The first of the Alien Nation novels, published in 1993 after the end of the first and quite unbelievably only season of a great TV SF series, picks up the story directly from the end of the cliffhanger with Newcomer detective George Francisco's wife and daughter (Susan and Emily) in intensive care isolation following a poison attack from a bigotted anti-Newcomer group.

But the book's main action takes place in the story's past, in the lead up to the arrival of the Alien Ship. In this time Matt Sykes has newly been promoted to detective and lands a plum assignment in Homicide. For his first case he is investigating the murder of a retied college Astrophysics professor in a car park at a late-night shopping mall.

Sykes believes there is more to this case than a simple robbery. This feeling is increased when he discovers (with some help from fellow detecive Bryon Grazer - his future boss from the series) that the professor's home computer has been wiped clean and all floppy disks removed from his home. Could he have been killed for something he had discovered?

Meanwhile on board the Tentonese ship and the soon-to-be-renamed George Francisco is still Stangya, the slave worker. His Uncle Moodri (one of the TV series best supporting characters) is an elder of the Tenctonese, one of the non-workers that the Overseers believe harmless and in some ways helpful to maintaining the submissiveness of the slaves. What these Overseers do not realise is that the Elders are planning an uprising. They have been biding their time, for periodically in the voyage, the ship drops into normal space to use the gravity well of a star to make slight course corrections.

At each of these they have been checking the planets of the systems to see if they would be suitable for the Tenctonese to live upon following the uprising. When they enter our Solar System they decide the time is right and set their plans into motion.

This was one of my favourite TV shows of all time. I simply could not fathom the reasons why this was axed. It could have become a truly great show had it carried on. That said, reading this book was never an intention of mine. I went away for a few days, took a couple of books with me and read them by the end of the first morning (as it was raining). When the rain stopped and went out I found this book in a small book shops in a small town and thought "Why Not?"

It's a well written little book, and seems to have been written by two people who are aware of the characters, as there are no glaring differences in behaiour. George is still George, Matt is still Matt, and Buck/Finiksa still doesn't know what he wants to be and is still a pain. Having Buck selected to become one of the Watchers – the adolescent Tenctonese destined to become Overseers is a great touch, and suits the character – even down to his not being comfortable in that role either.

This is a fun little read but not one that was ever likely to set the world on fire.