Mort

David's previous Star Trek novels include the best-selling Imzadi (Pocket Bks., 1992). In his latest, the crew of the Starship Enterprise have another go-round with the redoubtable being known as Q.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.