Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing Book
Review: After greatly anticipating a TOS mini series, I feel very let down. I found "Wagon Train to the Stars" the 1st book in the New Earth 6 book series to be almost totally non-interesting. While the story did have 2 or 3 good moments, including a very exciting and unique battle, overall it just didn't catch my interest.I was looking forward to a grand sweeping adventure featuring TOS entire crew, plus hopefully some interesting characters among the colonists. What I feel I got was a big isn't Kirk the greatest saga. Don't get me wrong, I like Capt. Kirk as much as the next fan. But come on. Almost 2/3's of the text is Kirk talking to himself about how heroic he is forced to be. The other crew members are underutilized. In fact they are barely used at all. Chekov gets a good storyline for once, but it is much too brief and one of the books few highlights. We are introduced to a few colonists in a cursory way. There are a couple of potentially interesting characters but they aren't used well. Too bad to. It had the makings of a grand adventure. I would pass on this one if I were you. I usually enjoy Diane Carey's Trek novels but this one sadly disappionts.
Rating:
Summary: Disappointing Book
Review: After greatly anticipating a TOS mini series, I feel very let down. I found "Wagon Train to the Stars" the 1st book in the New Earth 6 book series to be almost totally non-interesting. While the story did have 2 or 3 good moments, including a very exciting and unique battle, overall it just didn't catch my interest. I was looking forward to a grand sweeping adventure featuring TOS entire crew, plus hopefully some interesting characters among the colonists. What I feel I got was a big isn't Kirk the greatest saga. Don't get me wrong, I like Capt. Kirk as much as the next fan. But come on. Almost 2/3's of the text is Kirk talking to himself about how heroic he is forced to be. The other crew members are underutilized. In fact they are barely used at all. Chekov gets a good storyline for once, but it is much too brief and one of the books few highlights. We are introduced to a few colonists in a cursory way. There are a couple of potentially interesting characters but they aren't used well. Too bad to. It had the makings of a grand adventure. I would pass on this one if I were you. I usually enjoy Diane Carey's Trek novels but this one sadly disappionts.
Rating: 
Summary: A Fair Trek to the Stars
Review: After reading several of the Trek novels this one truly is a wagon train to the stars. Kirk having to cope with the uncertain future that he might not make it to the new planet "Belle Terre". How he relates to the civilians and rebels make for interesting reading. However this book series should have been three parts. Six parts is milking it. The best Treks are the two part or three parts..this one was a struggle to read through as good as it was.
Rating:
Summary: A Fair Trek to the Stars
Review: After reading several of the Trek novels this one truly is a wagon train to the stars. Kirk having to cope with the uncertain future that he might not make it to the new planet "Belle Terre". How he relates to the civilians and rebels make for interesting reading. However this book series should have been three parts. Six parts is milking it. The best Treks are the two part or three parts..this one was a struggle to read through as good as it was.
Rating: 
Summary: Campfire material
Review: As a veteran of Star Trek since it first aired in 1966, and having watched all TOS episodes many times, and the first several of the movies, and all of TNG, and most of DS9, and Voyager - I feel I've adequate background to critique this novel from the standpoint of its "Star Trek" heritage. Furthermore, for 35 years I've read Sci-Fi and its near relatives extensively from Asimov to Zelazny and from originators of the genre to many of its new lights. That said... This book is potential campfire material. The characterizations bear little resemblance to their originals other than their names. What the characters say, how they say it, and what they do may as well be from entirely different entities. For a person who has never watched TOS, this book would not have such glaring defects. But even a novice would notice more. Compared to hundreds of books I've read that had multiple story threads, this one is torture! The editors should have extensively re-arranged the text (and not used a mixture of serif and sans-serif fonts). Material tens of pages back in the book should have come first to help the reader understand the beginnings of the story. Maybe a second or third read through will help. But I can't bring myself to suffer through another reading of this book when there are so many other better written Sci-fi novels from first time novelists to enjoyably spend my time with. Okay, I must admit this was my first tentative foray into Star Trek's spin off novels. I'd hoped for a rewarding evening of reading but I feared this and other Star Trek novels would be hatchet jobs on TOS. If this is indicative of other Star Trek novels, and some of the reviews so indicate, then this excursion for me stops with this book - even if given to me for free. Given the reviews from those obviously ignorant of TOS and real Sci-Fi, even five-star reviews are suspect. I can't even think of who to give it to as a gift. Nobody deserves the poor writing, let alone the misleading knock-off of TOS. Then again, maybe I'll keep it - as an example that even the most inept budding novelist can get their stuff published. This book may thus be saved from the campfire and be used in writing classes instead.
