Greg Cox

Prose and comics are two mediums that have very different strengths, and nowhere is that more evident than here. One of the things that made 52 so successful was its very investment in the comics model of long-form serialized storytelling: it told a single story in 52 parts, adding up to over a 1,000 pages of comics. Though obviously you could in theory reproduce this in other mediums (prose, television, &c.), I don't think it would play to their strengths, at least not as those mediums are show more produced in contemporary America.

So while a novel version of 52 could in theory work, I suppose, this novel version never could. The whole point of the story was its hugeness, its sprawl, its peeking into every corner of the DC universe/multiverse. That just cannot happen in a 359-page novel. Cox is hampered by trying to simulate the very format of the original comics; while in his later novelization of Countdown to Final Crisis, he can just lop out whole subplots, here he emulates the original comics in having 52 chapters, one for each week. This means at least some part of each issue has to make it into the book, which makes it much more difficult to cut the story down. Countdown focuses on just a couple of the subplots in great detail; the novel of 52 hits most of the subplots at a very superficial level.

The result is a book that would probably be mildly interested if you hadn't read 52 as a comic, but is thoroughly uninteresting if you have. I'm sure Greg Cox did his best with the hand he was dealt, but in this format, I just don't see a way this project could have ever succeeded.

(Also I'm pretty sure there's just one flat-out error: the Nightwing who meets Batwoman in Gotham is Dick Grayson here, but I'm pretty sure that in the comics he's meant to be the undead fellow former Robin Jason Todd impersonating Dick.) show less

Another formulaic, cliché-ridden, money-spinning novella, I suspect from the J.J. Abrams School of Writing. The plot was fair enough, although a little heavy-handed (pardon the pun), but Greg Cox is obviously one of those serial novelisation hacks who can quickly process a television series, picking up a handful of memorable episodes and character catchphrases, before spewing out a recognisable but soulless rendition in mass market paperback. He claims to have watched the original series show more during the 60s, and queued up to watch the films at the cinema, but his version of Captain Kirk et al reads like he merely surfed the Internet for half hour with pen and paper in hand, cribbing from YouTube and Memory Alpha. Kirk 'doesn't believe in no-win scenarios', Uhura quotes that 'risk is our business', and Scotty actually calls another crew member for stealing his 'line', 'They can't take any more!' Not to mention Cox's 'Name that Episode' score chart - when Scotty is taken to sickbay, I knew that his brush with death in The Changeling would be brought up, because Cox must have already name-dropped half of the original series by that point.

Sadly, for Cox and Abrams alike, recapping and quoting doesn't quite capture the spirit of the show or the characters for me. The dialogue was way off, not to mention completely infantile in places - Chekov sneers 'Dramatic much?' like a snarky teenager, and Kirk challenges an opponent with 'Bring it on!' - and none of the original characters sounded remotely familiar. Calling Kirk on his flagrant and constant abuse of the Prime Directive might have been amusing if handled with slightly more subtlety, but the moment was reduced to a long list of - you guessed right - old episode synopses. Kirk gets packed off to fight bare-chested, Spock performs a mind meld, the secondary characters take turns in the big chair, and Sulu earns a placeholder as a love interest. Been there, done that, returned it to the library. The only plus point is that this is a quick - and I mean two or three hours, tops - read.

Where are the writers who actually care about these shows and their characters? Please, rise up and defeat this army of mercenary robots! show less

Though I liked the show a lot — minus a couple of character caveats, this is the first book I’ve ever tackled in the Star Trek universe dealing with the Voyager crew. This also happens to be one of the most enjoyable reads I’ve ever experienced in the book franchise based on the various shows. Whether it’s the Original Star Trek, Next Generation, or Deep Space Nine, everyone knows the quality of writing and stories for the paperbacks of their continuing adventures in that universe show more can run from dreadful to really good — but sadly, heavily weighted toward the former. Usually the characterization is off, or the story is lackluster, or the writing is terrible. I’m ecstatic to say that NONE of those things apply here.

Greg Cox has done a marvelous job of capturing the essence of the characters from the show, and he’s wrapped them in an entertaining and enjoyable story that while no new shakes, is like a splendid episode we simply weren’t allowed to see. Sure, if you critically examine it upon finishing, it has some standard similarities to an oft-repeated narrative — a seeming paradise with a dark underbelly — but it’s so well done and so entertaining, while you’re reading you simply don’t care. There’s humor and drama, a few thrills, a few dark moments but not so much it takes away from the good feeling throughout that you’re “watching” a lost episode.

