should PARAMOUNT take over?

[RobertScorpio]

So this back and forth about TREK continuity as to where the books fit in gave me an idea...why not stop publishing the books after the current crop come out...hire some Trek guru (Okuda comes to mind) to be the 'Berman' of the books. From then on any book that is published would be considered canon (like Star Wars books) and any future books would honor the new continuity...

Since I highly doubt there will ever be a TNG movie again, this means the entire TNG era (TNG-DS9-VOY) would be able to make official canon books. I would also try to cut back on the amount of books. I'd say six each from TNG-DS9-VOY. I leave TOS off this list because of the new movie. But if they did sanction any new TOS books they would have to abide by what ever is being set forth in the new movie...

Right now I only by TREK books based on who the authors are NOT because they are Star Trek. I know its narrow minded, but I don't have a lot of time to read so when I do I know the authors that I read always do a great jobs.

Rob
Scorpio

 

[Mysterion]

^^^^
Paramount/CBS already has someone that approves the books before they're published.

 

[Trent Roman]

What an idiotic notion. A few people complaining because they can't wrap their minds around the way tie-ins work cannot conveivably be cause for scrapping the entire book line, which already has good leadership in the form of the editors and Paula Block, and a largely consistent continuity. The books have taken the opportunity of the series ending to continue the story forwards on their own. And I don't see what your buying habits have to do with anything; if you're not buying because you don't think the books are in continuity, you've made a mistake, and if you're not buying because you don't care for all the others, then that's entirely your perogative but doesn't impact on anybody else but you.

Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman

 

[RobertScorpio]

^^^^
Paramount/CBS already has someone that approves the books before they're published.

Of course they do. But they do not really care what is in these books nor do they require any real connection between the books. What they need is some overseer who will plot out the course for the next seven years and allow books to be written so long as they abide by some uniform universe so as the books create a canon, a universe if you will, all their own. They don't have that now. Is Spock's son from YESTERDAY'S SON (I think that's the title) considered canon outside that book by the other books? I don't think so..

As I said before. I don't by all the books because I just don't think they really 'matter' as the Star Wars books do. I only by the books based on who writes them, not because they are Star Trek. I would be more apt to buy more if I thought it was a community aspect to the books..not just stand alones...I don't mean serialized books, I mean at least some concept that what I am reading matters and is official...and changes the community..

Rob
Scorpio

 

[Therin of Andor]

So this back and forth about TREK continuity as to where the books fit in gave me an idea...why not stop publishing the books after the current crop come out...hire some Trek guru (Okuda comes to mind) to be the 'Berman' of the books. From then on any book that is published would be considered canon (like Star Wars books) and any future books would honor the new continuity...

Her name is Paula Block, she heads up CBS Consumer Products, formerly Viacom Consumer Products - and Paula and her team comment on every licensed ST novel, short story, comic, RPG sourcebook - proposals and finished manuscripts - plus the toys etc - for CBS TV and Paramount Pictures. She's been doing the job since the late 80s, AFAIK, and did it in addition to the then-Star Trek Office (ie. Richard Arnold for Gene Roddenberry). Paula is a lifelong ST fan who wrote fan stories and attended conventions in the 70s.

But why should all new books and comics suddenly lay down the law for the next ST movies and/or TV shows? You reckon all prospective screenwriters should read all tie-ins before ever writing a Star Trek script, or that Paula should use her photographic memory to prevent every error? Especially when we get about 24 books and 20 or so comics every year.

How would that suddenly make Star Trek "better"?

 

[RobertScorpio]

What an idiotic notion. A few people complaining because they can't wrap their minds around the way tie-ins work cannot conveivably be cause for scrapping the entire book line, which already has good leadership in the form of the editors and Paula Block, and a largely consistent continuity. The books have taken the opportunity of the series ending to continue the story forwards on their own. And I don't see what your buying habits have to do with anything; if you're not buying because you don't think the books are in continuity, you've made a mistake, and if you're not buying because you don't care for all the others, then that's entirely your perogative but doesn't impact on anybody else but you.

Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman

Well..double idiot on you. Why can't these writers write books that take what the others have written into account? Star Wars books do it. Why can't star trek? You need to be more acceptable to other people's opinions or, at least, go to an anger management specialist.

Rob
Scorpio

 

[Dayton Ward]

All the books and other licensed products are already "official." That's the whole point of them being "licensed" in the first place. There is an office at CBS responsible for reviewing all of this stuff and making sure it is consistent with the television series and films. Pocket's editorial staff ensures that the books remain consistent with one another, though of course deliberate exceptions are made depending on the project (the Crucible trilogy being a recent and prominent example).

