String Theory Book Two: Fusion

Star Trek Voyager: String Theory #2

by Kirsten Beyer

When Captain Janeway orders the investigation of a peculiar and dangerous anomaly tied to an alien civilization, it sets in motion a chain of events bridging Voyager's past with its future, forcing choices upon the crew with terrible repercussions, and discoveries beyond their wildest expectations. In this second novel of an exciting 3-part odyssey, Tuvok, Voyager's Vulcan security chief, answers a cosmic siren song that puts him on the verge of startling transformation, testing the crew's continued cohesion by challenging its assumptions about loyalty, duty, free will, and friendship.

Genres: Star Trek, Science Fiction, Star Trek Voyager, Fiction, Ebooks, Media Tie In, Novels

315 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2005

Reviews

[Alejandro · Rating 4 out of 5]

The String Theory trilogy continues!


This is the second book in a trilogy titled “String Theory”, celebrating the 10th Anniversary of “Star Trek: Voyager” (in 2005), each book written by a different author. The whole story is set after events of the TV Fourth Season Finale (“Hope and Fear”) but before the events of the TV Fifth Season Premiere (“Night”) of the original run of the “Star Trek” Spin-off TV series.


NACENE STRIKES BACK!

Just when Captain Kathryn Janeway and the crew of the USS Voyager thought that their adventure in the Monorhan space system has finished…

…it was just beginning!

And members of one of the species that affected the most the fate of Voyager is back!

The Nacene!

The same powerful alien species that The Caretaker (the responsible of bringing the Starfleet and Maquis crews along with their ships to the Delta Quadrant) and Suspiria (The vengeful mate of the Caretaker).

Few alien species aside of the Borg and Species 8472 fill with fear and caution to the crew of Voyager than meeting once again a Nacene.

And this time, it’s a Nacene with an insidious agenda and with powers so great that she’ll be able to make believe that she has been a member of the crew, and not only any member but…

…Phoebe Janeway… Kathryn Janeway’s sister!

“Phoebe” altered the memories of the crew along with the main computer databanks and nobody, not even Captain Janeway will have any doubt that “Phoebe” has been since the beginning of their epic journey through the Delta Quadrant.

However, that’s just the half of their problems, since Lt. Cmdr. Tuvok has been “summoned” by a mysterious entity to go to a large space array, full of secrets and danger!

This time the crew of USS Voyager won’t be able to remain unscathed or…

…complete!

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed Fusion for the most part, despite the overly-complex and often confusing plot. Though this is Kirsten Beyer's first Star Trek novel, one can see why she would go on to make the Voyager "relaunch" novels so compelling. Her grasp of the characters that she so obviously loves to write is impressive, and was the hook I needed to bring me along on the journey of this novel. There is also a great deal of cleverness in the story, with Beyer using past lore from Star Trek: Voyager to great effect. A competent and enjoyable middle entry in the String Theory trilogy.

Full review: https://www.treklit.com/2024/06/StringTheory2.html

[Amy Tudor · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good continuation with high stakes, and all the characters had a part in the story. Had trouble keeping my attention in it but that may have been due to life rather than the book itself. Looking forward to the final instalment of the series

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the second book in the Sring Theory trilogy series. Think of Fusion more along the lines of a spooky ghost ship mystery than a traditional Star Trek novel. Tuvok is drawn to a wonderous, yet abandoned space station using telepathy, Voyager's crew is in persuit. However, this station bears a similarity to the Caretaker array that brought Voyager into the Delta Quadrant. Given what the Caretaker and his people can do, this could be both a blessing or a curse. The station is tremendously powerful, but is seemingly empty, but isn't. Fusion follows the story threads established in the first String Theory novel, while adding greater depth explaining the Fourteenth Tribe's exodus from their world. This book is great for explaining the origins and motives of the Caretaker's people, a topic rarely visited in the televised series. Fusion does end on a cliffhanger but, hopefully, the next book is just as good.

[Rocky Sunico · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first volume was a solid setup for a classic Voyager-style story. This book decided to take things further by presenting us with more challenges but also digging deep into the lore of the Caretaker and his advanced race that we've come to know as the Nacene. It's a shame that these books don't get confirmed as "canon" because I rather liked some of the ideas they introduced for the Nacene that rather works with everything else.

Also, I get why some sites have listed Mosaic as recommended reading for this book as we start with the appearance of Phoebe, Janeway's sister. Of course it's not actually Janeway - just a very powerful creature who decides to take on her appearance and impant false memories in all of the crew to justify her presence. But having gone through Mosaic helped to provided a fuller sense of character for her sibling.

There are things that feel a bit heavy-handed like still pushing the Janeway-Chakotay romance (even if largely as internal dialog), but the rest of it is still pretty solid.

