Great material, terrible audiobook

The information in this book is worth it for any Trekkie, however I think you'd be much better off with the print version. This book is simply not written in a way that works in the audiobook format. 99% of it is told in the form of presenting someone's name and then a quote that is more or less relevant to the content. Unfortunately a lot of the time after the quote is over you may want to recontextualize it by checking the name again or even looking up who that person was, easy in print, pain in the ass in audio format. There is almost no narration outside the string of quotes.

The quotes are voiced by several different readers and some of them were absolutely dreadful and clearly had no familiarity with Trek, no motivation to check the pronunciation of unfamiliar words, and whoever edited the audio didn't care to correct them. Some of the mispronounced words that jumped out at me:

Qo'noS - que-no-es instead of KRO-nos
Kazon - Kah-zon instead of Kay-zon
Marquis - Mark-ee instead of Mah-key
T'Pol - Tee-Pol instead of Tuh'Pol
Locutis - low-cut-us instead of lo-ku-tus
Ensign - in-sign instead of en-sin

That last one isn't even a made up Trek word, it's just a normal English one. The funny thing is a lot of the book focuses on the bad tendancy to have people involved with Trek who didn't know our care about Trek, but it made the same mistake with the voice cast for this book.

Again, lots of great information here, the author did a fantastic job, it's just the audio version that is lacking.

16 people found this helpful

There be Light Here

My review covers the entire 50 year work, both the First 25 and the next 25. Together they add up to over 50 hours of Star Trek listening goodness.

I thought I knew a lot about Star Trek before I listened to this mammoth undertaking but my knowledge was a rain drop in a mud puddle. It's like Ken Burns does Star Trek. The Star Trek Universe, its spin offs, reboots, the lean years, feuds, Legends, its impact on Society, Technology, and the future are all there, warts and all.

My only complaint was each section began with a glossary of the people involved in Star Trek and the list is so large listening to the whole thing takes an entire hour. Being an Audiobook, it's hard to retain the list's information and it's very awkward to try and reference back to it. That said, it is easily skipped

11 people found this helpful

Learn to pronounce!

What would have made The Fifty-Year Mission: The Next 25 Years: From the Next Generation to J. J. Abrams better?

This was an interesting story but the mispronunciation of multiple "Star Trek" universe words was very distressing. I think if I read the book it would have been fine. Part of the time I didn't understand what the reader meant because words were so badly mispronounced. It was sad.

20 people found this helpful

The narrators are not Trek fans

Priceless stories! But the narrators pronounce many key names inconsistently and incorrectly. Nitpickers will hate that. Star Trek is its own universe. It pulls fans out of the Trek world when we hear names pronounced incorrectly. We have spent two decades of watching and re-watching. As an example, "Betazed" does not rhyme with "amazed". But beyond that, this book is well worth spending your Audible credit.

9 people found this helpful

Very entertaining book; not-bad performance

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

I listened to this book, Vol. II, after listening to Vol. I, so I knew what I was getting into. I enjoyed it overall. I like oral-history storytelling; If you don't like the multiple points of view and diffused nature of oral-history stories, then this isn't for you. My only complaint about the book itself is that there was no mention of the controversy about similarities between Deep Space Nine and Babylon 5. It would have been interesting to hear what the people involved with DS9 had to say about it.

How did the narrator detract from the book?

As so many people have pointed out, the producers of this audiobook were negligent in letting each narrator choose his or her own pronunciation of names and characters in the story; it was particularly noticeable when three readers were featured, back and forth, pronouncing Diana Muldaur's surname alternately Mull-Dore, Mull-dower, and Mull-dawr. It isn't that hard to call the subject's agent and ask, and then instruct each performer on the correct pronunciation.There was one reader's style that grated; she over-emoted and as a result it had the tone of a preschool teacher relating juicy gossip stories, which didn't work well, for me, with the tone of the speakers who were quoted.

6 people found this helpful

Shocking problems with organization and narration!

What disappointed you about The Fifty-Year Mission: The Next 25 Years: From the Next Generation to J. J. Abrams?

I felt little thought had been put into transitioning this into an audiobook. This recording literally begins with A FULL HOUR in which the narrator reads - in alphabetical order - the names and short bios of the enormous number of people who are featured in the book. This list of "dramatis personae" is obviously meant to be a useful reference to leaf back to as you read, but no-one in their right minds would listen to this entire list, especially not before they had even heard the book!!Even the narrator seemed to be getting bored, and his reading sounded more and more stilted and computer-y as the list droned on.

Why not place this information at the end, where liteners can choose whether or not they want to hear it? Or better yet, make it an attached PDF so readers can check back as they listen to read about who is who.

How did the narrator detract from the book?

Star Trek has got so many fans who are also actors - couldn't they find anyone to read this who has actually seen Star Trek? This narrator clearly has no idea how to pronounce many of the people's names, nor the names of the characters they played. This seems an especially shocking oversight considering the audience for this book is likely to be overwhelmingly made up of people who do know how these names should sound, and who care very much about the franchise that is the subject of this book.

In light of that, and since this whole book is supposed to be a celebration of Star Trek, the least I would expect a professional to do is ask how these words are meant to be pronounced. One slip would have been understandable, but consistently, regularly mispronouncing name after name just seems lazy and disrespectful - to the creators of Star Trek and to its fans.

26 people found this helpful

SOOOOOO much drama! Who knew?

Overall, my review of volume 1 applies equally to this one: It’s an ABSOLUTE MUST for Trek Fans and totally lives up to its promise in the title of being complete and uncensored; it’s one of the best Behind-the-Scenes type books I have ever read.

Specifically, I preferred volume 2 much more than the first because I’m a TGN & Voyager fan, and I can’t believe how much drama went on behind the scenes! It was fascinating to read.

Your interest in this book will correlate directly to your interest in the various TV series and movies.

9 people found this helpful

Captivating.

The next 25 years is an insight into the continuing evolution of Star Trek. This volume gives you an overview of the creators struggle to get the franchise back on TV in the late 80's and to keep the franchise alive decades after the creators death.

4 people found this helpful

Great book but mispronounced names and words

This was a great and entertaining history of Star Trek post TOS to modern day. However it is marred by almost every Trek name, place, character, etc being sadly mispronounced. It is very distracting.

3 people found this helpful

Great Information, Bad Pronounciation

They mispronounced Kazon. Several times. I don't understand how you can have a book geared towards hardcore fans and not give your narrators a pronunciation guide. They mispronounce several key names, but usually it's just one person and one time. Talking about the Kazon was the worst offence and it drove me crazy.

6 people found this helpful