What is the biggest reason that you read Trek novels/stories?

[Halogen]

For my first post: a poll.

I, personally, have never understood why people like to read novels about Trek, so, I thought I would post this.

If this poll function is like those on other forums, it will only allows a single answer from each participant. So, please choose the most important factor that compels you to read, instead of or in addition to watching, star trek. [EDIT: Oops. It does allow multiples. Choose away, but please avoid lazy "click every box" answers]

Feel free to elaborate on "Other"

[C.E. Evans]

The first three options of the poll sums up it real nicely for me.

[Ktrek]

I have always been a sci-fi fan ever since I was about 5 years old. I was a child of ten when Star Trek premiered and I loved it. When I was a teen it ran in syndication and every day when I got home from school I watched Star Trek. I came to love not only the science fiction in the stories but the characters themselves. This love and enjoyment found a place when TNG, DS9, VOY and ENT were running as well, and it was the characters that made me love these incarnations. I especially grew to love and enjoy TNG and DS9.

The Star Trek universe and philosophy has also been part of the appeal and without new shows to watch books can be an excellent way to enter into that universe and experience new adventures with your favorite characters.

I also enjoy reading Star Trek books because it's very easy to pick up a book where you already know the characters. I don't have to keep notes in my head, and sometimes on paper, to keep track of who's who and what's what. Now there are always new characters introduced in every book but the crux of any Star Trek book usually revolves around characters you already know and love.

I could go on but those are the main reasons and not to mention that many of them are pretty good stories in their own right.

Kevin

[Christopher]

Halogen wrote:

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Stay tuned for my rant about Abrams in a bit.

No, thanks. I've heard it all before.

Besides, this is the Trek Lit forum, not the Movies forum. The only Abramsverse topics relevant for discussion here are the movie novelizations, the IDW comics, and the young-adult Starfleet Academy novels (plus the aborted movie-sequel novels that I and others wrote a few years back).

[Infern0]

The simple answer is because I liked the tv shows and characters and want to see/read more

[Halogen]

Christopher wrote:

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Besides, this is the Trek Lit forum, not the Movies forum.

Oh, I know, elsewhere. Are there any particularly notorious threads about Abrahms hate I should look at.

[Infern0]

There are a lot of guys on here who love Abrahms, think he's the "saviour" of trek, made Trek "better than ever", etc etc.

I myself think he made a decent Star Trek fan-flick that got a major release in theaters, and get crucified a lot for that opinion "Abrahms is the future, deal with it" that sort of thing.

All you will do is get yourself into a massive argument with a bunch of people who think he can do no wrong and will never stop defending the man

[teacake]

Abrams is as a god to me.

Now if only we could get those grievously unpublished JJTrek books PUBLISHED!! I haven't been keeping up with that, and I see from Christopher's post that no, this hasn't miraculously happened yet. Is there any news about them? I was more excited about those books than any recent Treklit at the time (obviously a certain return of a certain character eclipsed that). Do you think we will ever see them?

[Therin of Andor]

My first ST reading experience was the novelization of ST:TMP and I was thrilled that it filled in gaps in the movie - luckily, I read the book first! Ditto ST III, which opened in Australia several months after the USA. ST II's novelization also had lots of new stuff.

With the TAS "ST Logs", again I was thrilled that the stories were interconnected with new material (esp. backgrounds for the Aprils, Arex and M'Ress).

So, when it came to original novels, the ones that thrilled me the most were the ones that filled in missing information: prequels, sequels and elaborations on canonical ST. One of my first original novels was "The Fate of the Phoenix", but I only knew of the female Romulan Commander via the Blish novelization of "The Enterprise Incident". Later, I found the first "Phoenix" book and the tapestry was woven closed!

"Ex Machina", "Imzadi", "Strangers from the Sky", "Final Frontier", "My Enemy, My Ally", "Crucible" trilogy, "The Buried Age", "Devil in the Sky", "Andor: Paradigm"... most of my favourites are tightly connected to canonical events or have canonical guest stars. "New Frontier", with its myriad of obscure canonical characters. And Peter David, Greg Cox, David R George III and Christopher Bennett are masters at weaving ST tapestries from the canon.

[Desert Kris]

Halogen wrote:

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For my first post: a poll.

I, personally, have never understood why people like to read novels about Trek, so, I thought I would post this.

This seems a curious statement, given that you have constructed a poll that covers a number of reasons that make it easy enough to see why people would choose to read ST novels. Without meaning to seem confrontational, it seems to hint at a specific viewpoint towards the general quality of ST Lit vs. any other literature that's non-media tie-in, and the readers who prefer reading one type or another exclusively. Giving it the benefit of the doubt, would you care to clarify? Would it be more accurate to say that you're curious about how the data looks, in terms of ranking the reasons, from major or lesser, for wanting to read ST?

