Double Helix Omnibus

Star Trek: Double Helix #1-6

by Peter David, Diane Carey, John Vornholt

A six-book series featuring all aspects of the popular Star Trek: The Next Generation universe in a complex and gripping adventure, now collected in one single omnibus volume. For over a decade unknown enemies have unleashed a string of deadly biological weapons throughout the Alpha Quadrant. Not only the Federation is at stake. The plague threatens first Romulus, where Vulcan Ambassador Spock calls upon his old friend Dr McCoy; and then the Cardassian space station Terok Nor -- later to be Deep Space Nine -- where Prefect Gul Dukat is forced to work with Federation doctor Katherine Pulaski and rebel spy Kira Nerys to save those under his command. Meanwhile Captain Picard and his crew join forces with Captain Mackenzie Calhoun of the USS Excalibur to confront the hidden architects of the virus and avenge the deaths of thousands. But the truth is closer to Jean-Luc Picard than he knows. Its seeds were planted ten years before, when, as captain of the USS Stargazer, he was caught in a conflict between two hostile races. Then, Commander Jack Crusher of the Stargazer and Vulcan officer Tuvok teamed up to investigate the conflict, unaware that their intervention would breed catastrophic consequences for the future...THE AUTHORS of the six Double Helix volumes are John Gregory Betancourt, Dean Wesley Smith and Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Diane Carey, John Vornholt, Peter David and Michael Jan Friedman.

Genres: Star Trek, Science Fiction, Fiction, Media Tie In, Anthologies, Star Trek The Next Generation

1120 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

About the author

aka David Peters

Peter Allen David, often abbreviated PAD, was an American writer of comic books, novels, television, films, and video games. His notable comic book work includes an award-winning 12-year run on The Incredible Hulk, as well as runs on Aquaman, Young Justice, SpyBoy, Supergirl, Fallen Angel, Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2099, Captain Marvel, and X-Factor.
His Star Trek work included comic books and novels such as the New Frontier book series. His other novels included film adaptations, media tie-ins, and original works, such as the Apropos of Nothing and Knight Life series. His television work includes series such as Babylon 5, Young Justice, Ben 10: Alien Force and Nickelodeon's Space Cases, which he co-created with Bill Mumy.
David often jokingly described his occupation as "Writer of Stuff", and he was noted for his prolific writing, characterized by its mingling of real-world issues with humor and references to popular culture, as well as elements of metafiction and self-reference.
David earned multiple awards for his work, including a 1992 Eisner Award, a 1993 Wizard Fan Award, a 1996 Haxtur Award, a 2007 Julie Award and a 2011 GLAAD Media Award.

Reviews

[Sean Randall · Rating 5 out of 5]

Of course I read the individual volumes making up this series in my teens and yes, I naturally reread them again for Goodreads. But never before have I come across an omnibus where I literally read them back to back without a transition, so I quite liked that.

The first book, Infection, is a pretty standard depiction of an early TNG novel. There’s a good lot of Klingon in there and some Will and Deanna, but it very much has the feel of an early season work.

Vectors, set on DS9 prior to its television debut, was a fascinating read originally because it took us away from the screen but showed us characters we already knew. It’s still quite an intriguing story, more so for the back story of Pulaski than anything else, although we do get quite a lot of Quark and his family and some of the simmering that’s trademark Kira and Odo.

Starting my favoured arc is Red sector, which alongside Quarantine and Double or Nothing are probably my favourite Trek Trilogy.Carey’s done a superb job in capturing not only a young Starfleet Ensign’s insecurities here, but also his overwhelming awe for Spock and McCoy, which is of course endemic to their generation. We also see a new class of ship here doing some very interesting work, and get a look into the lower ranks (which really worked well onscreen with both TNG and Voyager).

Quarantine takes advantage of the appearance of Tom Riker on The Next Generation whilst providing us another glimpse into events before they became televised. We follow Chakotay and his ragtag Maquis crew, Tuvok appears (of course), and we get a solid link between a TNG and DS9 episode into the bargain.

Peter David’sDouble or Nothing was my introduction to Calhoun and the Excalibre, and whilst he brought the series to a shatteringly powerful and explosive end, his irreverence took a little getting used to. I do enjoy his style of writing, and if the first book was plodding and formulaic, the formula was here too, but somehow the excitement managed to carry on as well.

And then after everything is all over, we go back with Friedman to the Stargazer, to see where it all began. Sadly Picard’s not really made much of here, but on the plus side we get a lot of Jack Crusher and Tuvok (again!) to add one more thread into this rich, complex tapestry of this interesting and overall very satisfying series.

[Kathleen Jerome · Rating 5 out of 5]

There was just so much to love about this book- or rather- series. I loved how one thread ran through all 6 of the books and included so many different characters, places, and time periods. I really enjoyed every book in the series, each in a different way. I think Book Two: Vectors was my favorite- Crusher and Pulaski in the same book along with Bajor and Terok Nor:-) Amazing!

