Rating: 
Summary: Star Trek: Best Destiny
Review: Star Trek: Best Destiny written by Diane Carey is a flashback novel of James T. Kirk. This book mixes the past with the present in the Trek genre. James T. Kirk is seen as a teenager wanting to show his father that he can and will be worthy of wearing the Starfleet uniform someday. This is the first adventure we get to read about where James T. Kirk plays a sugnificant role. There is personal danger, self-discovery, and unparalleled adventure. We read about James T. Kirk about to retire from his long tenure with the fleet. Now, events draw him back to a youthful adventue with his father George and Captain Robert April. A part of the galaxy only left in James Kirk's memory, a world called Faramond, mysterious in nature Kirk takes us back when he was sixteen years old. Although he was estranged from his father he admired what his father did for him, but Captain Robert April changes James Kirk's life forever. This is a good Father-Father image/ son book. The adventure now only in James' memory they face life or death... but a glimpse of the future sets James T. Kirk on a Trek of his own... best destiny.
Rating:
Summary: Star Trek: Best Destiny
Review: Star Trek: Best Destiny written by Diane Carey is a flashback novel of James T. Kirk. This book mixes the past with the present in the Trek genre. James T. Kirk is seen as a teenager wanting to show his father that he can and will be worthy of wearing the Starfleet uniform someday. This is the first adventure we get to read about where James T. Kirk plays a sugnificant role. There is personal danger, self-discovery, and unparalleled adventure. We read about James T. Kirk about to retire from his long tenure with the fleet. Now, events draw him back to a youthful adventue with his father George and Captain Robert April. A part of the galaxy only left in James Kirk's memory, a world called Faramond, mysterious in nature Kirk takes us back when he was sixteen years old. Although he was estranged from his father he admired what his father did for him, but Captain Robert April changes James Kirk's life forever. This is a good Father-Father image/ son book. The adventure now only in James' memory they face life or death... but a glimpse of the future sets James T. Kirk on a Trek of his own... best destiny.
Rating:
Summary: A competently told background story of Kirk's youth
Review: The interplay of present and past situations added dynamics which wouldn't ordinarily have been there. Good attention is paid to what is already known about Kirk such as his misfortune with Kodos the Executioner. It was very clever the way the author explained how Kirk could have been behind in his studies yet make it to Starfleet Academy early. It was also clever how they explain Kirk's rapid ascendancy to the Enterprise with Captain April putting in the good word for him. There was a lot to like here.
On the down side, there are an awful lot of "coincidences" to consider. The Enterprise being originally named the Constitution explains how the first ship of a class is not eponymous which is a long-standing hole in the Trek continuity. However, Kirk's father being the one to suggest the name Enterprise is hard to believe.
Some of the writing was lacking. Chapter 13: "The bridge was lit like the fourth of July" (hackneyed simile). Chapter 21: "...sitting duck..." (unbelievably overused phrase in Star Trek. Almost a Beer Trek "drink a shot" rule whenever it is uttered).
Nit-pick time: Chapter 28: "Forty-five years earlier... USS Enterprise 1701-A" should read "USS Enterprise 1701". Somebody got mixed up during a flashback.
Rating: 
Summary: Very Excellent Book!
Review: This book I use as a prize for the Online Simulations Association at http://www.sbmemorial.com! They love it every time! It is one of my personal favorites as well!
Rating:
Summary: My favorite Star Trek book!
Review: This was an awesome book. I love how Diane Carey shows us Kirk as a child and how he finally decided he wanted to join Starfleet and how he grew from a teenaged rebel to the best Captain in the fleet. It's well written and interesting, and lets us see into past of Captain Kirk and the Enterprise.
Rating: 
Summary: A biography like novel about Captain Kirk.
Review: When Pocket Books needs a shot in the arm, they release a major novel about one of the main characters or events in the Star Trek universe.
Therefore, Best Destiny does feel a bit contrived and was undoubtedly picked over with a fine tooth comb to make sure it conformed to the trivia ladened Star Trek timeline.
This is a glorification of the early life of James T. Kirk, and goes a little to far in places to be believable.
Rating:
Summary: Star of Today's Star Trek has a shadow: Kirk's childhood!
Review: Young "Jimmy," at 12, is running, for his life, it seems, from father's bidding, which would mean Jimmy must travel with Dad on the maiden voyage of the U.S.S. Enterprise. Jimmy, always the rebel, prefers to keep his feet on the ground, or at least not in outer space; so he finds like-minded youths and leads them cross-country away from the threat of Dad and Starfleet. It seems this rebellious journey was every bit the important part of his life as that inevitable journey into which Dad forced Jimmy.
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