"Night of the Wolves"
by S.D. Perry and Britta Dennison

The reins of the Terok Nor trilogy are passed from James Swallow to relaunch regular S.D. Perry and newcomer Britta Dennison for the second book, Night of the Wolves. Covering the years from 2345 through to 2357, the story sees the Occupation in full swing.

As before, we see things from a number of perspectives - Bajoran Resistance groups are rising up against their alien oppressors, whilst religious leaders struggle to see how their beliefs can be practically reconciled with their situation; Cardassians are becoming increasingly harsh in their treatment of the Bajorans, with the impressive new space station constructed in orbit of the planet facilitating slave labour.

Given that this book actually deals with the Occupation itself, as opposed to Day of the Vipers which was a prelude to the Cardassians' takeover of Bajor, I'd expected things to kick up a gear, and for this to be a more fast-paced and focused novel than its predecessor. Instead, the majority of the book is more of a meandering affair, following numerous different groups of characters, each on their own private journeys. In the absence of one or two unifying plots, we're presented with several smaller story threads, often comprising more of character scenes rather than epic action sequences. On the whole, this is a interesting approach, giving us a more personalised and detailed view of life during the Occupation than we've been treated to in the past, and the ways in which lives - both Cardassian and Bajoran - are affected and altered is genuinely fascinating to discover.

So, whilst it's not what I expected, Night of the Wolves could quite easily have worked as a character-driven piece; but the way characters are used means it's unsuccessful from that perspective. As with the previous book, the majority of the characters are of the authors' own creation, from a Cardassian troubled by her encounter with a Bajoran Orb to a key member of the Resistance who joins forces with Lenaris Holem. The cast is very large indeed, and with so many parallel adventures going on, the first half of Night of the Wolves sometimes feels like a sprawling mess. Characters and storylines drift in and out of focus, almost at random; as soon as I'd become fully engaged with a person or a situation, they disappeared for a frustratingly long while. When more familiar faces like Damar, Kira Nerys, Ro Laren and Odo popped up, their appearances felt almost gratuitous, and the younger versions of their characters felt generic and uninteresting. Perhaps focusing on fewer characters, and affording them a little more development, would have improved things.

But to criticise the disjointed storytelling is to ignore the quality of the stories told. The journeys of Opaka Sulan and Miras Vara are honestly two of the most engaging and interesting tales I've encountered in recent Star Trek books, each realistic and enchanting and thrilling in its own way. Even though they flit in and out for short periods of time, the characters are very well drawn, and easy to become attached to - despite my issues with its structure, I did find a lot to enjoy in the first half of the novel.

And then, in the second half of the book, things shift suddenly. Out of nowhere, the novel develops a faster pace, and it feels like the static situations are beginning to develop and characters are beginning to grow more than they had done previously. Where the short scenes had seemed insubstantial and slight, they become tantalising and pacy, giving a nice feeling of choppy relentlessness to the story, as if things were building up to a climax. Having enjoyed some of the detailed character work but been generally unimpressed, I was taken aback by how addictive Night of the Wolves becomes once it gets going.

Whether this makes up for the earlier chapters is debatable; I found that it was too little, too late. After its disappointing start, Night of the Wolves does develop into a decent novel, with a lot of enjoyable character work, but it never comes close to the brilliance of Day of the Vipers, and it hasn't excited me about the third and final book whatsoever. My high hopes for this trilogy have been replaced by indifference, and Dawn of the Eagles will have to work hard to raise the standard back up. On the whole, Wolves is a really mixed bag.