Star Trek Deep Space Nine #17: The Heart of the Warrior Book

3/5 Stars

Something unsettling is happening on the Deep Space Nine space station. A peace conference is being held, but is that what everyone wants? As Commander Benjamin Sisko is working to keep peace on the space station, Major Kira, Lt. Commander Worf, and Odo take off on a secret mission to discover the secret, addictive substance changelings use to control their Jem'Hadar warriors. Will Deep Space Nine remain peaceful? Will Kira and Worf accomplish their mission? Will they even make it back alive?

I don't have a whole lot to say about this book, so, unlike yesterday, today's review should be pretty brief. You can see that the copy I read of this book was pretty worse for the wear. That's because I picked it up for 25¢ at the thrift store. It's super easy to find cheap Star Trek books lying around second hand shops. (At least around me it is.)

The next thing I'll say is that it's been awhile since I've watched Deep Space Nine and I haven't watched much of it, so I can't tell you exactly how well this book does justice to the characters.

I guess that's where I'll start my review then, too. I liked the characters, but they were a little shallow. I'm not too sure if the author was relying on his reader knowing the characters already or was relying on the 16 previous books for understanding, but it felt like there was something missing. I'm really not trying to be nit-picky or wishing for Betancourt to have reintroduced all the characters or anything like that. I simply wanted a bit more depth to what was written on the page. We get inside a few heads, but I still felt like I wasn't really inside them. Does that make sense? Probably not. So, even though the characters were fun to read about, there was nothing about any of them that really struck or stuck with me.

I felt the same way about the plot. It was a decent plot, but there was always something missing. Like the characters, it lacked depth. Still, I did find the plot interesting and propelling. I wasn't dying to pick this up, but it kept me entertained while I was at the gym and trudging my way through my cardio workouts. I found myself wanting to know what was going to happen next even if there was a bit of tension lacking. The only other thing that did actually bother me about the plot was how the 2 separate ones going on never fully converged, and that was a bit disappointing. The happenings were a bit hollow, some sections were dull and uninteresting, but overall the story was decent and fun to read through.

Like the characters and the plot, I also felt the writing was merely okay. There weren't any grammatical errors or any of the alike that made the writing dull; it was more the fact of something lacking again. There was too much explaining and not enough imagining. The writing may be one of the main reasons I didn't really connect with the characters. It was always reserved, un-embellished, and flat. Even so, it was easy to get lost in the story, even if I couldn't fully lose myself in the writing.

Overall, this book was just okay. I've only read 2 Star Trek books, so I can't say anything like "not the best but not the worst" here. However, I think I still can say that this is a book that Star Trek fans don't have to read, but it's not one fans have to avoid either. Nowhere near a must read, but a decent read (if you can pick it up for cheap…like me!).

Review originally published on my Wordpress blog Dreaming Through Literature.