Star Trek: First Contact (Star Trek: The Next Generation Movie Novelization #2) by J.M. Dillard

Star Trek: First Contact (Star Trek: The Next Generation Movie Novelization #2) Reviews

• 
  Jeremiah Murphy

  I’ve been reading all the Trek movie novelizations in order. I liked this one and enjoyed the book more than the movie. There’s lots of cool detail and the story reads well. I think the best Trek novelization is Wrath of Khan, where the movie is a jumping off point for the book. This one stays close to the screenplay.
  
  I think my main issue with this one is Picard. I like it best when he’s a diplomat and reasons his way out of problems. In this one he’s more of an action hero, he definitely has an emotional journey. But the last action sequence seems to ignore Picard’s internal development.
  
  My favorite part of the book was learning more about Lilly.
• 
  Corey Chapman

  Other than the inconsistency of first contact, this was a well written novelisation of a fantastic Star Trek story. The inconsistency could’ve been fixed by one more pass in the editing process.
  
  According to Star Trek, first contact was made on April 5, 2063. When the Enterprise arrives in the past, Data gives the date as being April 6, one day before first contact. But when Picard gives his captains log at the end of the novel, he says that it is April 5, 2063.
• 
  Love of Hopeless Causes

  Gates McFadden is not appropriate as the pov of Picard. I think they wanted her to represent the Borg, but this makes the audiobook unlistenable. Still intend to try the physical copy.
• 
  Alicea

  Until quite recently, I was very much a Star Trek: The Original Series kinda gal. I never investigated the other realms of the Trek universe and I had no real desire to...and then Netflix recommended I watch Star Trek: The Next Generation. After that it was kind of a given that I was going to fall head over heels in love with that particular cast of characters. (If you're wondering, I'm torn between Captain Jean-Luc Picard and Data as my favorite.) This of course meant that I had never really explored the literature of ST unless it revolved around my boys Kirk, Spock, and McCoy. My first foray into worlds unknown was the movie tie-in for First Contact by J.M. Dillard. I'm going to be up front and tell you that I still haven't seen this film but I'm going to be rectifying this at my earliest opportunity. This book features the ST:TNG cast as they come face-to-face with their old enemies the Borg Collective. dun dun DUN There's a time travel element to this book which I found a bit squidgy but honestly anytime Trek goes down the time travel route it's questionably done. They're not going back to just any era, however. They end up going back to the time of Zefram Cochrane and to Earth's first glimpse of another planet's inhabitants. The Borg aren't just going back to witness history in the making. (Wouldn't that be a funny concept for a movie? And here's the Borg kicking back in recliners with buckets of popcorn to watch the human race exploring the vast unknown for the first time.) So the crew of the Enterprise must pull out all of the stops to try and defeat this formidable foe. This is a Picard/Data heavy storyline so I was definitely on board with it. It wasn't the most fantastically written Trek novel that I've ever read but it was probably the quickest. I read it in between panels at Star Trek: Mission New York to give you an idea of its length (276 pages). If you're a fan of ST:TNG then you've most likely read this before but if you're a Trek noob then you'll most likely find this an interesting tie-in to the film version. If you're not a Trekkie then you're probably going to pass on this one although honestly why isn't everyone a Trekkie at this point? ;-)
• 
  Brianna

  My Star Trek knowledge is quite limited, but I thought I would give this book a try, mostly on a whim. I had never seen any of the Next Generation movies or the show, so the beginning of this book was a little much to get my head around, but I enjoyed it far more than I expected to. The story was engaging and while I didn’t feel particularly attached to any of the characters, I felt invested in what was happening to them. There were some difficulties in the descriptions of the settings and actions scenes often became a little muddled. That was my biggest problem. On the other hand, I thought the subtleties of social interactions were conveyed really well. I watched the movie after I finished the book, and the way Dillard allowed the reader to enter the mind of the characters helped to bring the story together like the movie could not.
• 
  Philip

  I got chatting to someone online about Star Trek: Generations and she said there was a lot more detail in the book, so I thought I'd check out TNG film novelisations, starting with my favourite. Unfortunately, this is 90% of just the screenplay written as prose, and when you know this film as well as I do, reading a book like that seems a bit redundant. There was some extra stuff, like Lily's backstory and how she ended up with Cochrane, but it wasn't anything terribly interesting or relevant to the plot.
  
  Of course I can't review a novelisation without mentioning Star Wars: The Phantom Menace by Terry Brooks. Now THAT is how you do a novelisation. Take a below average screenplay, chuck out all the terrible dialogue, write new scenes that explain the character better, and end up with a book that most SW fans would wet themselves to see made into a movie.
• 
  Steven Shinder

  People who enjoy the movie will probably enjoy this an equal amount. It'sa pretty straightforward translation from screen to page. A little bit of new stuff here and there, like Worf's thoughts when he thinks he's about to meet his doom, and Lily and Zef's thoughts on the characters from the future. You really get a good idea of how much Zef hates being perceived as a hero. Oddly, the characters say they've arrived on April 6th, and then the next day, it's said to be April 5th. I'm guessing the script for the film originally said the story takes place April 6-7 instead of 4-5. Zef's response to the Vulcan salute is different, and not as charming as how it's done in the film. But overall, a nice novelization. Even includes an interview about how the ideas for the film came out.
• 
  Craig

