This TNG novel, which I haven't heard anything about, recently appeared on Amazon. Note the release date, which is December 1, 2014. I wonder what it is about, and why we're able to pre-order it so far in advance.
That sounds like a placeholder date in Amazon's database rather than an actual publication date. Generally the release dates given for Trek novels tend to be toward the end of a month. The problem is that these computer databases usually don't have an option for "sometime during that year," so they have to put in a fake month and day. It happens all the time on Amazon.
Perhaps she is taking Picard and Beverly down the road we've watched being set brick by brick of them leaving Starship life and settling down with their family? If they go that route, I think it would be cool if Worf was made Captain of the Enterprise
If that happened I think I would completely stop reading TNG books. Have become less and less interested in them in recent times with the changes to the crew, and getting to the stage where I will no longer have a desire to read TNG books.
I'm just the opposite, I am finally finding Picard to be really interesting to read with his family and him having to struggle with that as well as the crew growing together again because of the changes.
The Crusher family settling down on Earth doesn't mean they would be out of the series. There is a precedent, the Siskos on Bajor - and they are still an integral part of DS9-R. Maybe Beverly even becomes captain of the Pasteur a few years down the road, just like Sisko returned to active duty? Una McCormack being the resident Cardassian specialist could also mean that the story focuses on Glinn Dygan and his return to his people? Or, the title itself could be placeholder and the story about something completely different.
Exactly. That happens so often these days -- a completely random working title being picked for the paperwork, having nothing whatsoever to do with the actual story -- that it's pretty useless to try to read any meaning into these advance titles showing up online.
FWIW When I asked Una on Twitter if she could shed some light on this after 8of5 posted about it over a week ago she answered "Not really." Which of course could mean anything between "I don't even know what all this is about" and " I'm not allowed to talk about it."
To hazard a guess: ebook. Maybe the sales of The Struggle Within and The Stuff of Dreams show there's a sufficient market for these and now more will be on the way?
I was told after The Struggle Within came out that it did well enough for Pocket to decide to do more of them. The next ebook novella after TSW was Vanguard: In Tempest's Wake, and The Stuff of Dreams is the third one in recent years.
Dr. Rumack: How soon can you land? Oveur: I can't tell. Rumack: You can tell me; I'm a doctor. Oveur: No; I mean I'm just not sure. -- Airplane!