[C.L. Spillard · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've given these 6 books 5 stars not because they are brilliantly-written, thought-provoking literature but simply because they do what's expected - provide an escape and, frankly, a stress-buster, for these pestilential and war-riven (here in Europe) times.
In Book 1 ('Infection') we are given to wonder who - or what - would rather two species (one of them us humans) be at each other's throats than living happily together as they do on planet Archaria III. The same shadowy outfit is again at it, on another planet this time, in Book 2...
Only in Book 6 ('The First Virtue') do we find out how it all started, and how it ends.
Or does it?
In the meantime we get all the classic Star Trek items: the good Captain Picard attempting peacemaking on behalf of the Federation; his faithful crew running the ship 'like clockwork'; a rather clumsily-described but still heartwarming development of a friendship between a hot-headed human and a Vulcan workmate... And for sci-fi cliche afficionados, we get the seductive blue/green slave girl (every tale should have one and yes, for some reason she has to be blue or green).
What I like about it most is the way, even though written more than twenty years ago, it has something to say for us today. The 'Purity League' could be any of today's far-right organisations, and their reaction to the arrival of the plague is depressingly realistic. So is the attribution of blame, in a later book, by one side in a war to their opponents, when it turns out the atrocity in question was committed by a scheming third party.
I have to admit now that I cheated: I didn't read these tales as an Omnibus, but bought the books separately. And I was delighted to find, in the back pages of each one, an invitation to take part in a Star Trek TNG story competition - an invitation for which I'm sure I'd need a far more detailed knowledge of TNG characters than I presently possess, as well as a USA passport and, with the deadline having passed in 1999, a time machine.

[Octavia Cade · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read and reviewed each of the six novels collected here separately, so this is basically just for my own records. I think the best of them was Red Sector by Diane Carey, but they were all of them pretty average outings for Star Trek. As a collection, however, it was perhaps a little less successful than the sum of its parts. Don't get me wrong, I still enjoyed it, so it's still three stars from me, but the weakness of the antagonist and his very stereotypical motivation wasn't that exciting, and it took a long while for the series to move on from its episodic attempts to cure contagions in various places. Now, I quite like medical mystery stories of this sort, and I always enjoy the Trek novels that feature medical staff doing medical things, but I can still recognise a repetition too far when I see it.

[Michael Baird · Rating 3 out of 5]

As any omnibus edition with different authors, some of the work I really liked and some was rather slow to slog through. Overall the treatment of characters was not very in depth and named main universe characters could easily have been replaced with any generic name and the stories would have carried the same impact.

[Desiree Trott · Rating 4 out of 5]

I set myself a goal to read through every DS9 book, and when a story is part of an arc, I read them all. I really enjoyed most of the 6 stories. Some more than others. As always Peter David is amazing.

[Loki · Rating 3 out of 5]

This one was surprisingly not uneven, for an omnibus collecting six novels on a loosely connected storyline. Four of the six novels are light and fast, and can be read in roughly the time it would take to watch two episodes of Star Trek. I hadn't previously grasped how much of a house style there was for these tie-ins. None of them are bad, per se, but all of them are disposable. The other two are written by Peter David and Diane Duane respectively, and have a distinctly deeper sense of the character's emotional lives (and visible senses of humour).

The stories themselves are fun, connected by the loose plot and also the gimmick of unlikely team-ups: there's a story where Tom Riker teams up with the Maquis, another where Dr Pulaski works with Gul Dukat, one where Jack Crusher and Tuvok go on a mission, and so on. Which makes things a little more fun, particularly given that some of these stories also fill in some of the blanks from the shows: how Rom came to work for Quark, whose idea the Enterprise-D was, and so on.

Basically, if you're a fan of Trek, you'll find enough to enjoy here, and if you're not, you've no reason to ever pick up this book.

[Joy]

This is a six book series written for Star Trek The Next Generation. Each book is about an outbreak of an epidemic but each outbreak hits a different place with different results. However, there is an underlying plot throughout the book.

The first volume "Infection" takes place during the first season of Next Generation (yes, Tasha is there). The disease first strikes Archaria IV, a planet colonized by religious zealots from earth but also inhabited by a race known as the Pelagians. The disease is hailed by many on the planet in favor of racial purity as it only affects people of mixed decent. My only gripe with the book is that it seems to end too suddenly.

The next book, "Vectors" takes place on Terok Nor while it is still occupied by Gul Dukat and the Cardassians. It affects both races equally. Dr. Pulaski is asked to come try to help the situation by her ex-husband who is a Bajorian and it turns out to be another designer virus.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

I began this book a couple of weeks ago & I'm now into the third book of the omnibus, "Red Sector". It is so different to the other previous two books as until the 12th chapter there is no mention of the deadly artificial virus that is killing many millions of people throughout the Alpha quadrant. I was beginning to think this was one book that wasn't about the virus at all!

Nevertheless I'm finding the book very interesting - though it's a little disconcerting how it jumps over long periods of time. I've read many books written by Diane Carey but this one seems far out of her usual style! But, as I mentioned further up, I like the book.

I'd better shut up now or I'll end up writing a spoiler on the book!