Perhaps Cox’s greatest achievement is the way he chose to criss-cut the story, seamlessly flowing from one portion of the crew to the next to give us, the “viewer,” a cohesive overall picture, just as the film editors did on the show. Other writers in the Star Trek universe often choose to focus on one or two main characters, perhaps to make it easy on themselves, but Cox takes the road less traveled, giving most of the crew a chance to shine, and moments that provide us humor or drama, even a tiny bit of insight. It makes this one feel full and well-rounded, much more like a terrific episode where everyone is involved. That brings me to my next point:

By including Harry, Paris and Chakotay, Tuvok and Kes, Neelix and The Doctor, and especially Kes, this lessens the role the grating Janeway has to play in this. If you’re one of the millions like myself who laments that producers did not cast Erin Gray in the role of Janeway, and went with Kate Mulgrew instead, you don’t have to worry about the character as she was written, or as portrayed by Mulgrew, nearly ruining another great episode with her caustic, Kathryn Hepburn-level grating voice, and condescending personality. To be fair, that was the way Janeway was written, but I truly believe Gray would have brought more to the role, and perhaps found a way to dissuade the six people who wrote her character from turning her into such an infuriating mess. With her “screen time” wisely lessened here, though she does play an important role as Captain, she slides down the literary palate much easier here than in the show.

On the technical side, I did run into a number of typos in the print version — either an actual typo, or a “to” missing in a couple of sentences, for example — but they appear in as many mainstream books as they do self-published, despite what you hear from reviewers trying to pull the wool over your eyes. In this case, as is so often the case, it was ticky-tack stuff not relevant enough, nor frequent enough to ever become a distraction, or even an annoyance. And, this was a pretty big book as well. I only mention it as a preemptive strike because someone else is certain to laser in on it. Trust me, it’s nothing. If it was, I’d tell you.

I won’t go into fine detail about the plot on this rare occasion, since the premise is well explained on the back cover of the book and in the introduction of the listing, but suffice it to say I LOVED this one, and had an enjoyable time flying through it. For those wondering about the time frame on this one, Kes is still with Neelix, and Paris and Torres aren't even beginning to come together yet. A great read; a blast, in fact, and a book I’ll be keeping around so I can read it again at a later date. That says it all. show less

The Librarians and the Mother Goose Chase by Greg Cox is the second book in The Librarians trilogy. Eve Baird along with Cassandra Cillian, Jake Stone, and Ezekiel Jones have just returned to the Library annex in Portland, Oregon after another successful mission. They are all off to relax when the Clippings Book (and the Librarians miniature versions) start acting up. A professor in Northumberland wakes up inside a pumpkin, a tree trimmer in Miami gets carried away by a freaky wind, a show more librarian in Ohio found three mice without eyes in her kitchen (and she attacked them with a butcher knife), and Mother Goose’s Magic Garden, an amusement park, is about to be demolished. Jenkins believes that the 1918 Mother Goose Treaty has been broken. In the 1700s Elizabeth Goose created a spellbook that ended up getting published. The Librarian at that time rounded up all the copies except one which remained with the family. It ended up getting divided into three sections for the three different factions of the Goose family in 1918. It seems that a descendant has decided to stage a coup and claim all three copies to enact a horrible spell. Stone, Cassandra, and Ezekiel each take a different clipping and set off. Eve and Jenkins have their hands full in the Library. Mother Goose’s magic has set off the goose that lays the golden egg. They need to catch it and return it to its cage before more magical items start acting up. Just another typical day for the Librarians and their Guardian! Join Eve, Ezekiel, Stone, Jenkins and Cassandra on another magical adventure in The Librarians and the Mother Goose Chase.

The Librarians and the Mother Goose Chase is bewitching. Greg Cox captured the quirky character’s personalities perfectly (for those of you who watch the show) as well as the Library. I could just envision the Library from the written descriptions. I found the book to be well-written, engaging, and entertaining. I thoroughly enjoyed the humor in this story. I found myself laughing out loud many times while reading The Librarians and the Mother Goose Chase (especially when Jenkins was trying to capture the goose and Eve with Dead Man’s Chest). The book has a fast pace that never slacks. The description of Mother Goose was spot on from the children’s books. I give The Librarians and the Mother Goose Chase 5 out of 5 stars. I do wish, though, that the mystery had not been so easy to solve. One clue was all I needed to identify the responsible party. The book is written with four points-of-view (Cassandra, Stone, Ezekiel, and Eve) which works for this book. It is not confusing or complicated. If you have not watched the show or the movies, you can read the book. The author provides the backstory needed. I think it does help, though, to have watched the show. As I read the book, I could picture it in my head. I have not had the opportunity to read The Librarians and The Lost Lamp (first book in trilogy), but I have moved it to the top of my TBR pile. show less