Star Trek - Dreadnought!

"Put Piper on."
Damn, I knew it, I knew it! "Pi-" My throat closed up.
"Star Empire, do you read?"
"P-Piper here."
"Can you handle that helm?"
"Hell if I know, sir."
"I can command you from h-"
The ship shuddered and lurched to starboard, pushed by a photon blast on the underside of the primary hull.

So, it was with trepidation that I picked up my final book in this selection of ten Dreadnought! (#29 Pocket, #29 Titan) (1986).   Disappointingly, books in this grouping (#21 to #30) have been majoritively misses (for me anyway) with a couple hits.  I got about half way through Dreadnought! and was ready to write a scathing review.  I wasn't enjoying reading it, I didn't like the style, I hated the main character, I despised the puerile dialogue... and then I thought... perhaps I'm reading this the wrong way?

I like well written books, and frankly I've been spoiled.  I mean, when you've found an author or two who just get everything right for you, you're spoilt.  There is one particular author (not a Star Trek author) who just takes my breath away every time I read a new book by him, and damn it I want that sensation with more things I read!  Keeping this in mind, I took a step back from my own dislike of Dreadnought! and wondered who it was written for, who would like it, who would read this novel and dream they were lieutenant Piper.

It became so obvious then.  I'd been so unhappy reading it, holding it up against an impossible standard that I hadn't given it a fair chance.  I hadn't stepped back and thought that, well, perhaps I'm not really the intended audience, perhaps in its own way it is good, it's just not what captures my imagination anymore.

Anymore?

Yes, anymore.  When I took a step back I realised that actually, actually I would have loved this book fifteen years ago.  A silly, awkward fourteen or fifteen year old who dreamed about being older, not realising that as an adult she wouldn't be the same person, that she wouldn't have that same mentality.  A girl who didn't realise her glib remarks didn't really do her any favours and that sarcasm wasn't very flattering.  A girl who wasn't interested in the latest boy band, but who idolised star ship captains, and elves, and fairies.  A girl who still secretly played make believe while running around her family's land, making herself a main character in a myriad of games and make believe stories.  Could she rescue a borg drone from being a drone?  Yep, because she was special.  Find a magic lamp and make three wishes? Of course.  Somehow succeed against the odds, gain her peers respect, earn recognition?  As easy as breathing.

Yes, that little girl would have loved Dreadnought! and lieutenant Piper's exploits. 

Oh, of course that isn't going to get it completely off the hook, but once I realised some of this I started to be able to enjoy it (you might have noticed I'm a little bit mulish).

I guess my mind keeps coming back to that explanation of a Mary Sue; why they exist, what they represent, and I just get the feeling that (and I recognise I could be wrong) lieutenant Piper of Proxima may as well be called lieutenant Carey of 'somewhere in the USA'.  I very much think even if we discard the term 'Mary Sue', Piper is still a self-insert (made more likely by the rumour that Diane Carey modelled for the cover herself) and her adventures probably the outcome of many hours of play.  Carey herself says she was a first generation fan, she would have been what, thirteen or fourteen when Star Trek first aired?  It fits, doesn't it?

Lieutenant Piper is like... the dream outcome for an awkward, dorky girl in her teens.   She isn't one of the beauty queens or popular girls, but she's still pretty enough to have a 'lover' right?  And everyone seems to love her, even though she hasn't learned to love herself yet.  She makes friends easily, but importantly she makes mistakes with her relationships too... so she's realistic to a teenage girl trying to make her way through the minefield of school and hormones.  Piper gets angry with herself, berates herself, asks herself why she's being so stupid.  She makes those silly teenage comments that sound so clever to a child (what a come back!), but to an adult it makes you cringe a little bit inside (oh, why did you say that you silly girl!).  

Carey (or Piper, or both) realises that Kirk is off limits, after all no mere woman could come between Kirk and Spock (I caught all those little observations Carey, slash knows slash) so she creates her own Vulcan 'Sarda'.  Sarda doesn't look like Spock, his colouring is auburn hair and light eyes but he's still a Vulcan and... also caught between two worlds.  Although he is fully Vulcan, he has a penchant for weapons design.  Piper drew attention to this, Sarda got ostracised by his fellow Vulcans, cue teenage angst.

This is naturally what will draw them together in the end - and Carey Piper will have a deep and meaningful bond with a Vulcan, just like Captain Kirk whom she idolises.  Now I completely understand her passion for Kirk, completely but good grief girl, stop making eyes at the Captain when you've got a Vulcan waiting in the wings (and a forgettable ex, that's ok though).

Events move incredibly quickly, like a child recounting a story 'and then this happened, then this, then suddenly - this!' one minute she's a cadet in the academy taking the Kobayashi Maru test, then she's been made lieutenant on the Enterprise, then she's on board and before she can change her clothes there's an emergency.  Then she still doesn't change her clothes (because she's special don't you know!) and then she breaks out, steals a shuttle type thing, gets caught by the soon to be bad guy, then escapes, then captains the dreadnought, then we're all back home in time for an award ceremony and a buffet.  Later she's going to go sailing with Captain Kirk and they're both going to talk about what it's like to be bonded close friends with a Vulcan.

It's honestly ridiculous, I mean she wears a black jumpsuit instead of her uniform the whole way through.  Her group bunny hop down a corridor as a diversionary tactic.  The amount of contact between her and Sarda is nearing on indecent, and some of the descriptions of things - 'orgasmic' oh you naughty girl! - are far past appropriate!

It's not so much a Star Trek story as a girl's fantasy.  To be the one at the centre of the narrative (and it can't be any other way written in the first person), to be accepted by people you admire, to work out and thwart a plot which threatens the galaxy AND manage to show that you listened in your social studies class as you talk about ideas like 'big government' and 'civil liberties'.

That being said Diane Carey has made copious use of the Technical Manual, which gives the specifications for the Dreadnought class ship and the name Star Empire.  She also uses a couple of the flow diagrams which are in the technical manual that describe Starfleet hierarchy.  In addition to this, there are also two technical drawings at the back of the book which show two smaller ships / shuttles - a one man fighter 'polliwog' and a two man 'arco attack sled'.

So... I guess although it's ridiculous, thoroughly unbelievable silliness, I guess it isn't totally terrible as long as you accept it for what it is.  Seeing that Carey wrote historical romance novels around this time, it makes sense that the Piper and this whole book should be written in this style.  Historical romances are aimed at women and the main characters are often just stand ins for the audience, and that's what Piper is.  She's making new friends and having encounters with men who are (in her world) possible romance options. 

Anyway, Dreadnought! has a lot of heart and despite not liking it, I'm going to give it a 2/5.  As I said, for what it is, it isn't bad.  It's not trying to be anything other than it is, which is a  simple teenage / young adult novel set in the Star Trek universe.

2/5 - because uniforms aren't for main characters.