[Brenda · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn't always know what was going on, plot-wise, but I enjoyed the book anyway. After the first few chapters, when it was really difficult to picture the aliens' culture and appearances and location, I couldn't put the book down. I remember getting through String Theory, #1 much faster though. I think that's because the author of #2 made word choices that left the text a bit more dense. There were longer descriptions and more involved explanations for events, which I don't think were either satisfying or dissatisfying. The longer explanations usually didn't make me feel more involved with the characters, but they didn't make me want to stop reading either. Overall, reading this book was an enjoyable adventure. All the loose ends were tied up by the end, and it was fun to see how the problems were resolved. The only plot thread left dangling was a "to be continued" for #3, the final book in the series.

[Harry Hol · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very enjoyable and suspenseful Star Trek: Voyager book, even more so than the first part.

After commander Tuvok leaves Voyager without authorization, the crew ties to catch up with his shuttlecraft. The chase leads to an advanced space station, orbiting a singularity.

There's a familiar 'abandoned spooky space station' theme to it all, with some pretty tense moments and fun ideas.

Even though it's more than clear that every main character will survive (this series of books is set between seasons 4 and 5 of the tv-show) there's enough tension and suspense to forget about the inevitable fortuitous outcome.

Fusion is very well written and the author really 'gets' Trek. I especially enjoyed how aware she is of the full Voyager continuity and how she ties up so many loose ends that the series' producers left dangling even after seven seasons.

Fusion ends on a cliffhanger, and I'm looking forward to the concluding book.

Highly recommended for fans of Star Trek: Voyager, but start with book 1, obviously :-)

[Peter Rydén · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mycket i boken gör att man inte upplever berättelsen som logisk eller trolig, men Beyer som författare gör ett bra arbete med att föra läsaren vidare in i det som berättas och man vill därför läsa vidare. Jag har haft svårigheter att greppa vad som menas med "stringteorin", men denna bok förklarar detta på ett mycket enkelt och lättförståeligt sätt. Vi får möta mer av den nacenska kulturen, om än mestadels utifrån, och detta ger en större bas för att förstå den person som förde USS Voyager till deltakvadranten. Jag har faktiskt läst denna bok två gånger (med några års mellanrum), vilket hör till ovanligheterna, och jag tror att boken vid en andra genomläsning faktiskt kändes bättre än den första gången.

[Carina · Rating 3 out of 5]

I did remember right, this book is not as good (IMO) as its predecessor. It also has a lot more 'scientific' jargon in it which means I absorbed a lot less.

The rating of this book is purely down to my enjoyment of it, so this next sentence honestly had no impact on my rating. But the shipping of Chakotay and Janeway!!!!! It's so right, but makes me hate Endgame even more.

Other thoughts, love the little hint to Q at the end of this. It's so easy to overlook (but I've recently rewatched some episodes of MLP: Friendship is Magic so his 'voice' is somewhat familiar to me atm). I'm obviously going to read the third book, but I'm not as keen as I was yesterday when I finished book 1.

[Austin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really liked Kirsten Beyer’s Relaunched Voyager series and was excited to read this as Tuvok is one of my favorite characters from the series. I think this was a solid part of the String Theory series and enjoyed it. It was very technobabble heavy and was hard to follow at times because of it, and I definitely should not have waited months between reading the first one and this, but it was still enjoyable

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

"She needed to know the answer, the correct answer to the question. Only that could stave off the inevitable physical discomfort of ignorance."

Gods I really am Kathryn Janeway. Here's to hoping I never become the admiral!! I mean it wouldn't be terrible to be a crone getting closer and closer the older I get but a crone who doesn't drink coffee... I'd rather be dead.

[Levy Mclaurin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book I thought was really good. It definitely kind of brought all the elements together as far as better understand of the story and looking forward to the third and although I have it I’ll probably read something else in between.

[Randy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fast paced and enjoyable. Reads just like an episode of the show. The author does a great job of capturing the essence of the Voyager crew. It is important to read Book 1 in the trilogy before delving into this one. I look froward to book 3.

[Steven Shinder · Rating 4 out of 5]

Phoebe and the case memories reminded me of that Rick and Morty episode with the parasites. Interesting angle having to figure out how to fool the EMH. It felt very authentic having Neelix super concerned about Naomi’s well-being.

[Tim Balasa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Decent book. Some parts were difficult to follow due to the nature of the aliens involved.

[Melvin Lance]

Enjoyable

[Melissa · Rating 2 out of 5]

The best part was the cliffhanger Epilogue.

[Diana · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite of this trilogy so far. Some nice J/C moments. 😍

[Sharon · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the second book in the String Theory trilogy.

Voyager is docked at an ancient space station. Tuvok finds himself the recipient of a mysterious summons coming from somewhere on the array. He abandons his post and shuttles over in order to answer the call. He finds himself caught up in a sub dimensional age old war that answers some of the questions about The Caretaker and the Ocampa.

