Destiny trilogy - speculations

[ronny]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

Yes I do.

Presidential polling predicts the results of elections by polling 1,500 Americans nationwide out of over ONE HUNDRED MILLION voters.

So yes, I'm pretty certain I can predict the general content of your books based on the information thus provided.

Hey, don't get riled up.

I'm sure you worked hard on them.

If they turn out to be any good, I'll say so and apologize.

But I don't anticipate that.

This has been a useful thread. It made me learn how to put people on ignore in the new software.

 

[Turtletrekker]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

This has been a useful thread. It made me learn how to put people on ignore in the new software.

 

[Dayton3]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

Reap the Whirlwind clocked in at 124,000 words. For comparison purposes, Gods of Night runs roughly 96,000 words; Mere Mortals wrapped up at around 98,000; and Lost Souls finished at roughly 108,000 words.

And yet, as I have just explained to you in a previous post, you haven't. You've gotten it utterly wrong. Which kind of sinks your illogical presidential-polling analogy.

And gee, why would I get "riled up" that you're taking a figurative dump all over 18 months of my work without having actually read any of it?

A few things Mr. Mack:

1) I hope I'm wrong. I would enjoy a good Borg story.

2) Based on the information given I'm giving you my opinion.

You disagreed with my conclusions. You never said the spoilers presented were out and out incorrect.

To you, the spoilers I assume are only a sample of what you consider a well written, well thought out book.

To me, the spoilers indicate yet another Borg story cluster****.

3) Do you come to a DISCUSSION BOARD expecting adoring praise for a product none of us have read yet?

Why?

I'm criticizing it before reading it based on the information so far presented and based on more than a decade of simply awful handling of the Borg by writers.

4) If you want the trilogy presented in a better light, perhaps you could release some spoilers of your own that make the books look better rather than simple denials about what is in them.

5) Writers aren't the only people who have years of their work denigrated in some way. Been there, done that.

 

[William Leisner]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

You disagreed with my conclusions. You never said the spoilers presented were out and out incorrect.

Dude, it's not his job to spell out for you why you're fucking wrong. Just trust that when the man who wrote the books in question tells you you're fucking wrong, you're just fucking wrong.

To you, the spoilers I assume

And there's your problem: you've got that whole "ass/u/me" thing working there...

Again: guy who wrote the book vs. psuedonymous internet keyboard monkey who read a few blurbs. Who's gonna know better?

3) Do you come to a DISCUSSION BOARD expecting adoring praise for a product none of us have read yet?

Of course not. That would be as silly as expecting people who haven't read said product from taking a big steaming dump all over it. And then claiming to be loved by God.

 

[KRAD]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

First off: Q & A was about 68,000 words. A Burning House was 95K, and A Singular Destiny wound up at 88K.

2) Based on the information given I'm giving you my opinion.

You haven't been given any significant information.

3) Do you come to a DISCUSSION BOARD expecting adoring praise for a product none of us have read yet?

Why?

He doesn't, but he does expect people to know what they're talking about in a discussion. If you read Gods of Night and decide that you don't like it, I can safely say that Dave will have no problem with it. Coming to a discussion board expecting adoring praise for a product none of you have read yet is indeed ridiculous -- but so is coming to a discussion board expecting negative feedback for a product none of you have read yet, which is exactly what you did.

 

[LightningStorm]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

2) Based on the information given I'm giving you my opinion.

But you are not basing your opinion on the information given to you. As you are being given information right here by the single most reliable source ever (the person who wrote it!). He's giving you information that says your prior information is incorrect and runs under false assumptions. If you are taking "information given" into account to form your opinion, then you MUST be taking this into consideration too. Yet it is abundantly clear that you are not.

You never said the spoilers presented were out and out incorrect.

He did say this:

blurbs that have already been discredited as "preliminary" content for the sales catalog, and not in fact the actual back cover copy? You couldn't be more wrong.

Which doesn't explicitly say "all of what has been presented is wrong" it does pretty heavily imply that a great deal of it is quite inaccurate.

 

[Steve Roby]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

This has been a useful thread. It made me learn how to put people on ignore in the new software.

I learned to do that some time ago, but yeah, there are times it's really a relief to see something like

This message is hidden because username is on your ignore list.​

 

[Christopher]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

2) Based on the information given I'm giving you my opinion.

But you are not basing your opinion on the information given to you. As you are being given information right here by the single most reliable source ever (the person who wrote it!). He's giving you information that says your prior information is incorrect and runs under false assumptions. If you are taking "information given" into account to form your opinion, then you MUST be taking this into consideration too. Yet it is abundantly clear that you are not.

Also, KRAD, Bill Leisner, and I have all read Destiny, and we all agree, Dayton3, that you are absolutely wrong in your speculations. That's not a subjective opinion, it's firsthand knowledge of the actual storyline of the trilogy.

Let's say you read a short newspaper item about a murder and, based on a couple of scattered factoids mentioned in the item (say, that the killer was male and it happened in her home), you conclude the victim's husband probably did it. Let's say you're then confronted with three eyewitnesses who actually saw the murder take place and tell you that the husband was across town and that they personally saw a one-armed man break into the house and commit the murder. Would it be remotely rational for you to reject their firsthand knowledge in favor of your uninformed guesswork?