  Frankly I was disappointed in this treatment of First Contact. Tense moments in the film were lost in the author over-emphasizing other unnecessary elements. I did appreciate the background stuff for Lily and Cochrane and getting to know those characters better but I think this novelization could have been done better in other hands. I liked the behind the scenes section at the back though, it's interesting to see what their original ideas were for First Contact- going back to the Renaissance Era and fighting the Borg with swords?! Crazy!
• 
  Evan Burge

  I will say First Contact is pretty good for a movie novelization. It’s well written—almost lyrical—with a decent amount of emotional resonance. But the movie’s humor doesn’t quite translated, and some of the rapid-fire perspective shifts feel ill-suited for the format. On top of that, the Enterprise’s crew is often sidelined for new characters I cared little about.
• 
  Chad

  It’s comfort food for your brain, basically. It’s entertaining but it doesn’t blow me away. You get some more insight into Cochrane and Lily as characters but there’s little here that you don’t get from the movie. I enjoyed it but as far as novelizations go I’d rate this as fairly middling.
• 
  Melissa

  Celebrated First Contact Day (April 5th) by reading First Contact. It's exactly what you'd expect from a movie novelization. Interesting to get more in depth look into character motivations. And, of course, just like the movie, the book needed more Beverly!
• 
  R

  I got this one on audiobook because Gates McFadden was the narrator.
  
  It's exactly what you expect it to be. It's the novelization of the movie. If you enjoy the movie, you'll definitely enjoy this (as long as you like novels and/or audiobooks).
  
  
• 
  Julie

  As read by Gates McFadden, who did a very good job. There were also sound effects, which made it all the more interesting. It was entertaining, and kept me occupied on my daily walks. :)
• 
  Kimberly

  Fun and quick read. Lots of action. Stigmatizes mental illness.
• 
  Rob

  In this case, the book was better than the movie, expanding on the backgrounds of some of the new Characters. This was a Good Read.
• 
  Maureen Bauer

  Of Course, I enjoyed reading this novel, it is Star Trek. It took me a day and a half to read this novel based on a favorite film.
• 
  Ron Lang-Alon

  So, overall good. I don't exactly understand why there are differences between the film and the book. Small ones. And some of the additions the author made to motive and such felt out of character.
• 
  Tom Nutter

  this is exactly like the film but with more description and character moments. thoroughly enjoyable
• 
  EmBee

  L
• 
  Rachel

  Listened to on audible. Good adaptation of the movie. McFadden's narration was good
• 
  Robin

  Another 99 cent book.
• 
  Carmilla Choate

  It's good but doesn't offer up anything not in the movie
• 
  Thorsten

  Geniale Umsetzung des Drehbuchs.
• 
  Rob Tesselaar

  A quick and easy read. Nothing special but it did fill un an interesting part of Star Tek universe history.
• 
  Lois Merritt

  Even though this was an abridged audiobook, it didn't feel like it, and filled in the movie in great and unexpected ways. So, not my favorite movie (that's still Generations!), but loved the book.
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  5/4/22 - read the whole, unabridged book, and still liked it; there's not a whole heck of a lot that gets added to the movie story, but what there is, is definitely important and wish it was somehow added to the movie itself, mostly that the movie shows Cochrane just basically a drunk that wants to make money. But here, it goes into he's drunk to control his manic mental illness that was controlled (though not cured) before the war but after, since resources were no longer around flourished to the depths it did.
• 
  RumBelle

  The Borg have, in my opinion, always been the most horrifying Star Trek villains, and the ones I have always been most interested in. Their mysterious origins, why they behave the way they do, why their unique bond with Picard. Many books, TV episodes and movies have gone a long way toward answering those questions. First Contact was one of the best. It described the lengths the Borg would go to to stop humanity and the Federation. In addition Picard's Captain Ahab element made this all the more taut of a novel. It really showed what the Borg fight meant to him. The action, and science elements with the first warp flight rounded out the story-line nicely.
• 
  Joy

  I like J.M. Dillard's novelizations of Star Trek movies and episodes. She stays true to the details of the filmed version but adds a nice level of description and details as well.
  
  My favorite part of this is actually the opening few paragraphs when she is describing the Borg ship. Otherwise the plot is the same as the movie version. My mother wouldn't let me go see this movie when it originally came out (I was 12 and it was rated PG-13, yeah, she was overprotective), so I read this novelization first (and therefore, wasn't tainted with having seen the film first).
• 
  Sean Meriwether

  This is one of the very few books I have ever read based on a movie; the last two were Videodrome and Star Wars, to give you some context. It was a perfectly fine verbatim capture of the film, but the movie is much stronger, interesting, and gripping than the novel (and has the sexy Lt. Hawk who can call me any time he is visiting NYC). If it had filled in some of the back story, such as Picard’s capture by the Borg, which is covered in the series and only briefly in the movie, than I might have enjoyed the book more, but the novelization does not deliver.