Collateral Damage

I’ve read several of David Mack’s Trek novels and have had mixed reactions to them, but he hits a home run with Collateral Damage. I really loved the way he gave the Nausicaans (somewhat marginal players in the Trek universe) a depth and complexity we, or at least I, haven’t seen before. Mack took what could have been a standard issue revenge story and grounded it in real emotion and compelling motivation. Another reviewer mentioned they found themselves pulling for the Nausicaans and I wholeheartedly agree: by the end of the story I found myself rooting for them.
The novel does a wonderful job of elevating Worf, revealing his depth and further developing his evolution into an exceptional captain.
The courtroom drama surrounding Capt. Picard and his involvement in a political coup gives us another delicious round of sparring with his old nemesis Phillipa Louvois.
The most surprising aspect of the book was the dialogue. Mack’s dialogue has never been a favorite of mine but in Collateral Damage it’s snappy, real and rings true for each character, especially Worf and our Nausicaan protagonist Kinogar.
My only real criticism (and I’m picking nits here) is the time spent on the navel-gazing of the Enterprise’s security chief, Lt. Smrhova. But even her scenes and dialogue were for the most part very entertaining and fun to read, particularly her exchanges with the “outrageous” Thadiun Okona.
Star Trek: Collateral Damage is great fun, a compelling read and a wonderful addition to the Star Trek library.
Oh, and for sharp-eyed readers there’s a great tip of the hat to Brooklyn Nine-Nine…I won’t spoil it here though.

Three takeaways:

1. The Borg are even more awesome than I thought (which is saying something).

2. I never thought I would pull for the Nausicans.

3. Worf is going to be a helluva captain.

I really struggled finishing this book. I figured this book would primarily focus on the courtroom proceedings of Picard and really there wasn’t much there. What was there finished without much flair or doubt and in reality I never had doubt because he wasn’t part of the conspiracy.
The part of the story involving Okona was just annoying and honestly served very little importance to the overall story and made the Enterprise’s security chief look like a bitter Klingon who then follows the “I’m not impressed by his charm but for some reason she still sleeps with him” plot. It as utterly ridiculous.
Other things were inconsistent with the Star Trek universe (the use of money which has long been discontinued, continued black ops services operating outside the mandates of Starfleet) it all just leaves me disappointed with an author I’ve really enjoyed reading