Star Trek novel previews: Force and Motion and Elusive Salvation

Out this month is the latest DS9 novel, Jeffrey Lang's Force and Motion, a new adventure away from the station focusing on Nog and O'Brien, and guest starring Benjamin Maxwell. Here's a reminder of the blurb:

In 2367, Captain Benjamin Maxwell of the starship Phoenix ordered the destruction of a Cardassian warship and a supply vessel, killing more than six hundred crew members. Maxwell believed that the Cardassians were arming for a new attack on the Federation, and though history eventually proved he was probably correct, the Federation had no choice but to court martial and incarcerate him.

Almost twenty years have passed, and now Maxwell is a free man, working as a maintenance engineer on the private science station Robert Hooke, home to crackpots, fringe researchers, and, possibly, something much darker and deadlier. Maxwell’s former crewmate, Chief Miles O’Brien, and O’Brien’s colleague, Lieutenant Commander Nog, have come for a visit. Unfortunately, history has proven that whenever O’Brien and Nog leave Deep Space 9 together, unpredictable forces are set into motion…

You can read a excerpt from that book below, thanks to Amazon's handy-dandy preview thing. And continue below for an excerpt from last month's new novel too:

Purchase: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.ca, Amazon.de, Amazon.fr, Amazon.co.jp.   

May's book was Elusive Salvation, Dayton Ward's sequel to the brilliant From History's Shadow. This time the TOS element is set in the move era (a bit before The Wrath of Khan), while further alien encounters from the 20th century are chronicled. Here's the blurb:

The Arctic Circle, 1845: Escaping the tyranny under which their people have lived for generations, aliens from a distant planet crash land on Earth’s inhospitable frozen wastes. Surviving the harsh conditions will pose a challenge, but over time the aliens will migrate to more populated areas, with decades passing as they work to conceal their presence from their former oppressors, who continue to hunt them at any cost.

San Francisco, 2283: When a mysterious craft is detected entering the solar system, Admiral James Kirk is dispatched by Starfleet to confront the vessel. He meets with an emissary from the Iramahl, a previously unknown alien race who have come in search of their brothers and sisters thought to have gone missing in this area of space centuries earlier. Having recently thrown off the last chains of subjugation by another species, the Ptaen, they now believe their lost people hold the key to saving their entire race from eventual extinction.

New York, 1970: Roberta Lincoln, young protégé of the mysterious agent Gary Seven, is shocked when she receives the oddest request for help—from the future…

And here's an excerpt from that one too!

Purchase: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.ca, Amazon.de, Amazon.fr, Amazon.es, Amazon.it, Amazon.co.jp.

You can also hear Dayton Ward discussing the book on an episode of TrekFM's Literary Treks; as ever I recommend waiting until you've read the book to enjoy the full spoilery chat.

Finally, dipping back earlier in the year, April brought us Christopher L. Bennett's Live By the Code, the fourth Rise of the Federation novel (the post-Romulan War Enterprise series), and as is customary Bennett has now released extensive annotations for the book, on his website, detailing all the references and real science he pulled upon. Another great extra feature for us book lovers!

To keep track of all the latest releases, hit the books or prose buttons on my 2016 and 2017 schedule pages. You can also find series reading lists and author bibliographies on my dedicated Star Trek lists site.