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There was a time
when I owned every single Star Trek tie-in novel ever published.
When I became a paperboy in grade school I took my first real
paycheck and bought every single Star Trek novel ever published
by Pocket Books. (This would have been the late ‘80s, so there
would have already been a lot of them, although not nearly as
many as there are now.) I had already collected all the novels
published before Pocket Books took the helm, including the
retellings of the original series by Blish and the animated
series by Alan Dean Foster. I took a great deal of pride in the
completeness of my collection, continuing to buy each and every
Star Trek novel as it was released.
I kept that up
even after I had essentially stopped reading them. Then,
eventually, the habit grew too expensive: Once DS9 made its
appearance there were three different series of novels, each
with a monthly release, and I couldn’t afford to spend $20 or
more each month on books I wasn’t even reading.
Not to mention
the shelf space.
My point here is
that I had gotten to the point where I simply ignored media
tie-ins. My philosophy was simple: With all the great books out
there that I will never get a chance to read, why should I waste
my time trying to sort through the great sea of mediocrity which
is tie-in fiction?
But then I
encountered Babylon
5, which lit a burning passion in my heart. In fact, the TV
series was painfully good, with each new episode leaving an ache
of yearning in its wake.
That ache still
wasn’t good enough to get to me try out the tie-in fiction,
mind you. In fact, in a lot of ways, my love for this particular
series only made the tie-in novels less interesting to
me. Why? Because what raised Babylon 5 to its transcendent level was largely the loving care with
which J. Michael Straczynski revealed his universe, his
characters, and his story. Disconnected, disjointed tie-in
fiction written by third party authors simply lacked the very
things which made
Babylon
5 so special.
But, suddenly,
that changed: The license for Babylon
5 tie-in novels changed hands and, with the new arrangement, J.
Michael Straczynski was providing detailed outlines. The new
novels were, rather than being misbegotten step-children, unique
new windows into the Babylon
5 universe.
And that,
finally, enticed me back into the tie-in stable. Three trilogies
resulted from the Straczynski outlines: LEGIONS OF FIRE by Peter
David; THE PASSING OF THE TECHNO-MAGES by Jeanne Cavelos; and
THE PSI CORPS TRILOGY by J. Gregory Keyes. All three were
eventually issued as omnibuses by the SFBC, and it’s in that
form that I finally picked up copies.
I read LEGIONS
OF FIRE last year. It was my first choice among the three
because it finished the story of Londo Mollari – a story which
had been broadly and intriguingly hinted at over the course of
the TV series, but never told. Its revelations made it an
addictive and entertaining read for me, but I couldn’t help
regretting the relative crudity of its craft. In a lot of ways,
the flaws in the novel made it painfully clear that I was
reading a novel written by one author from the outline of
another: For whatever reason, Peter David had been unable to
fully own the material, resulting in a certain lack of
depth. Nor had he been able to forge a smooth narrative from
bullet points, creating an awkward pacing and a definite lack of
causal continuity.
In short, you
had a very compelling plot that simply didn’t come to life in
the telling. The result was something that I think any fan of
Babylon
5 would enjoy reading, but which fails on its own merits. As a
result, I ended up setting aside the other two trilogies,
expecting more of the same.
All of this is
nothing more than a lengthy prelude, however. What I’m really
here to talk about is my reaction to THE PSI CORPS TRILOGY,
which I just finished reading.
Let me brutally
blunt here, because otherwise I fear my point will be lost:
These are damn
good books.
And I don’t
mean that in a “these are really good considering that
they’re tie-in novels” way. I mean that these are damn good
books, period. Start with a little of MUTANT by Henry Kuttner,
then add a lot of THE DEMOLISHED MAN by Alfred Bester, and then
give it some meat with a dark version of the best parts of
ENDER’S GAME by Orson Scott Card and you’ll begin to have
some sense of what THE PSI CORPS TRILOGY has to offer.
In short, J.
Gregory Keyes offers a dynamic, complex story with an epic
scale. He seizes the opportunity to work with a large,
multigenerational cast by drawing each character with care and
detail. He then cements the entire work by placing at center
stage an absolutely compelling psychological drama which takes
the reader’s heart in hand and wrings emotion from it almost
effortlessly.
The only
“flaw” – and I hesitate to call it such – is that there
is a gap in the narrative of the trilogy. The first volume, in
an epic style reminiscent of THE FOUNDATION TRILOGY, covers the
history of telepaths from their first appearance in the 21st
century until the time of Alfred Bester (another of the many
compelling and deeply drawn characters from the television
series). The second volume is the life story of Bester up to his
first appearance in the series. The third volume essentially
completes Bester’s story after the series. (The missing part
of the narrative, of course, is the story that we see in the
series itself.)
In essence, THE
PSI CORPS TRILOGY is the Tragedy of Alfred Bester. The
particular brilliance of the work can be ascribed entirely to
Keyes’ success in not only telling this story as an intense
drama of the human spirit, but also by imbuing in Bester the
legacy of the telepathic race. Keyes perfectly captures a
character created by Straczynski and portrayed by Walter Koenig,
and then renders that character into a Janus-like figure,
looking down upon the twin destinies of his people. The result
is Shakespearean in its scope.
As I sit here,
giving the work the thought it deserves – looking at its
details and savoring each in turn – I am particularly struck
by the complexity of the characters. Not only does Keyes
practice an exceptional conservation of cast (never once
allowing a character to simply amble through his narrative
without some deeper purpose or effect), he also makes sure that
every character is fully realized as a living, breathing being.
On a similar
note, the careful weaving of the story’s many themes also
leaps out at me as a stellar accomplishment. No event is allowed
to pass as an idle plot point: Nothing simply happens – it
happens to someone, and has a meaning; an impact; an
effect upon them. And, on top of that, each event carefully
illuminates some new facet of the gem which Keyes is crafting
– it has a unique significance not only to the characters, but
to the reader.
Which brings me
back to my thesis statement:
These are damn
good books.
You should read
them.
GRADES:
-
DARK GENESIS: A
-
DEADLY RELATIONS: A
-
FINAL RECKONING: A
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