A GREAT BOOK RECOMMENDATION!

Status: Writing on Chapter 191 of The Price of Freedom. (Page 1,672)

Doing: Writing on this blog; answering e-mails; working out, and well...you know the rest! :0)

Watching: Baseball! (Mets vs. Tigers)

Listening to: Not a thing.

Reading: Kushiel's Scion. Page 252.


TOPIC: CRUCIBLE: MCCOY-PROVENANCE OF SHADOWS

It isn't often that I do a book review. Rarely, in fact does a book just tear at the heart strings of this avid book worm and author.

But after reading Crucible: McCoy-Provenance of Shadows by David R. George III, I was like...so crushed with emotion. I spent the last couple of days finishing up the book (and not being on the internet as much)--not being able to put this one down for a second.

I wanted to know what happened with Doctor McCoy in the alternate timeline--after he had saved Edith Keeler. (For those of you who want to reference--you may want to watch the TOS episode of Star Trek called "City on the Edge of Forever".)

It turns out that he spent a lot of time in the past--almost a quarter century--before he met his end when the Nazis bombed the East Coast and wiped out Atlanta with a nuclear bomb; McCoy being killed by a German pilot whom he tried to help rescue from the wreckage--leaving behind the woman whom he had been married to for only a year.

What drove this one part of the storyline that David George had written so well--was the emotion and a sense of urgency behind McCoy's initial attempts to find his way out of this mess that he caused.

I was most taken by McCoy's struggles to adapt to some most unforgiving circumstances--to try and blend in into a most difficult time period; the Great Depression--as he moved from one place to another in an effort to basically survive.

As time went on, he became more and more entrenched in the life of the other people he commonly associated with; people like Phil Dickson and his wife Lynn.

Or Doctor Lyles.

McCoy became a mainstay in the little town of Hayden, South Carolina. And this version of the old Southern doctor died in a past he never once belonged to; because of one act of selfless heroism.

In the other timeline--the one that the other McCoy lived in--he didn't save Edith; thus allowing her to die.

However, events from his other "life" leads McCoy on a personal journey of self-discovery, heart ache, sorrow, and loss--as he spends the next 35 years trying to uncover a mystery that is connected to the life he never had.

What's interesting about this is how this one section of the book documents events covered in the last season of TOS, the movies--and sideline events which were fracturally obscured by time itself. (Those of you who know the romance between one Yeoman Barrows and McCoy should be delighted in knowing that the two finally married shortly after Kirk died at the beginning of "Generations"--and stayed married up until 2366; whereas (as he author hinted then), McCoy passed away with his wife of 71 years. Oddly still, the event chronicled then was a prelude to the TNG episode "Encounter at Farpoint"--where Barrows presented McCoy with the view of the newly commissioned Galaxy-class starship, USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-D)--for their anniversary together; from their cabin lookout on the USS Hood. Though there are some contradictory themes here with this book and William Shatner's Star Trek saga involving the resurrection of Kirk and him joining forces with his some of his old crew far into 2371 and beyond. (McCoy was alive in this series.)

But one had to wonder: Why didn't DeForrest Kelly's character make anymore subsequent appearances in either TNG or Voyager episodes?

Because--as the last lines of the book indicates--: "...he peered back at out at the yard, at the trees, and no matter how it had started, he had a wonderful, happy life. He'd done good work, had enjoyed the company of close friends, and had shared much of his life with a loving partner.

"He knew that he could not have been more fortunate. And then he closed his eyes for the last time."--Doctor McCoy died soon after his visit on the new Enterprise.

Of course, we all know that Gene Roddenberry wanted to connect both generations together when he launched the new Star Trek franchise back in 1989. And so he brought a very old and very frail Admiral Leonard H. McCoy on board.

But the last pages connecting the final scene and this episode was marked by McCoy's comments about how he viewed Tonia Barrows as his "home"--and not the one he had been spending in Atlanta, Georgia, for the last 70 years.

This much he remarked to Lieutenant-Commander Data during the tour--but wasn't delved on in the famous scene in the pilot episode of the Next Generation.

Still, it was a nice touch by the author to connect a few loose ends together.

And by and by? A book I would strongly recommend--if not to read the last chapter over and over; for sentiment's sake.

Sky