And yeah, Abrams rant...lurked and seen so much that is so dispiriting. It's just a movie. It didn't kill the franchise. It's been so successful, so that's frustrating for people looking for very specific things in ST that they feel the movie doesn't have. I enjoyed it, so maybe I don't understand what proper Trek is supposed to be (), therefore I resolve to not care and continue to enjoy it while looking forward to the next one. Cheers.

The top three reasons listed in that poll are the reason I read ST and other media tie-in novels, including Star Wars and Doctor Who novels (and many others), same reasons for them. Another reason I like reading media tie-ins are for those groundbreaking, earth shaking novels ambitious enough to try to change the readers' perspectives on the fictional universe they are set in. Way back, without video players or a TV network playing re-runs, the novelizations of televised stories were sometimes the most convenient way to experience or re-experience a TV story that you wouldn't be able to see. Alan Dean Foster kept the animated show's stories alive in circulation while the animated series itself was unavailable to see.

[King Daniel Into Darkness]

I love the depth and scope that the novels add to Trek. The Trek universe is probably the biggest and richest fictional universe out there. Including the novels, it literally goes on forever. The story of the Vulcan/Romulan split? What was Surak like? The very first mission of the as-yet-unnamed USS Enterprise under Captain April and George Kirk? What happened to Shelby, Selar, Robin Lefler and many other one-shot characters after they appeared on the show? A look inside the Deparment of Temporal Investigations? What everyone's days as a cadet were like? Captain Pike's life story? Saavik's? Picard's? The origins of the Borg? What's that Andorian four-gender thing about? Picard's years as captain of the Stargazer? Glimpses into myriad parallel universes, with differences from the minor (what if Starfleet did take Lal from Data?) to the extreme (if planet Vulcan never found peace?) And possibly most relevant of all, what happened to the main characters and what happened in the Trek universe after Next Gen, Deep Space Nine, Voyager and Enterprse ended?

So much Trek, so many wonderful enjoyable stories. Not every book is a classic - I'd say the hit/miss ratio is about the same as that of the episodes. But they are hugely entertaining overall. The best novels are some of the very best Trek ever.

Halogen wrote:

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Oh, I know, elsewhere. Are there any particularly notorious threads about Abrahms hate I should look at.

Just start a new thread in the XI+ forum and rant away - but I should warn you, most people there are big fans of both the old and new incarnations of Star Trek. You'll probably have every point you make dissected

[Relayer1]

I ticked the first three options.

For me its now about continuing where the shows left off. I like it all but my preference is filling in the gaps and taking things forward. I read TOS Treklit before Next Gen started for the same reason. I like the continuity and it fills a gap left by the shows. Some of it is a lot better than the TV versions !

Stuff set during the shows doesn't have the same appeal, but that's not to say there aren't great stories to be told...

[King Daniel Into Darkness]

teacake wrote:

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Now if only we could get those grievously unpublished JJTrek books PUBLISHED!! I haven't been keeping up with that, and I see from Christopher's post that no, this hasn't miraculously happened yet. Is there any news about them? I was more excited about those books than any recent Treklit at the time (obviously a certain return of a certain character eclipsed that). Do you think we will ever see them?

Christopher speculated a few months ago that Pocket may (emphasis on the "may") simply not have the licence to publish novels based on Abrams' Trek movies. Trek isn't licenced as one entity, each incarnation is done separately. Perhaps the books were written during negotiations, but then something went awry?

[Sci]

King Daniel wrote:

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I love the depth and scope that the novels add to Trek. The Trek universe is probably the biggest and richest fictional universe out there.

This.

Add to that the fact that novels are capable of greater thematic depth and characterization than film or most individual episodes of television (and the fact that well into the 2000s, much of TV Trek was constrained by the tropes and conventions of the 1980s due to Berman and company seemingly being frozen in time), and you have a recipe for a literary version of the Star Trek Universe that is much richer and more emotionally and intellectually stimulating than much of the canon upon which it is based.

[Relayer1]

Sci wrote:

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This.

Add to that the fact that novels are capable of greater thematic depth and characterization than film or most individual episodes of television (and the fact that well into the 2000s, much of TV Trek was constrained by the tropes and conventions of the 1980s due to Berman and company seemingly being frozen in time), and you have a recipe for a literary version of the Star Trek Universe that is much richer and more emotionally and intellectually stimulating than much of the canon upon which it is based.

Couldn't have put it better myself...