Star Trek: Envoy (Adapted)

By: L.A. Graf

Narrated by: George Takei, Essene R.

While on the U.S.S Excelsior, Captain Sulu receives top priority orders to proceed by shuttlecraft to Starbase Three. He is to act as the Federation's envoy to a historic peace ceremony between the Krikiki and the Den-Kai - the two dominant, warring races in that sector. The Federation has made it clear to Sulu that it is vital that this mission be successful. Sulu's role is to hand over a young Krikiki prince to the Den-Kai as a symbol of peace. But once Sulu learns of the physical hardships and isolated life that are to befall the prince, he is faced with one of the most difficult choices of his carreer: carry out his orders and protect another being's life only to see it taken away, or interfere and risk destroying the fragile peace...and violate the prime directive in the process.

©1995 Paramount Pictures, All Rights Reserved (P)1995 Paramount Pictures, All Rights Reserved; AUDIOWORKS Is an Imprint of Simon & Schuster Audio Division, Simon & Schuster Inc.

A fun audio play

First and foremost this is more of a play made up of monologues and soliloquies and George Takei is one of half a dozen voice actors telling this story. George Takei is a good voice actor with a good emotional range. It is a shame he cant do more of the voices in the book as he can do other characters well. the other voice actors do a decent job in the story some more flat then others. Serious work was made in developing music, effects, and voices for this audio drama and it is surprising this much work went into the production. There were several times in the audio production that the sound effects drowned out voices making it harder to understand what was going on which was a shame. People put effort into making this a varied and well developed adventure but struggling to understand what people are saying is a serious problem.

This was part of a series of audio adventures made for Captain Sulu set in the era after he becomes Captain of the Excelsior. The idea of following Sulu on adventures has merit. This is good Trek story about Captain Sulu struggling with his responsibility as an officer and what he sees as a moral quandary. It tells a good story in an hour and I didnt regret the story. It works well enough though I would have enjoyed a little more time exploring the idea. Honestly if my big problem with a story is "I want more of it" then that is perhaps a good mark.

Overall I found this fun and I wish they had done more of these audio plays with Sulu, Uhura, and other Trek characters.

Too distracting and hard to hear

I listened to the book while driving in my car. While, George Takei. Did a very good job performing the book, the sound effects were way too loud and obnoxious. It made it very difficult to hear what George was reading..