As for them being declared "canon" by some other party, no matter how many times this discussion comes up, I've never seen an answer to this simple question: Why is our entertainment and enjoyment of a book or other product dependent on someone else's stamp of approval? "Canon" in the Trek sense is simply the body of work the producers of Trek films and television episodes acknowledge when creating new material. That's really all there is to it. All the other crap that springs up from the countless discussions of canon is exactly that: Crap. Unless you're writing for one of the movies or the series, or are involved in the development of some tie-in product, canon should mean precisely dick.

 

[Therin of Andor]

But they do not really care what is in these books

Paula doesn't care? Since when?

nor do they require any real connection between the books.

Most of the books do connect with each other, and connect extremely well.

What they need is some overseer who will plot out the course for the next seven years and allow books to be written so long as they abide by some uniform universe

And that somehow will make them higher quality literature? For who? You? (Who obviously doesn't even read the books, or else you'd know full well that most of them agree with each other.

Is Spock's son from YESTERDAY'S SON (I think that's the title) considered canon outside that book by the other books? I don't think so.

How about "Time for Yesterday"?

No other novel has ever denied the existence of Zar, son of Spock.

I don't by all the books because I just don't think they really 'matter' as the Star Wars books do.

George Lucas was recently quoted that he rarely bothers with the SW books and comics continuities, and he has often overridden them with live action films. A good example is an early comic book where Jabba the Hutt had been drawn as a fat human male, not as a big, green, alien slug.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

Trent, Robert, please knock off the name calling. This thread can be conducted in a calmly manner like previous canon discussions.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Why can't these writers write books that take what the others have written into account? Star Wars books do it.

There are only six movies and a few telemovies and cartoons for the SW books to worry about. ST has 30 seasons of episodes and eleven movies as source material.

 

[Thrawn]

So this back and forth about TREK continuity as to where the books fit in gave me an idea...why not stop publishing the books after the current crop come out...hire some Trek guru (Okuda comes to mind) to be the 'Berman' of the books. From then on any book that is published would be considered canon (like Star Wars books) and any future books would honor the new continuity...

Since I highly doubt there will ever be a TNG movie again, this means the entire TNG era (TNG-DS9-VOY) would be able to make official canon books. I would also try to cut back on the amount of books. I'd say six each from TNG-DS9-VOY. I leave TOS off this list because of the new movie. But if they did sanction any new TOS books they would have to abide by what ever is being set forth in the new movie...

Right now I only by TREK books based on who the authors are NOT because they are Star Trek. I know its narrow minded, but I don't have a lot of time to read so when I do I know the authors that I read always do a great jobs.

Rob
Scorpio

You seem really unaware of what's been going on over the past few years. First of all, only 12 mass market paperbacks are printed a year, meaning your "cut back to 6 each of VOY-TNG-DS9" is a bit silly. Second, all the books DO stay consistent to each other and build on each other; the DS9 relaunch has had ongoing plots since it began in 2002, and more recently the A Time To... series has led into Articles Of The Federation, Titan, and the TNG relaunch, all of which will again merge in Destiny. All ongoing stories, internally and mutually consistent. As far as I can tell, only David R. George III's Crucible trilogy and the novels by William Shatner exist in their own continuity, and there are very good reasons in each case. The whole remaining currently published body of Star Trek fiction is mutually consistent, and has a long-term plan.

So, the books right now are what you want them to be exactly (and, if I might add, MUCH better than Star Wars right now, which besides Karen Traviss I think is pretty terrible). They're just not called 'canon', and this is a definitions problem that you need to get over. Sure, it's possible that these books will get contradicted by future screen material, but that happened and is still happening to Star Wars 'canon' all the time. Star Trek just doesn't lie about it.

 

[Jim Johnson]

As I said before. I don't by all the books because I just don't think they really 'matter' as the Star Wars books do.

How do Star Wars books 'matter'? What exactly do you mean by this?

I would be more apt to buy more if I thought it was a community aspect to the books..not just stand alones...I don't mean serialized books, I mean at least some concept that what I am reading matters and is official...and changes the community..

What community? The community of fans? The internal continuity within the book series?

Sounds to me like you haven't read much of the recent Trek offerings. Most of the recent books have been part of a number of ongoing series, Titan, Vanguard, the continuing storylines in the TNG books and DS9 books, etc.

 

[Trent Roman]

Why can't these writers write books that take what the others have written into account? Star Wars books do it. Why can't star trek? You need to be more acceptable to other people's opinions or, at least, go to an anger management specialist.

