Headlong Flight (Star Trek: The Next Generation)* by Dayton Ward

I read it as a: paperback

Source: my own collection

Length: 333 pp

Publisher: Pocket Books

Year: 2017

**There be spoilers below!**

Back to their mission of exploring uncharted space, the Enterprise-E is checking out a nebula in the “Odyssean Pass” when they encounter what appears to be a rogue planet. This planet seems to be shifting between dimensions – and scans show it has life signs on it. A message from the planet warns the crew to stay away for their own safety, but Captain Picard wants to help them, so he sends Worf and an away team to the surface to investigate. Of course, because it’s Star Trek and the Enterprise crew is incapable of having a normal day (and there would be no story otherwise), the planet chooses that moment to disappear with Worf and friends on the surface. Whoops. Now Picard and the rest of the crew have to figure out where the planet went (hint: not only is there inter-dimensional traveling, but time traveling as well!), but the planet has attracted the attention of the Romulans, too, who think this would make some shiny technology to bring back home. Only, which time/dimension does this lot call home? I don’t know, it’s a mystery!

This was just a good old fun Star Trek story. It was not a tie in to anything else. It wasn’t part of a grand, multi-novel story arc that you had to read a hundred books before to understand the plot. It didn’t have any bullshit social or feminist issues that make me want to scream like some of the newer Voyager novels. There was a mystery, some technobabble, an away mission gone wrong, and Romulans oh noes! I loved it. I wish all the Trek novels would go back to being just standalone, fun novels, like they used to be waaaaayyyyyyy back when they were still numbered books. I could pick one up and read it and it was like its own episode.

This had everything a good Star Trek book (or episode) should have. Action, a little mystery, and sciencey technobabble. There were parts that made me laugh, and one or two parts that made me nostalgic and a little teary, not gonna lie. Those were wonderful, heady days on the Enterprise-D.

It was interesting to see the differences the Other Enterprise-D took in its timeline. Tasha Yar didn’t die, but instead, Picard himself was lost to the Borg at Wolf-359. Riker was the Enterprise-D’s captain, but his experiences turned him from the confident and happy XO we knew to a somber, self-critical man who constantly second-guesses himself and his worth as captain. It was nice to see how he went from that back to a man more familiar by the end of the book. Similarly, it was also nice to see how Yar might have turned out, still vivacious and brave but more seasoned, if she had lived. It made her death hurt all over again because we got a glimpse of what might have been.

It was also good to see how the two Enterprise crews not only worked together but also with the Sidrac to fix the trans-dimensional shifting and time traveling. In true Starfleet tradition, they even managed to play nice with the Romulans, who initially really did not have any interest in playing nice at all.

Overall, just a fun book, very enjoyable. I wish more of the Trek relaunch novels were like this, just a standalone book.

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