djwudi's review against another edition
adventurous
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
3.0
A decent Trek adventure, with some interesting explorations of the Horta. However, yet another instance of Kirk immediately falling in love with a pretty woman from the planet of the week. I know it’s Trek cliche, but I wish more authors would just let Kirk interact with women as people, instead of so predictably and pointlessly as romantic interests.
david66's review
adventurous
hopeful
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
A fun, relatively short, Star Trek story. All my favourite characters from the Original Series are here and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Not a classic Trek but an interesting and decent paced story. For Trek fans only!
hemlockreads's review
3.0
I hate the romance in this book. Hannah has very little personality early on except for being pretty. There wasn't any chemistry between her and Kirk. By contrast all the Horta characterizaruon and world building was Excellent and I could read a whole series of it. Human (or former human) supremacists in space just feels boring as a plot, maybe because real life ones returned to prominence. The villains were cartoonishly evil and obvious but it was very satisfying when the general died.
judenoseinabook's review
3.0
Better than average Star Trek story. Nice to see the Horta making an appearance. And Captain Kirk fallsin love - again!
hemlocket's review
3.0
I hate the romance in this book. Hannah has very little personality early on except for being pretty. There wasn't any chemistry between her and Kirk. By contrast all the Horta characterizaruon and world building was Excellent and I could read a whole series of it. Human (or former human) supremacists in space just feels boring as a plot, maybe because real life ones returned to prominence. The villains were cartoonishly evil and obvious but it was very satisfying when the general died.
yoshi83's review
3.0
This book is worth a read if you like Hortas a lot (which I do). Kirk's current love interest is written well, but you can find this sort of thing in other books, too. The xenophobic antagonists were merely okay and not that interesting.
strikingthirteen's review against another edition
3.0
We're 3.5 years into the first 5 year mission and Kirk and the crew are faced with a unique problem with a planet population who cannot leave their world, even though there is a planet destroying asteroid heading their way and there's no way to divert it. Kirk of course (much to my annoyance and much eyerolling) falls in love with one of the advisors and really, really wants to help. Spock, despite being distrusted by most of the planet but the sole virtue of being alien, suggests a certain species they encountered on Janus VI can help. Hence the 'devil' reference of the title.
It was an alright, light read all things considering. As mentioned above I found Kirk's fling with Hannah annoying and mostly distracting and, lord help me, out of character. Spock seemed also very keen to tell people that he is unable to feel emotions when we all know that's not the case. But, again, that's probably a lot of my personal characterization factoring in. I found the suggestion that Spock made a little bit out of nowhere but that gave a good chance to revisit this species, which was rather interesting.
It was an alright, light read all things considering. As mentioned above I found Kirk's fling with Hannah annoying and mostly distracting and, lord help me, out of character. Spock seemed also very keen to tell people that he is unable to feel emotions when we all know that's not the case. But, again, that's probably a lot of my personal characterization factoring in. I found the suggestion that Spock made a little bit out of nowhere but that gave a good chance to revisit this species, which was rather interesting.
esperata's review against another edition
4.0
An enjoyable read although I found some parts less engaging. The asteroid and genetic tampering of the Vesbians was intriguing and I thoroughly enjoyed the proposed engineering solution, especially as it involved Spock dealing with the Horta. The Captain's involvement with Hannah was less pleasing although admittedly completely in character. As Dr McCoy might say "Nobody's perfect".
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