Titan: Over a Torrent Sea (SPOILERS)

Discussion in 'Trek Literature' started by Julio Angel Ortiz, Feb 13, 2009.

  1. RikerLover

    RikerLover Lieutenant Commander Red Shirt

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    Thanks. I would have peaked ahead anyway.
     
    Last edited: Feb 20, 2009
  2. Brefugee

    Brefugee No longer living the Irish dream. Premium Member

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    So how long after Destiny is Over a Torrent Sea then? I thought it would be a few weeks, two months tops, but given that spoiler it's been what? Four or five.
     
  3. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    ^^It begins about a week before the epilogue of Destiny, but jumps forward a few months.
     
  4. Julio Angel Ortiz

    Julio Angel Ortiz Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    IIRC, it tells you right at the beginning. The prologue takes place between February and April, and then Chapter 1 picks up in July after Titan has already begun their new mission of deep space exploration.
     
  5. Brefugee

    Brefugee No longer living the Irish dream. Premium Member

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    That makes sense, well I look forward to reading it sometime in April :bolian:
     
  6. RikerLover

    RikerLover Lieutenant Commander Red Shirt

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    I'm happy now I got my copy this evening and am a few pages in and haven't peeked ahead yet.
     
  7. JAG

    JAG Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    I still have not found it by me. I asked BN to put an order in for it for me.
     
  8. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    Well, of course you couldn't find it by you! It's by me! :D
     
  9. Ktrek

    Ktrek Captain Captain

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    Yeah! My wife finally found a copy for me at our local Hastings! (shame on you B&N! First time Hastings has ever had a book before B&N!). I am really looking forward to devouring this one over the weekend! Yippee!

    Kevin
     
  10. Sxottlan

    Sxottlan Commodore Commodore

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    Found a copy today. I wasn't expecting to, but there it was.

    I've been able to find the books early again recently.
     
  11. RikerLover

    RikerLover Lieutenant Commander Red Shirt

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    I'm about halfway through and loving it.

    I can totally relate to Eviku's loss. I don't have any children and my dog and cat are like my children. Christopher, I gather this part was written after Tasha went to the Rainbow Bridge.

    I haven't gotten to the resolution of Ree's kidnapping of Deanna but I can see how 1 1/2 individuals with psi abilities could cause someone's instincts to kick in. The plotline seemed to come out of the blue but it makes sense that it happened especially considering Tuvok's and Deanna's emotions at that moment.

    I'll have more when I finish.
     
    Last edited: Feb 21, 2009
  12. RikerLover

    RikerLover Lieutenant Commander Red Shirt

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    Just finished. I absolutely loved it. I cried at several points near the end.

    Julio, when I saw Aili's sister's name, I had a feeling that's what you were referring to by saying it wouldn't make sense until I read the book.

    The confrontations between Riker and Lavena and among Troi, Tuvok, and Ree were awesome. I was happy to get a little insight into Riker's and Lavena's past.

    I also enjoyed the reunion with Riker and Troi and little Natasha which was a minor complaint about Lost Souls.

    All in all this was an awesome book. Guess what I didn't actually peak ahead like I said I might.
     
  13. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    ^^Thanks for the kind words! And yes, you're right about when the Eviku material was written.
     
  14. JAG

    JAG Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea


    Guards!!!
     
  15. cem1701

    cem1701 Ensign Red Shirt

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    Need to read A Singular Destiny first?

    Hello,

    I am probably going to be getting my hands on Over a Torrent Sea before Singular Destiny. Should I hold off on reading it until I read Singular? I am look forward to both very much so I do not want to ruin anything for myself.
     
  16. Thrawn

    Thrawn Rear Admiral Premium Member

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    The twist at the end of Singular is mentioned at the beginning of Torrent...but it's also been mentioned about 8,000 times around here (the Typhon Pact). So if you know what that means, then don't worry about it; if you haven't read anything about the Typhon Pact yet, though, you might want to hold off.
     
  17. Ronald Held

    Ronald Held Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    I just got mine at a Borders express. Christopher, how technically challenging will it be for me to read the novel?
     
  18. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    Well, assuming you're able to hold a book and turn pages, and to turn on a light when it's dark out, you shouldn't have any technical challenges reading it. As far as your comprehension goes, I'm in no position to judge that. :p
     
  19. Thrawn

    Thrawn Rear Admiral Premium Member

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    My review: (!!!UNMARKED SPOILERS AHEAD!!!)



    By this point, I have some pretty high expectations for a CLB novel; I more or less expect it to make me reevaluate some important aspect of myself and the universe, awe and delight me with some kind of idea I'd have never even considered, create flawless and moving character arcs for several main characters, and take such an irrepressible delight in the wonder of the universe that it's effectively impossible to put down.

    And, as usual, dude managed to completely exceed my expectations. It's pretty absurd by this point, really; aside from GTTS, every CLB book I've read has left me going "WOW! I mean, I knew it was going to be GOOD, but not, like THAT good!" and mumbling stupidly for a while. The end of this one even made me well up a little. No actual tears, but it was close. I was genuinely moved.

