DWD's Reviews

Published in 2019 by Top Shelf Productions. Illustrated by Harmony Becker. Winner of the 2020 Eisner Award for Best Reality-Based Work. Winner of the 2020 American Book Award. George Takei is most famous for his part in the the original Star Trek series and the subsequent movies. But, over the last 20 years or so, Takei has been on a personal crusade to make sure that the  Japanese Internment Camps are not forgotten.  President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued an executive order in February of 1942 to place all of the Japanese on the west coast of the United States into camps because they could not be trusted not to help the Empire of Japan. This order applied to all Japanese, even if there was absolutely no reason to suspect them of doing anything at all to help Japan. Takei's family was included in this round up and this graphic novel is that story. The graphic novel format is ideal for the story of a young man caught up in a situation he cannot possibly understand. Takei does ...

  Winner of 2012 RT Reviewers Choice Award. Winner of the 2013 Hugo Award for Best Novel. Winner of the 2013 Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel. Published in 2012 by Tor Books. Redshirts is considered a modern classic and I absolutely jumped at the chance to download it for free thanks to Tor Publishing's e-mail newsletter and their monthly free e-book offer. I don't take every e-book they offer, but this is a book I've been considering for a while and you can't beat the price of free. The title of the books tells you that there is a Star Trek tie-in with this novel. As every Star Trek fan knows, on the original series the joke is that the character wearing red shirts (except for Scotty and Uhura) are expendable characters that die in a number of weird and sometimes horrible ways.  This book features a universe similar to that of Star Trek . The characters are based on the flagship of the Universal Union fleet - the Intrepid . The fate of the redshirts on the...

Published by Macmillan Audion in 2018. Read by the author, William Shatner. Duration: 5 hours, 11 minutes. Unabridged William Shatner gets personal in this look back at his life. He offers advice, although to be fair you have to know his first piece of advice - don't take his advice. Why not? Because his life is his life and you are you and the situations are different. That being said, he does offer one really good piece of advice - say "yes" to new opportunities. Besides the advice, he fills the book with stories of his life and discussions of situations he faced and how he dealt with them. He is brutally honest about his childhood and his lifelong inability to make real friends. Leonard Nimoy was one of his few friends, but at the end of his life Nimoy had refused to talk with him for five years. The author, undoubtedly being overly dramatic - and also interesting. Sometimes he drifts into sort "old man" ramblings about life in general and repeats himself, bu...

Published in May of 2018 by Macmillan Audio. Duration: 6 hours, 58 minutes. Read by Holter Graham. Unabridged. A.D. Jameson is a student of cinema - not just science fiction and fantasy movies, but of cinema in general. I used the word "student" in the previous sentence carefully because he is not just a fan of movies, he studies the directors, the movements and the ideas behind the movies. Photo by DWD But, he is also a proud geek - a fan of sci-fi and fantasy literature and movies. Like me, he was really into those genres in middle and high school, moved away from them for a while during and after college and then came back to them in a big way when the Star Wars "Special Edition" movies were released. My own children do not believe me, but there was once a time when the mere sight of a Star Wars t-shirt or bumper sticker was worthy of comment. Now, they are everywhere. My family probably owns more than 20 Star Wars -related t-shirts alone. A.D. Jameson...

Published by Simon and Schuster Audio in 2016 Read by Robert Petkoff Duration: 9 hours, 40 minutes Unabridged Number One from the original pilot of Star Trek This book is part of a series marking the 50th anniversary of Star Trek. Captain to Captain features Captain Una, better known as Number One in the original pilot episode of the Original Series ("The Cage") and the regular cast of the Original Series. Captain Una, a legendary Starfleet officer, comes to the Enterprise on a surprise visit for vague reasons and promptly steals a secret object that captains of the Enterprise keep hidden away from even the Federation. Kirk isn't even sure what it is exactly, but he knows it can't fall into the hands of the Klingons, the Romulans and maybe not even the Federation because what he does know is that it is the key to more power than anyone should be able to control.  Now Kirk has two questions: Why did Captain Una steal the object? Why is Captain Una heading...

Published in 1989 by Pocket Books (Simon and Schuster) The idea behind the book is interesting: What happened to the characters from the original Star Trek series between the end of their original five year mission and the events of the movie Star Trek: The Motion Picture ? But, the follow-through is quite weak. The characters feel like cardboard cut-outs of themselves, especially McCoy. Kirk's decision to become an admiral makes sense. but McCoy's outlandish, petulant, even childish response to Kirk's decision was simply not believable to me. Even worse, the new characters are, at best, one-note wonders. McCoy and Natira,  McCoy quits Star Fleet to find a woman from the TV episode "For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky." She is the leader of a group of refugees who live inside a giant spaceship that they thought was a planet. They had a romantic spark but when McCoy returns to visit her he finds that she has made a political marriage...

