Bantam Book Club: Spock Messiah

Ah, Spock Messiah.

Before we proceed, let’s just pause to really examine the Corgi edition, what I like to call Disco Bowie Vulcachrist.

Suh-weet Mother of Baby Jesus.

 

Time was not kind to The New Voyages and, oddly, time has been kind to Spock Messiah. Maybe because it comes right after reading some very fanfictiony fanfic in the previous book, but I was more willing to overlook Spock Messiah’s faults –and they are legion– because it had a longer storyline with actual suspense.

First, rampant sexism. The cause of the book’s major problem, Spock getting his brains scrambled with the mind of some low-tier Muadib, is the fault of a female ensign with designs on our Vulcan friend. And it just rolls from there: she repeatedly gets to use her “wiles” (meaning her wiggly tush) to save the day, and the Enterprise crew are uncomfortably leering about her. She’s not really a Mary Sue, kind of the opposite.

Then there’s the characters. Kirk is a little too hard-nosed. Chekov is oddly impertinent and sarcastic. McCoy is okay. Spock –well, Spock’s brain (BRAIN AND BRAIN WHAT IS BRAIN) gets taken over for most of the book, so he’s always off. And. Then. There’s. RED. HAIRED. SCOTTY. It’s just odd: this book, like Spock Must Die, clearly has details lifted right from the series bible (you can always spot it when Uhura is referred to as being a Bantu woman) but there will be things so completely off, you think they were writing from the Gold Key Comics.

But there’s something charming in the book. It’s very epic, a very important thing in the 70s, when each novel I would imagine in my head as The Upcoming Movie. It has this oddball Dune-meets-Laurence of Arabia with a little Conan/Burroughs or something thrown in going on, that kept me going. There’s a slightly confusing twist, confusing I think because they never really adequately explain how the brain-mix thing works vis a vis the dop “hosts.” I’m still not clear how this works: Enterprise crew members somehow get loaded with the memories and personalities of select natives of the planet, but what exactly goes on with those natives? Are they aware, or just copied and move on? Doesn’t it become apparent that there’s a copied identity roaming about?

But overall I enjoyed it in a slightly-off but adventurous way. All in all, this book has improved in age.

Especially with what comes next. Get ready for The Price of the Phoenix.