 

[ATimson]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

Let's say you're then confronted with three eyewitnesses who actually saw the murder take place and tell you that the husband was across town and that they personally saw a one-armed man break into the house and commit the murder. Would it be remotely rational for you to reject their firsthand knowledge in favor of your uninformed guesswork?

If those eyewitnesses were friends with, workers for, or otherwise acquainted with the husband, yes. Especially since they saw the murder, and yet somehow knew that the husband was across town at the time despite supposedly not being witness to his current location.

 

[David Mack]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

2) Based on the information given I'm giving you my opinion.

You don't have any information. You have some hyperbolic advance sales drivel and a bunch of speculation by other fans who know as little as you do.

You disagreed with my conclusions. You never said the spoilers presented were out and out incorrect.

To the extent that they conveyed that the story includes the Borg and the familiar ships and characters of The Next Generation and Titan, they were correct. But the conclusions you inferred from that information are still absolutely wrong.

To you, the spoilers I assume are only a sample of what you consider a well written, well thought out book.

To me, the spoilers indicate yet another Borg story cluster****.

First of all, they're called blurbs, not spoilers. Second, the blurbs you've seen were advance marketing copy, not the actual back cover copy, which I think comes closer to capturing the tone of the books. Third, what rankles me is your habit of dismissing my work before it's even published.

3) Do you come to a DISCUSSION BOARD expecting adoring praise for a product none of us have read yet?

No, but that doesn't mean I'm going to sit idly by while someone denigrates my work months before it's even published. If you read it and hate it, that's fine by me. But I have no tolerance for people who think they're entitled to dole out savage opinions about a book that they haven't even read.

4) If you want the trilogy presented in a better light, perhaps you could release some spoilers of your own that make the books look better rather than simple denials about what is in them.

First, that's not my job. Second, my editors and I have worked very hard to avoid releasing any spoilers. The whole point is to keep the core elements of the story a secret. You know...so people can read the books to see what happens.

5) Writers aren't the only people who have years of their work denigrated in some way. Been there, done that.

Judging from your posts in this topic so far, I'd say you probably can look forward to many more years of being viciously denigrated.

 

[Christopher]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

Let's say you're then confronted with three eyewitnesses who actually saw the murder take place and tell you that the husband was across town and that they personally saw a one-armed man break into the house and commit the murder. Would it be remotely rational for you to reject their firsthand knowledge in favor of your uninformed guesswork?

If those eyewitnesses were friends with, workers for, or otherwise acquainted with the husband, yes. Especially since they saw the murder, and yet somehow knew that the husband was across town at the time despite supposedly not being witness to his current location.

They'd just talked to him on a videophone, okay? What do you want from me? It's an analogy!

 

[Kirsten Beyer]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

If they turn out to be any good, I'll say so and apologize.

But I don't anticipate that.

I'm sorry, Dave. I promised myself I was going to stay out of this but I just can't take it anymore.

At the 2007 Shoreleave convention Marco asked me to repeat for the fans at the Pocket “Upcoming Release” presentation what I’d told him after reading the outlines of Destiny.

My exact words were “It’s fucking brilliant.

And that was just the outlines.

I get paid to write. I’m not easily impressed. As a rule of professional courtesy I never share my views of other author’s work publicly.

But I’m telling you that just the outlines blew my mind.

I’ve read all three manuscripts since then and I’m standing by my first impression. If you guys don’t go bugfuck nuts when you read these books I’ll be absolutely amazed.

Until then, think about something, please.

It’s not hard to sit there and throw stones based on a badly written blurb that captures nothing of the creative mastery of the form Dave is demonstrating in this project. When he says he’s given 18 months of his life to Destiny, I hope you understand what that means. One of Trek’s most prolific and widely praised authors has passed up plenty of other opportunities to create something that literally takes Trek to a whole new place. Every single day for months, every moment that he wasn’t working to keep food on his table or in the crapper, he was sitting in front of his computer writing his ass off into the wee hours of the night.

Love or hate the finished product, a little respect for what the man has already done on your behalf wouldn’t be out of line here.

But that’s just me talking.

Do me a favor. Sit down and craft an epic story that adds something totally new to the Star Trek Universe and takes at least fifteen of our most beloved characters and say, fifty others, and moves their stories forward in a way that is meaningful, compelling, and edge-of-your-seat entertaining. Turn that story into three novel length outlines…say twenty pages, single spaced per novel. Get that story past Marco, Margaret and the powers that be at CBS. Then…sit down for three months straight and write three to five thousand words a day, until you reach 100,000 words. Re-read those words a couple of hundred times and revise them until they don’t just sit there on the page but literally get up and dance in front of you.

Then do it again.

Then do it one more time.

Once you’ve done that, feel free to decide, before you’ve read a word Dave has written, that Destiny probably won’t be your cup of tea.

Go ahead. I’ll wait.

 

[Wowbagger]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

3-5K words a day?

