I really should've liked this book immensely. I'm a big fan of diplomatic/political intrigue, and the Star Trek universe has done it particularly well a few times. Unfortunately, this fell flat. One problem was the lack of distinctiveness in voices: a large part of the appeal of tie-in fiction lies in hearing familiar characters in our heads. McCormack not only miscued on that, but her Cardassians, Ferengi and humans all sounded the same. One of the subplots involved a deep-cover agent going native, and *almost* pulled off a brilliant tale: all the ingredients were there, but it just missed. The other subplot, involving a failing diplomatic summit, didn't work because of the voice issue coupled with too much similarity in names: it was hard to keep track of who was representing which faction.There was a terrific book in here somewhere, and maybe stronger editing could have excavated it. Didn't happen, though, making for a mediocre read. With the Typhon Pact novels, there have been at times more hits than misses, but Una McCormack's latest, "Brinkmanship" falls into the latter category. The story is a dual plot involving the Venette Convention a race that was once up for Federation membership that got forgotten about due to the Dominion War & Borg invasion. They've now taken up sides with the Tzenkethi which concerns the worlds of the Khitomer Accords. The Enterprise is dispatched to a peace conference to hopefully stave off any issues with them while the Aventine is sent on a mission to Outpost V-4 in order to determine if the Tzenkethi's motives with the Venette are what they say they are. McCormack's story while being well told starts out with an unnecessary amount of posturing by the Cardassian representative Detrek who causes a scene that nearly leads to war. There's also Commander Alden who in his mission to V-4 becomes so paranoid about the Tzenkethi that he literally causes an interstellar incident. The outcome of this story is pretty much a foregone conclusion since the odds of another conflict this early in the existence of the Typhon Pact would just be a bit of bad storytelling right now. McCormack goes overboard at times pushing this plot to the brink of war & pushing the Enterprise & Aventine characters to the brink of sanity & control. The only thing gained in this story is a bit more insight into the Tzenkethi themselves & we have a bit more development of the Aventine's crew which has been rarely used. Overall, a good story to be told, but also an unnecessary one with absolutely no gain or loss in this complex timeframe that probably could've been used elsewhere.
What do You think about Brinkmanship (2012)?
Intriguing… betrayals… trust… politics… war… peace… and more revelations
—Wilma
This wasn't one of my favorites, but it did the job. Loved the Tzenkethi.
—jacinta
