Chapter By Chapter (usually) features me reading one chapter of the selected book at a time and reviewing it as if I were reviewing an episode of a TV show or an issue of a comic. There will be spoilers if you haven’t read to the point I have, and if you’ve read further I ask that you don’t spoil anything further into the book. Think of it as a read-along book club.
In our last chapter we checked in on the plague planet for a bit of a tease to the cause. Not much to say besides it’s getting worse.
This chapter goes back to Vulcan and Sorel. When I first read this book I didn’t read The Vulcan Academy Murders yet, but it’s been so long since I’ve read this novel that I don’t know what level of interest I had in this part of the story. In the first book, Sorel was one of the murder victims, which gave us an idea about how Vulcans grieve, at least in Jean Lorrah’s rendition. The novels are not canon unless they’re worked into the show or movies, the official source material versus the usually unofficial material like the novels, comics, audio dramas, and video games. So how Vulcan telepathic linkage might not work officially as it does in this story.
These were new characters to me, because Sorel, Dr. Corrigan, and T’Mir were Lorrah’s original characters, and as far I currently know never appeared outside of these two novels, or at least ones she made. Dr. M’Benga might as well have been new as he made so little impact compared to Dr. McCoy or even Pike’s doctor in “The Cage”, Boyce, because he was part of a character moment scene for Pike as well as his later appearances in the Early Voyages comic, a better take on Pike’s time as captain of the Enterprise from what I’ve seen of Strange New Worlds. No Spock with mental issues and no Klingon boy bands. As to whether I had any interest Lorrah’s original characters alongside the main cast I couldn’t tell you. It’s been too long. We’re also introducing more new characters that may or may not be important. We’ll see as the book goes on but we should get to the chapter now.
The chapter takes place in Sorel’s office, introducing two more cast members: T’Kar and her adopted daughter T’Pina. I don’t know when it was established that all female Vulcans’ names start with “T'”, but it seems like every story I’ve reviewed for this site goes along with it, so it might be canon. The two women come from Nisus, T’Pina a survivor of an attack on a Vulcan colony just after birth so there are no records of who her parents even were. T’Kar was on Vulcan returning her husband’s katra, his…you know, I’m not sure how you describe it. Memory Alpha, if you please?
The katra, or living spirit, was the essence of the Vulcan mind and could be transferred to another person or preserved in katric arks before death. Described as a Vulcan’s eternal life force, it was likened to their soul.
T’Kar is a nurse and I’m not sure what T’Pina’s skills are, though I infer it has something to do with maintaining the infrastructure of the colony, possibly an engineer or something. Nurse are needed and T’Pina brings up keeping the colony running with so many people sick is also important. Nisus is their home and they won’t sit safe on Vulcan when they can help their friends. Sorel respects that and stops trying to talk them out of going. There is also a local who has interest in T’Pina, but his family has not contacted her, possibly due to not knowing T’Pina’s bloodline. We saw in the last book that some Vulcans believe that matters.
Speaking of which Sorel namedrops Sendet, who was Daniel’s rival for T’Mir’s affections, even trying to forcibly break their telepathic bond. Unfortunately he’s going to be in this story. I saw the opening page for the next chapter and it involves Kirk talking to him and the leader of his sect, so I’m expecting more trouble here. Or maybe Lorrah’s about to set up something with T’Pina? Like I said, it’s been a long time. I could see that happening, but I don’t think he deserves to find a mate after all the red herring crap he pulled in the last story.
Also coming from the last story is a mention that Sorel wasn’t able to save his wife’s katra. I’m pretty sure all of this stuff went over my head last time, but these are continuity moments necessary to at least where the characters evolved from since The Vulcan Academy Murders and I don’t think it takes away from this story. It’s just important info to the story at hand, which is how you do continuity right. McCoy suggested getting some time away from Vulcan, but Sorel was busy with his duties at the hospital. This is his chance to take McCoy’s advice…but he’s still going to be working. You don’t need a psychic bond to struggle with losing a spouse, after all, and some people choose burying themselves in their work. Sorel’s work just happens to be healing people and saving lives.
I don’t know how many more new characters we have coming because it’s been so long, or how many more returning characters…except for Sendet next time. With Daniel and T’Mir about to be back in mind meld distance, and we’ve seen circumstances to do that long distance in official shows, I’m kind of worried. We’ll see how Kirk plans to deal with this, possibly next chapter.
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