On board Voyager a mysterious force deceives almost everyone into thinking Janeway's sister is a member of the crew who has traveled with them the whole time. The alien has an agenda and will stop at nothing to accomplish what she has set out to do.

Once again every character gets a moment of focus and they are all 'in' character when compared to their TV counterparts.

I enjoyed it. I thought it was very well written but as with the first book some of the descriptive parts of it were overlong. Tuvok's observations in the station could have been reduced and made a bit tighter but apart from that its a good story told well.

[Jimyanni · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad, for a book with no beginning and no end. This book suffers from a common ailment of books that are "Book 2 of a trilogy". It starts where the previous book left off, so if you haven't read the previous book, you are denied the satisfaction of seeing the beginning of the story, and it also lacks a satisfactory ending. This one at least leaves off at a more satisfactory place than the first book of the series did, but that isn't saying much. Obviously, if you've chosen to read this series, and have read book one and are unwilling to simply cut your losses and give up, then you'll want to read this book. On the other hand, if you haven't read book one of the series, this is definitely not a stand-alone novel. The trilogy as a whole MIGHT rate a fourth star; this book by itself certainly doesn't.

[Shannon · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.75 stars.

I dunno how I feel about this book in the String Theory series. It's not bad, but it's not that great either. On the one hand, we get to learn more about the Array and the beings behind it. On the other hand, it was really slow and a little bit beyond the expectations of Voyager's reality. I think the word I'm looking for is "ethereal," like in a divine sense. Sadly, eleven days later, I can barely recall everything from this book.

But. Huge but.

I did like the progression of Tuvok's situation and how the cliffhanger(s) at the end of the book was written. Beyer does a wonderful job segueing from A to C; 1 to 3. It adds to the depth of the Mornohans, expands on the concept of "Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations," and balances humanity with celestial mysteries.

[Mikael Kuoppala · Rating 5 out of 5]

After a Jeffrey Long’s excellent but quite standalone opening “Cohesion” the “String Theory” saga really takes off with all the epic mythology the first volume only hinted at. Kirsten beyer’s first professional novel “Fusion” is like a symphony flowing the beautiful oboe solo that was “Cohesion”.

Beyer gets the characters just right and manages to hold an impressively ambitious plot together perfectly. All the elements- mystical, psychological, societal, scientific- might easily lead into a chaotic narrative, but “Fusion” forms into a beautiful, balanced whole.

Here’s a novel that excites, surprises and makes you think. It also taps boldly into the most intriguing elements of Voyager and general Trek lore. Any Voyager fan will find this a treat.

[Todd]

2.5* It was nice to be in the ST:V world, and this book was better written than the first one in the trilogy... but it meandered, used manner adverbs abundantly (sic), and wasn't representative of the greatest smoothness in prose. The plot was intriguing in that I wondered how the 2nd book would build from the first... though the many parts could have been cut to delve more into certain places. Some of the best Star Trek work ever has been done when characters are trapped / have limited access, and begin to learn their environments. I feel that this was not the case with the main location (other than the ship) in this book, and that was a lost opportunity.

[Beth · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is book two of a 3-book series and it was much harder to get into than the first one. It was really slow going at the beginning of the book but there were parts that moved more quickly which made it easier. At the end of book 1 Tuvok had left the ship so book 2 was the effort to find him and try to keep him alive. IMO it could have been done with much fewer pages. By the end of the book Janeway is near death and Paris, Kim and The Doctor are missing so it will be interesting to find out just how the crew finds them since they are not together. Each book has a different author and I really hope book 3 is better.

[Denise Link · Rating 3 out of 5]

I must admit that I didn't read the first in this series, and it has been years since I watched a Voyager episode, so I was a little lost. Even with that caveat, this book seemed harder to read than necessary. I'm usually a big fan of the complex sentence, but somehow these were cumbersome. And I would just start to find my footing when the scene would jump to a different character. I kept trying to figure out what was building on existing mythology and what was being created. Still: Star Trek. Three stars plus.

[Angela · Rating 3 out of 5]

The array is filled with strange creatures. Tuvok is becoming another creature. A caretaker like being is messing about with Janeways mind. It's a clever story, and its nice to learn more about the caretakers race. It is mainly Janeway's story looking at her past and her relationship with her family. Neelix is also given time to shine too. Warning, it does end on a cliffhanger. A good read.

[Kirsten · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not quite as good as book one in the trilogy. I got so bogged down in trying to understand the reasoning behind the story in this one that it got a little dry and irritating at times. That being said, it wasn't BAD either. So-so.

[Sean Randall · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really enjoyed the first of these but this descended a little beneath what I consider truly enjoyable trek, a combination of a rather silly ineffable species and Q never makes sense. Still, we'll see where it goes.

[Heather Mac]

Not too bad. Only a minor suck for post-Endgame publishing.

[Ivona · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tohle mě opravdu bavilo. :-)