It's not a question of opinion; you are, objectively, wrong. As others have said, the books are officially sanctioned and they do take one another into account (with a few exceptions). With Trek off the air and the later time periods unlikely to be visited anytime soon, there's no reason not to consider the novels as having similar import in terms of continuing the stories from the screen as the Star Wars EU does. And of course, in a bit of irony, the Star Wars novels are less relevant than ever (though still quite relevant overall, or at least I think so) with Lucas back in production mode and freely contradicting what books have established when it suits his story purposes - as well it should be, as we talked about in the other thread.

Besides which, I wouldn't want them to be exactly like Star Wars novels. (See? That's an opinion.) The Star Wars novels have demonstrated their strength in telling what I would call 'vertical' stories, focused on a fairly restrained group of characters and settings across large periods of time. Star Trek, in constrast, works better 'horizontally', covering a vast cast, cultural universe and events over a more restrained period of time. I wouldn't want Star Trek to do something akin to the New Jedi Order, focusing on one subject for the next five years, both in-story and in terms of the publishing schedule, even though, for the Star Wars line, the NJO was the best thing to ever happen to it, taking full advantage of that universe's storytelling advantages. The different franchises work best usign different approaches, logically enough.

Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman

 

[Deano2099]

Well..double idiot on you. Why can't these writers write books that take what the others have written into account? Star Wars books do it. Why can't star trek?

I'd suggest reading the books, because they do. In fact sometimes I find they can be a little bit too interconnect with certain references pulling me out of the story and trying to figure out which book they came from. I still prefer it that way though. Basically 90% of the books released in the past 5 years all fit into a common continuity.

 

[Sci]

As to the notion that the current crop of Star Trek novels can't take one-another into account...

Federation President Nan Bacco deals with the reprecussions of Captain Riker's decisions from Titan: Taking Wing in Articles of the Federation (and, of course, has taken office as a result of the actions of former President Min Zife from the A Time to... novels). Captain Riker's first officer on the Titan is a character from the TNG A Time to... novels named Christine Vale -- who herself first appeared as the Enterprise security chief in the first ebook from Corps of Engineers, The Belly of the Beast. Corps of Engineers' captain is David Gold, who appears briefly in the recent Terok Nor series, which itself incorporates elements such as the Oralian Way from Andrew J. Robinson's Garek novel A Stitch in Time and the DS9 Relaunch series. The DS9 Relaunch, of course, features the character of Elias Vaungh, who also appeared in two of the Lost Era novels (Serpents Among the Ruins and The Art of the Impossible) as well as the TNG novel The Battle of Betazed. An element established in the DS9 Relaunch novels -- the four sexes of the Andorian species -- is even incorporated into the recent ENT novel The Good That Men Do, which itself also features the characters of United Earth Interior Minister Haroun al-Rashid and Andorian Ambassador Avaranthi sh'Rothress, who were first established in Articles of the Federation to have been early Federation Presidents.

This nice little snippet should give you an idea of just how extensively the continuity between novels is shared these days.

 

[KRAD]

Why can't these writers write books that take what the others have written into account? Star Wars books do it. Why can't star trek?

We do. All the time. The books have had a common continuity for quite a while now, and we are making changes to the overall community and continuity.

 

[Christopher]

It's kind of reassuring when the harshest criticisms of the books come from people who clearly aren't reading them.

 

[Greg Cox]

Okay, this may be redundant, but I also have to refute that idea that Paula Block doesn't care about what goes in the books. Trust me, she's no mere rubber stamp. Paula has put me through the wringer on occasion in her determination to make sure that the books live up to the standards of STAR TREk and don't contradict the movies and tv shows. That's her job and she's very good at it.

And, yes, I also make an effort to avoid contradicting previous Trek novels without getting too dogmatic about it. (I'm not going to kill an entire plotline because of three lines in a Gordon Eklund novel published twenty years ago . . . .)

As to whether my books are "canon" or not, who cares? Continuity flows downhill from the movies and tv, not the other way around.

 

[JD]

ST has 30 seasons of episodes and eleven movies as source material.

Which comes out to 718 hours worth of shows and movies. No I didn't know that number off the top of my head, I used Memory Alpha and Trek core to add the numbers up.

I think everyone else has pretty much covered the ways that everything you said is untrue, so I guess there's nothing more for me to add here.

 

[Rush Limborg]

Canon's kinda relative.

I mean, The Bird had a tendency to change what was "canon" whenever it suited him ("All on-screen Trek is canon. The Animated Series ain't canon. Movies V and VI ain't canon. The third season of TOS ain't canon. In fact ONLY TNG is canon").

Rick made it more constant ("On-screen Trek is canon, everything else is not.").

Now, whatever JJ, Alex, and Bob call canon...will be therefore considered canon for the duration of their reign.

Talk about canon fodder.