I am Spock by Leonard Nimoy
This is a memoir by Nimoy which zooms through his involvement with the TV series (but gives enough to be interesting) and then more exhaustively covers his involvement with the 6 star trek movies involving the original cast (he also talks about the 7th and his reasons for not being involved with it). It also mentions his involvement with the Star Trek: Next Generation double-episode ‘Unification’ (this is a great pair of episodes, by the way). He also discusses ideas about a prequel Star Fleet Academy movie that was bandied around – which sounds an awful lot like the most recent reboot movie…
Nimoy writes in a straightforward, non-flowery style, and starts each chapter with some dialogue between Nimoy and Spock, discussing the issues covered in the coming chapter. He also sometimes intersperses these chats within the text. It’s interesting to start, but gets a little odd/pointless. His stories about Star Trek are interesting, but rather dry. Shatner’s books ‘Star Trek Memories’ and ‘Star Trek Movie Memories’ are much more entertaining, and detailed – and a pair of books I thoroughly recommend. If I had to pick one word for Nimoy, it’s ‘earnest’.
The book is also an interesting insight to his inner conflict with Spock and how it dominates his acting career (in this book, he strongly asserts he’s very happy with Spock now compared to earlier in his career – his book previous to this was called ‘I am not Spock’!). And whilst he says he’s happy, reading between the lines indicated Spock still haunted him somewhat back in 1995.
I really think anyone could read and enjoy this book, but really, only Star Trek fans (myself included) will be the ones to read it. And it has a great last line.
Rating: Good 6/10