Star Trek Deep Space Nine #16: Invasion! #3: Time's Enemy Book

I recall never really enjoying any of the crossover series Pocketbooks attempted, so I was surprised by how much I enjoyed this installation of the *Invasion!* series. I suspect part of the reason is that for the DS9 book, they (editor, writers, planners, whomever) took the idea at the heart of the series--this invading, unstoppable, ancient species looking to reclaim its territory that now makes up a big part of the Federation--and turns it on its head by having the DS9 folks have to deal with said unstoppable, ancients species' archenemy (or something like that). In a way, that's why I enjoyed DS9--it took the Trek concept and sort of turned it on its head and made it its own thing (which is why I strongly suspect I'm not so much a Trek fan as I am a DS9 fan).

I also appreciated that the writers had a much stronger grasp of the world of which they were writing than other writers of DS9 books: It's obvious they'd watched more than "Emissary" before getting to work. They display a strong understanding of the conceptual layout of the station and the space around it.

Best of all, at least for me, the writers seem to be character-driven; that is, they write stories that focus on characters, that develop those characters. I've read one too many books, particularly of the relaunch line, that focus on battles and technology and more sterile ideas. Bonus: the writers have a good grasp of who the characters are that they've been given to play with.