Star Trek: Strange New Worlds - The High Country by John Jackson Miller

[Enterprise1701]

As to the number of releases, one way Star Wars has addressed that — and which Trek absolutely should replicate — is with its Essential Legends editions, which are slowly bringing all the old mass-market paperbacks back as the trade paperbacks that stores prefer to stock, while giving some of those releases audiobooks if they never had them before. A similar program for the Pocket Universe novels is devoutly to be desired, and would really bulk up the bookstore sections.

Sad as I am to see the discontinuity between my older MMPBs and newer TPBs, I admit it does look nice to have reprinted novels match up in size with their modern relatives, as can be seen here with Therin of Andor's Ex Machina.

Christopher L Bennett's "Ex Machina" is now available as a reprint in Gallery's trade paperback format, making a great companion volume for the 2019 40th anniversary trade reprint of Gene Roddenberry's novelisation and Bennett's own March 2020 continuation, "The Higher Frontier" (which happens to be set on Andor).


TMP trilogy by Ian McLean, on Flickr

 

[JJMiller]

Nice to see!

Wanted to get into this thread that Dr. Don Lincoln of Fermilab, who advised me on some of the science that appears in THE HIGH COUNTRY, will be doing a "Science of Star Trek" panel with me Sunday at C2E2 in Chicago. My full C2E2 schedule is here. (I'm also at Galaxy Con Richmond this weekend — drop by if you're there!)

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

Uh, kind of? It's set between episodes 7 and 8, and does spoil a reveal from episode 3.

Just scored the DVD set. And I have the book with me. And I'm down to the last episode of PIC season 2.

But I'm also a day behind quota on reading the KJV for Lent.

*****
Spoils what? That Una is Illyrian? That's kind of like Sulu's first name being Hikaru: something that originated in the Novelverse, and was promoted to canon.

 

[Reanok]

I just started reading this book and really liked it so far.

 

[Christopher]

Spoils what? That Una is Illyrian? That's kind of like Sulu's first name being Hikaru: something that originated in the Novelverse, and was promoted to canon.

Well, something that originated in a standalone novel, at a time when there was no attempt at a "novelverse." Heck, Vulcan's Glory was barely even consistent with TOS, let alone other novels (what with having an Enterprise crew including dozens of unusually emotional Vulcans, instead of Spock being the only one).

 

[David cgc]

Spoils what? That Una is Illyrian? That's kind of like Sulu's first name being Hikaru: something that originated in the Novelverse, and was promoted to canon.

This is a very odd question to try to answer.

Spoiler: Ghosts of Illyria

Well, since you asked, and you’re probably caught up by now, the book mentioned how Dr. M’Benga’s sick daughter lives in the transporter.

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

Glad I saw the episode before I tripped your spoiler tag. And before I cracked the book. Shades of TNG: "Relics."

And I have this vague recollection about the Denobulans also doing genetic engineering.

 

[The Wormhole]

And I have this vague recollection about the Denobulans also doing genetic engineering.

Yes, Phlox said in the Augment arc that genetic engineering has been done by Denobulans to positive effect, but they don't use it to "redesign the species" they way it was done on Earth prior to the Eugenics Wars.

 

[JJMiller]

I figured that the element we referred to occurred SO early in the series, it was unlikely there would be many people who would buy the book who hadn't gotten at least that far in the show — especially as the book's release date slid.

We did not mention Illyrians (or Talosians, for that matter) at all, but there are subtle nods to each of those elements.

 

[Reanok]

I finished this book and thought it was really good. This was a story I really enjoyed seeing Enterprise mentions about north star was really cool. Thanks JJ Miller for such a great story. I hope you'll get to write more Star Trek books in the future.

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

I can see how one should hold off on it before at least seeing the end of the third episode: the chronology note is a spoiler of M'Benga's secret.

I've read the first chapter. Interesting, so far, but as it stands, with all that I have going on, I probably won't get to the point in the first season where it naturally falls, and I probably will have to re-read the first chapter when I get back to it.

And I'll probably jump right back in once I finish my Lenten journey through the KJV, and before I start my Eastertide reading. (This year, I'm thinking of re-reading the Divine Comedy. Which actually does have some riotously funny parts, mostly involving the punishments assigned in various corners of Hell.

Spoiler: Particularly what happens to flatterers

i.e., bullshit artists.

)

I figured that the element we referred to occurred SO early in the series, it was unlikely there would be many people who would buy the book who hadn't gotten at least that far in the show — especially as the book's release date slid.

Just those of us who prefer to have physical media to show for having bought an intellectual property product. I barely buy e-books, much less pay for streaming (and I still don't have the bandwidth for streaming audio, much less video, at home).

 

[Ronald Held]

In understand about hardcopy novels, though e-books take up no shelve space.

 

[Avro Arrow]

The High Country is finally--finally!--available at Chapters/Indigo.

Now I just need to be able to find time to get out there to get one...

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I'm thinking of re-reading the Divine Comedy. Which actually does have some riotously funny parts, mostly involving the punishments assigned in various corners of Hell.

Spoiler: Particularly what happens to flatterers

i.e., bullshit artists.

)

I've never read Dante's original but I have read the Niven/Pournelle version and it's one of my favorite novels. And yeah, I love the bit about the flatterers/advertising people.

The sequel (Escape from Hell) is not that great tho.

 

[Ronald Held]

I just finished. Not certain why it was appealing. I do not buy the Baffle's physics, but it is plausible in the prime universe.

 

[JJMiller]

Dr. Lincoln and I discussed the Baffle’s physics a couple of weeks ago in our C2E2 panel. Regrettably the event was not streamed/recorded, but the gist is we were going for an explanation that was “good enough for Star Trek.” I freely admit it wouldn’t pass muster in his (I.e., the real) world!

 

[Avro Arrow]

The High Country is finally--finally!--available at Chapters/Indigo.

Now I just need to be able to find time to get out there to get one...

So I was finally able to get out to pick this one up, almost two weeks later!

Finding the time to actually read it will be the next big challenge!

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

Finding the time to actually read it will be the next big challenge!

Chapters are very short. And best taken one at a time until about the 2/3 point.

 

[thribs]

I'm surprised La'an knows about the Sphere Builders. I would have thought knowledge about them would be heavily classified due to the time travel element.
I enjoyed the book but i did think the story dragged a bit for the first half. It got better later on when the chase started.

 

[JJMiller]

I tend to doubt they could have hidden everything related to the cause of a major war that had casualties on Earth — the families of the victims wouldn’t have stood for having anything less than the full truth. I also expect security chiefs, at least, would have needed to be briefed in on the threat to be on the watch for its return.

(Out of universe, we couldn’t reasonably not mention them at least once in the book, and she was in a better position to make an observation than Pike was.)