Rating:
Summary: A good star trek adventure
Review: Captain Kirk and the enterprise lead a group of pioneers to a distant planet to be settled by federation citizens. The problem is that its moon is unstable and may destroy the planet as well as the settlers. This is the first in a six book series.
Rating:
Summary: Couldn't finish the series.
Review: I bought all six volumes of this series, of which this book is the first, at a used bookstore. I've read several other Star Trek novels and enjoyed them, and thus looked forward to reading the series.
In this first book, I found Diane Carey's writing and characterization to be intensely annoying. She has a habit of using common words in odd ways. She does this frequently, like every other paragraph. It makes you stop reading and say, "why is she using that word?" Perhaps she thinks this makes her prose colorful, but I found it to be an irritating affectation.
The author seems obsessed with Starfleet uniforms. In one scene, Kirk models the new uniform for other Starfleet bigwigs. They applaud, he blushes. I found this scene to be completely contrary to Kirk's character as it's been established in the TV series and films. I don't think Kirk would care one bit about uniforms except to find them a minor annoyance.
In another scene, the Enterprise's chief of security is described as inordinately proud of his appearance in his new uniform, as he "prances" around the bridge. I can't believe the Pocket Books editors let this stuff get by.
The second book in the series, "Belle Terre," was a vast improvement. The story moved quickly and efficiently.
But the third book, "Rough Trails" by L.A. Graf, was dreadful. The main characters spend what seems like the entire book slogging through mud and radioactive dust. This book was so dreary and unpleasant that I gave up on it, and the entire series, halfway through the book. To anyone considering reading this series, I would say, don't bother.
Rating:
Summary: Not good Star Trek material
Review: I was really disappointed. I've been following Star Trek since the first episode of the original series and this is the worst representation of the characters I've ever read. It is almost as though Ms Carey has taken a dislike to James T. Kirk. She shows him to be shallow, self centered, and focused on maintaining his position and authority. Roddenberry's Kirk derived his authority from self assured leadership rather from an autocratic imposition of power as portrayed in this book. While I don't particularly like this book, I do believe in starting a series from the beginning. If the next one isn't better though, I'll give up on the series.
Rating: 
Summary: Good Story, but a Little Slow-Moving
Review: I'm the type that has to be hooked in the first chapter, and while this was by no means a bad book, it took me three tries to finish it. It genuinely surprises me that a book written by Diane Carey didn't have me staying up all night to read it. I say these things in comparison to the other novels in the New Earth series - I was pleasantly surprised by the next book in the series, Belle Terre. It starts off with a bang and just keeps going! So please read these books, I think they are worth the effort it took to get through Wagon Train to the Stars. The New Earth concept is quite interesting in spite of the fact that bookstores are flooded with so many crossover series and multi-novel series that I might be too old to read by the time I get them all!
Rating:
Summary: This is not your father's Trek TOS (The Original Series)
Review: It's probably at least a bit easier to build epic stories on the foundations of the more recent Treks (TNG, DS9 or Voyager) than it is to exume Jim Kirk & co, who were created 35 years ago. Back then, sci fi was more or less interstellar horse opera--"Wagon Train To the Stars" was a working nickname for Trek in its formative state. Trek TOS fiction has been mainly good guy/ bad guy, unlike its successor forms. But this series of books is among the best in the TOS universe when it comes to fleshing out Jim Kirk as a person, which is a lot easier to imagine about Picard and Sisko. And unlike in the sci fi of old, friends and allies don't always get along. Kirk is not only in the middle of a uber alles conflict between two alien races due to the fact that he and his charges happen to be passing through--he's getting just as much grief from anti-Starfleet types among the people he's on this mission to protect. It's easy to relate to that nowadays when it's trendy to hate your government, when the most obscene four-letter word is "GOVT". Herman Wouk this ain't, but I'm going to be very interested to see how this shakes out in the final reel.
| 