    I started reading Star Trek novels when I was 6; back then, I wouldn't have been able to finish this, much less understand it. Believe me when I tell you that no one is more surprised than me that Star Trek, after almost two decades, has aged right along with me, and is STILL making me think and feel this much. I'm genuinely blown away. This right here is art.

    More specifically, in a lot of ways, I think this might've actually been the first Titan book to genuinely live up to the series' premise of exploring the conflicts and revelations from having such an alien crew. For the first time, our biggest spotlight character - Aili - is one of the extremely alien and different ones, and Cethente and Ree put in fascinating appearances as well. Cethente's diving sequence, in particular, is one of my favorite Trek moments ever. But really the heart and soul of this novel is Aili's journey, and it became so much more interesting and affecting than I thought that character would've ever been... and she was one of my favorites to begin with!

    It’s also interesting that the book skips over the scientific part of finding The Solution at the end completely, and just deals with the cultural impact; it’s as if the fact of science producing solutions is never even in doubt, just the people’s willingness to accept them. And the way the squale culture was created to be able to underline that moral without them seeming backward was similarly fantastic. The work that went into crafting that society was remarkable. And on top of that, the world building in this novel is positively insane; this ecosystem is researched and conceptualized staggeringly well, and the idea of a genetic engineering creature is just bleeding brilliant. Implausible to be sure, but fascinating enough that I’ll believe it. I loved it all. Not to mention, of course, the perfect arcs for Tuvok (already 12x the character he ever was on Voyager), Riker, Vale, and Melora & Ra-Havreii... I mean, I will say that I would’ve liked to see more of Dakal and his new girlfriend, and Modan makes a few appearances but without being as cool as I’d have hoped, but that's about it. The story in this book was deep, multifaceted, and truly believable for everyone involved.

    My one big complaint with Titan is that this is now the sixth book in a row to be about profound, soul-searching topics, and I just have to say, it’d be fantastic if these guys could have just a little fun every once in a while. I liked the way this novel started calmly, but even then, it turned out to be a Giant Soul-Searching Epic for everyone involved. Can we visit a planet where the most valuable part of their culture is stand up comedy, or something? All six of the last Titan books (including Destiny) have been absolute genius, but in a row, it's getting to be a little draining. I'm glad I didn't read them all at once, or by this point I think my brain would've exploded. In all fairness, Torvig is always a breath of fresh air, and he gets two hilarious scenes in this one (one as he dons a new mechanical structure complete with fins; two as he decides the best solution to an immediate problem would be spending three weeks making the transporters create wormholes), but it would’ve been nice to see a bit more of that. There's plenty of humor, but very little... lightheartedness.

    Anyway, this is pretty clearly Bennett’s best work since Buried Age, and I absolutely adored it; it starts as a small tale of scientific discovery and becomes another shattering reconstruction of the human spirit as only CLB can do, and despite covering somewhat familiar ground does so with such stirring optimism and hope that it magnificently takes its place as a defining part of the post-Destiny optimistic Trek universe. It's probably the best Titan book so far, outside of Destiny.

    But all the same, I think I’ll go read some New Frontier now. After that, I need a laugh.
     
    Last edited: Feb 22, 2009
  20. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

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    Re: Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

    Wow. I'm welling up a little just reading this review. I'm immensely flattered.


    Interesting you should say that, because I was trying to move past the whole "Ooh, look how diverse we are!" thing, just take it for granted that the crew had gotten used to that diversity and that conflicts would come more out of individuals (albeit reflecting their own distinct histories and heritages) than species differences.

    But I guess what you're saying is that the book really gets into exploring the alien characters' worldviews and mentalities, rather than dwelling on their differences.

    Glad you liked those. I enjoyed developing those characters and their cultures. I actually didn't plan on using Cethente at first, but I needed some crewmember capable of handling that dive and Cethente seemed the best choice. I'm quite pleased with what I came up with.


    Admittedly, it's more that I didn't have a real-science solution for that. The basic crisis came more from Treknobabble energy fields than from real science, and so the solution was pretty much going to be applied handwavium in any case. Rather than think up a couple of paragraphs of that, I just said "We've devised a field" and focused on the more concrete science and logistics of the deployment.


    Thanks, but this is one of those times where it looks like I planned something that I actually didn't. This book is largely based on an unsold spec novel I wrote over a decade ago, and in that version, there was no technological fix that the ocean-planet aliens (more dolphinlike there) had to accept; their fear of technology was just an excuse to keep the leading lady separate from her crew for long enough that she needed to undergo the change that's proposed for Aili and Riker here.

    So really the work of creating the squales' society and environment was about half done back then and half done in the writing of this book. Which helped me do a richer job of worldbuilding than I probably could've within the bounds of my deadline for this book alone.


    I'm surprised to hear that, since I was trying to make this a lighter, fun change-of-pace book after the weightiness of Destiny. It dealt with some pretty serious character baggage, but I tried to leaven it with humor and avoid getting too dark.