Ouch. I always figured it was 1-2K. But that's probably for another topic.

 

[haubrija]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

Listen... I don't post alot but I read this forum religously.

I just wanna say David (and I hope its cool to call you that here)... I can not fucking wait for your work on these books to be released.

I don't care what's been released and what hasn't. I have faith in the dude's work. It's kind of like this... I'm a huge fan of David Fincher. Great filmmaker. Everything the guy has done has been brillant in some way, shape or form. Now did I love the Benjamin Button trailer... No. Does that make me in any way less excited for the man's next picture... No. I can't wait to see what he has in store. And I'll be first in line for a ticket.

Have you actually read of the man's books? Seriously? This isn't blind praise and I'm not some stupid fanboy deciding what's going to be good before I read it. Just look at the schedule... whatever happens is so big that there are numerous followups already on... That simple fact alone has my inner geek tingling with what's in store.

I've rambled on too long. Dave, I think what compelled me to write this is that... don't think some disenfranchised dude on a message board represents us all. I can't wait to read what you have in store for us. I can't wait man. Let this dude be first in line for the "I was all wrong about Destiny" T-shirt.

 

[Defcon]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

Do you really think that you can guess at the contents of a 300,000-word trilogy that I spent 18 months working on, when you know of nothing more than a troika of 125-word online blurbs that have already been discredited as "preliminary" content for the sales catalog, and not in fact the actual back cover copy?

Do you have any idea when we will see the actual blurbs? I'm a bit amazed we haven't seen them yet although it's only a little more than a month until the first book should start to hit the shelves.

 

[David Mack]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

^ Alas, there have been some miscommunications, which has led to the unfortunate delays in both the official cover copy and the cover art. The artists and the editors and everyone else are working as fast as they can.

Believe me...I wish we had sorted all this out months ago.

ETA: Thank you, Kirsten, for your unwavering support throughout this whole marathon process. Your input and encouragement have been invaluable.

 

[Idoliside]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

3) Do you come to a DISCUSSION BOARD expecting adoring praise for a product none of us have read yet?

Funnily enough this is one of those boards that I've noticed that the author can take any amount of critisism and take it well. They never expect praise, infact in the long time i've spent lurking on this forum i've always noticed that they seem to encourage critisism and remarks as a well informed discussion.
It makes us fans happier as parts of the books explained. And it keeps the authors minds aware of potential problems in trek lit.

Its known fact that alot of people were let down by the amount of borg lately (although saying that i did just re-read Before Dishonor and i found it still enjoyable) but still, we have faith in David Mack as a great author having read his previous works with Warpath, Vangard and the A Time To books that whatever he writes, it will be enjoyable.

In the end, if your complaining this much about a book before it's come out...don't read it. Easy!

 

[Defcon]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

^ Alas, there have been some miscommunications, which has led to the unfortunate delays in both the official cover copy and the cover art.

Thanks for the info.

Kind of unfortunate for Pocket Books PR-work that the centerpiece of the current line-up is hit by those problems.

 

[BrotherBenny]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

First of all, I'll be nice. I've enjoyed everything of Mack's that he's written and I've read and although the Borg have been badly written by some, i'm sure he's not one of them since he can't write crap, not in his nature based on the previous body of works.

Secondly, Dayton3, I won't put you on ignore, but please go back under your rock and stay until you develop some manners and simple civility. Humility would be nice too.

You're preaching to the converted here, converted to Mackism that is.

 

[Dayton3]

Re: Destiny trilogy - pretty heavy spoilers

2) Based on the information given I'm giving you my opinion.

But you are not basing your opinion on the information given to you. As you are being given information right here by the single most reliable source ever (the person who wrote it!). He's giving you information that says your prior information is incorrect and runs under false assumptions. If you are taking "information given" into account to form your opinion, then you MUST be taking this into consideration too. Yet it is abundantly clear that you are not.

Also, KRAD, Bill Leisner, and I have all read Destiny, and we all agree, Dayton3, that you are absolutely wrong in your speculations. That's not a subjective opinion, it's firsthand knowledge of the actual storyline of the trilogy.

Let's say you read a short newspaper item about a murder and, based on a couple of scattered factoids mentioned in the item (say, that the killer was male and it happened in her home), you conclude the victim's husband probably did it. Let's say you're then confronted with three eyewitnesses who actually saw the murder take place and tell you that the husband was across town and that they personally saw a one-armed man break into the house and commit the murder. Would it be remotely rational for you to reject their firsthand knowledge in favor of your uninformed guesswork?

You do know don't you that eyewitnesses are considered one of the least reliable forms of evidence ?

But I will undoubtedly read the books. I'll probably even post a review on Amazon.com. And I will look at them fairly because I'm intrigued by what I've heard.

That said, if there is anything in the books that includes hundreds of Federation starships being annihilated by the Borg and then our heros saving the day when all else has failed...then I will be royally pissed off.

Likewise anything involving manipulation of time, the universe, or some kind of reset switch (that Star Trek is infamous for).

Finally, how much time and effort someone puts into a producing a product should be utterly irrelevant into judging its quality.