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Star Trek: Vulcan's Soul: Exodus book 1 by Josepha Sherman and Susan Shwartz
01/12/2007 . Source: Eamonn Murphy 
pub: Simon and Schuster. 292 page paperback. Price: £ 6.99 (UK), $ 7.99 (US), $ 9.99 (CAN). ISBN: 978-0-7434-6357-7. Buy Vulcan's Soul in the USA - or Buy Vulcan's Soul in the UK  check out website: www.simonsays.co.uk
Having had some success with 'Vulcan's Forge' and 'Vulcan's Heart' these authors, Josepha Sherman and Susan Shwartz, have, quite logically,written more books with a Vulcan theme. This is the first part of a trilogy with the overall title of 'Vulcan's Soul'. It uses the popular suspense building method of cutting back and forth between two stories, one set in the Trek 'present' and one in the ancient Vulcan past.
It is 2364 and Spock is attending a conference of several races - Vulcan, Romulan, Klingon, Cardassian and human. He is suddenly recalled to his home world where he dons a strange crown containing the memories of Karatek, a Vulcan who lived at the time of Surak, knew that sage well and fought by his side. The next chapter is about Karatek.
Cut to the present, which is 2377, one year after the end of the Dominion War. A Romulan colony is mercilessly attacked and destroyed by an unknown race called the Waraii. They lay claim to Romulus and Remus and seem to bear some ancient grudge. All the Empires are severely depleted by the Dominion War so no one leaps to the Romulans aid, officially. But a renegade band of ships led by Spock, Saavik (his wife!) and Admiral Chekhov sets off to Romulan space to help out, risking court martial. Treating taxpayer funded military vessels as your personal property is common in Trekland but happily, as far as I know, no military commander has tried it yet in the real world.
Meanwhile, back in Vulcan antiquity, Karatek is a scientist working on big warships when Surak turns up at his base 'waging peace' Everyone else on Vulcan is waging war, so much so that the race is threatened with extinction. Surak's big idea is to turn the warships into multi-generation starships so that if the worst happens, the Vulcan race will survive. The base commanders response is to send Karatek on a fact-finding mission with Surak and his two disciples to survey the local military outposts. This is not logical but serves as a device whereby Karatek can get to know the old sage. Karatek is the principle, quite likeable, character in this historic tale. Surak is very wise but can be annoying to real people, as Ghandi must have been. Karatek learns to respect him but never becomes a disciple, or takes an S name.
The dual narrative, present Watraii emergency and ancient Vulcan crisis, rolls along nicely for three hundred pages. Logically, one must assume some connection between the Exiles who left Vulcan with Karatek and the Watriaii causing trouble in 2377 but the link is not made explicit in this first volume. Instead, one is left with a nice cliff-hanger ending.
The last three Trek books I read used the idea of Star Trek as Mills and Boon romance. This was an original approach but didn't work for me. Happily, this is Star Trek as it should be: ripping yarns. It's an intelligent, well-plotted tale with lots of insight into Vulcan culture. The word logical is over-used and misused, so that tears become a logical response! But that is standard in books about Vulcans. I look forward to book two, which, happily, I have to hand.
Eamonn Murphy
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