Published by Penguin Audio in 2011 Read by the author, William Shatner Duration: 4 hours, 27 minutes Non-fiction, biography If you are a fan of William Shatner , this is a must-read, or a must-listen if you prefer to listen to the audiobook version like I did. Shatner is unique and if you do not appreciate his odd blend of storytelling, self-promotion and urge to stroke his own ego then please skip this book. But, if you think a little self-promotion (actually, a lot of it) is okay and are willing to tolerate Shatner's ego trips for the sake of a good story than this short audiobook should please. Most of the book covers the last 5 years or so of his career under the guise of explaining several rules that he  has followed throughout his career. The most important rule and the most consistently followed is his admonition to say yes to opportunity. Throughout the book he talks about the positives that he has had in his career due to his willingness to say yes, includin...

A thoroughly entertaining audiobook experience Published in 1994 by Simon and Schuster Audio Division Read by John de Lancie Duration: 2 hours, 59 minutes Abridged I picked this one up at a library sale - they were clearing out all of their audiobooks on cassette. So, I picked up a bunch of them and dusted off the Sony Walkman (literally) and gave it a listen. Back in the day (1994) most audiobooks were edited to about 3 hours. This book was originally over 400 pages long so it was edited extensively as well, although the cover does not admit to it. That being said, the editing was very well done here. This could have been an extraordinarily confusing book considering that it bounces around in 3 different universes, but the editors have demonstrated a great deal of skill. All that being said, Q-Squared is not an audiobook for the Star Trek newbie. John de Lancie as Q In the original Star Trek , Captain Kirk and company encountered Trelane, a being of extraordinary powe...

Published in 1986 by Simon and Schuster Read by Leonard Nimoy and George Takei Duration: 90 minutes I picked up this audiobook on cassette at a clearance book sale in the "who's going to want this stuff?" section. Mostly, it was serious junk. Educational software that only operates on Apple IIe,  VHS copies of movies that I've never heard of starring some guy that was on some TV show that I barely remember and DVDs of some pastor's sermons on any number of topics (still in the plastic!). And, suddenly, I find a memory from my high school and college years - a genuine Star Trek audiobook from 1986!...on audiocassette! And...narrated by George Takei and Leonard Nimoy! So, I scuttle out of there like I've found a gold bar and pop it in car's cassette player - one of the advantages of having a 12 year old car is that it has a multimedia (CD and cassette) stereo system. Back in the day, audiobooks were almost always abridged, sometimes criminally. Thi...

It's Star Trek. It's William Shatner. What More Can You Ask For? Published by Simon and Schuster Audio in 2001. Read by William Shatner Duration: 3 hours, 6 minutes Abridged William Shatner in Star Trek: Generations The audiobook lasts about 3 hours and is read by William Shatner, who is also one of  the authors. I admit, I picked Star Trek: The Return on a whim - the fact that it was read by Shatner himself was a big plus. Shatner is nothing, if not interesting. His book is much like the man himself (at least his well-known public persona) - lots of action, bluster, bravado, noise and Shatner's well-known and unique speaking style. This book takes place immediately after the events of the Star Trek: Generations movie. If you haven't seen the movie lately, don't fret. Shatner uses it as a launching point only and goes on his own way. At the end of Star Trek: Generations , Kirk has been killed by sacrificing himself to save a planet and poss...

You can't go home again I picked my title for this review for two reasons: #1 - Sanctuary describes a legendary planet called 'Sanctuary' - a place where any and all fugitives are welcomed and spared from any further persecution. Unfortunately, McCoy, Kirk and Spock discover that once you come to Sanctuary you can never leave again. Thus the main challenge of the book - how do our intrepid three break out and get back to the 'Enterprise'? #2 - I used to be a gigantic reader of Star Trek books. In the 80's and very early 90's I had a rather large collection. In fact, my cousin and I had a complete collection if we put ours together. I was quite the fan. I ran across this book and picked it up for old times sake and discovered that 'You can't go home again'. The old magic just was not there. Not that I dislike the characters or even the basic plot idea. It was the way the book was written: -The supporting characters are on...

A pleasant enough read but at times it was just 'off' The premise of Crisis on Centaurus is that the colony Centaurus is bombed by a terrorist group and approximately 1 million victims die. The planetary government is in a shambles and the Enterprise is dispatched to aid in whatever way possible. However, Enterprise is having a series of computer failures and is not up to full capacity so things get tricky for Kirk and the crew. Ferguson has written an adequate Star Trek novel - his main characters are written very solidly, but his supporting characters are rather like cardboard cutouts. The women weep and the men clench their teeth and pound their fists in anger at the news of the terrorist attack. Having the benefit of hindsight in regards to the 9/11 attacks, I found the behavior of many of the characters to have been implausible at best, including doctors taking time away from the thousands of refugee patients to tour the Enterprise and especially the Mardi Gr...