Gate Crashers

Gate Crashers
By Patrick S. Tomlinson

As Nietzsche might have said, we should be aware that when we stare out into the immensity of space, space may be staring back.

Gate Crashers begins with a distant-exploration vessel discovering a mysterious alien device, setting off alarm bells back on Earth. This first contact, however, turns out to have a different meaning for the rest of the inhabited universe. One that consulting a copy of First Contact for Dummies isn’t going to help with.

The device is actually a signaling buoy alerting those who dropped it off that humanity has crossed a threshold in its development and broken out of its local game preserve. The buoy’s discovery then sets in motion a chaotic series of events that have to be somehow navigated by the usual loveable cast of heroes (including one gorilla).

Patrick Tomlinson obviously enjoyed jamming a whole season’s worth of Star Trek material into a single comic space opera, and it adds up to a lot of fun for the reader too. The only problem for humanity is that the alien lizard people have been watching Star Trek too.