By signing up you agree to our terms of use If you like Worf, then read Binti by Nnedi OkoraforĪ Klingon raised by humans is the ultimate outsider story. Thank you for signing up! Keep an eye on your inbox. But it’s deeply engrossed with so much of the human experience-particularly our soap operas.

While Data spends his time on the Enterprise wishing to be human, Murderbot is largely dismissive of the humans around it. Wells’s series tells its story from the perspective of Murderbot, a security bot who hacked its governor module to become self-aware and oh-so-snarky.

If you like Data, then read All Systems Red by Martha WellsĬommander Data and Murderbot are two very different sentient androids, but they share something unique and important: an unerring fascination with humanity and all its messy parts. A double murder onboard turns this into a working vacation, with plenty for wise-cracking Kangaroo and his handy personal extra-dimensional portal to investigate. After bungling a mission, a spy by the nickname of Kangaroo is forced to take a “vacation” on an interplanetary pleasure cruise. Chen’s thriller blends levity and action in a way that mirrors Riker’s personality.

Is that a gun in your pocket, or have you just been to Risa? Oh, to find a book that captures the mischievous twinkle in the eye of everyone’s favorite chief lech, William T. If you like Riker, then read Waypoint Kangaroo by Curtis C. But she faces a similarly isolating predicament as a pawn in the conflict between two warring sides for control of the Legion, a flotilla of decaying organic world-ships. Temperamentally, Zan, of Hurley’s queer, feminist space odyssey, differs wildly from Picard. He’s put in endless dangerous, ethically complex situations, and he manages (with the help of his crew) to come out the other side. Through each re-watch of Star Trek: The Next Generation, Picard’s qualities as a leader and the gulf between him and seemingly most of Starfleet command become more striking.

If you like Picard, then read The Stars Are Legion by Kameron Hurley If you, like me, are missing the crew of the USS Enterprise-D, may you find some solace in these read-alikes curated for your particular character preferences. The other thing it means, of course, is that I’ve been lured back for my umpteenth re-watch of Jean-Luc Picard’s original adventures on Star Trek: The Next Generation. I think law and precedent are on my side when I say the arrival of Star Trek: Picard means that every day is now Captain Picard Day.

Waypoint Kangaroo by Curtis C. Chen