Pliable Truths is the latest title written by Dayton Ward and is a mediocre addition to the Star Trek: The Next Generation novel range.
Ward takes the reader back to the era of the television series just after Captain Jean-Luc Picard endured captivity and torture at the hands of the Cardassians. Also, the Cardassians subsequently withdraw from their occupation of the planet Bajor. Captain Picard is tasked with overseeing the negotiations between the Cardassians and the Bajorans aboard the space station known as Terok Nor. Of course, Terok Nor is on the verge of being redesignated Deep Space Nine. Picard’s mission is complicated by a bombing and assassination. Also, the Cardassian responsible for his recent torture has arrived, which causes some understandable disconcertion. Picard and the crew of the USS Enterprise have several challenges to meet and a few mysteries to solve.
Dayton Ward has written several Star Trek novels for many years, and he is usually reliable. The problem here is that fans have already been through this era of the canon. We know what happens with Bajor after the Cardassians pulled out. There is no real suspense to be had. There were some interesting moments between characters. The reader gets to revisit the earlier days of Odo, Quark, Kira, and Garak just before Commander Benjamin Sisko arrives as the Starfleet representative. Garak’s scenes were kind of fun. He is, of course, the Cardassian tailor with a mysterious past and is much more dangerous than he first appears.
Ward isn’t a bad writer, but I just wasn’t interested in revisiting this portion of the canon. It also seems to take forever before the bombs started detonating, and characters started getting taken off the board.
Hopefully, the next novel in this series takes us into some uncharted territory.
Next up, I will see what author Max Seeck has waiting for me on Ghost Island.
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