So, the plan for 'Worlds of DS9" was to be one-shots, to have no overall plan.
Only someone with a severe reading comprehension problem could earnestly claim that the novels published since
Unity have had no overall plan.
Worlds of DS9 quite
obviously had an overall plan.
Andor: Paradigm wrapped up the Andorian arc,
Trill: Unjoined wrapped up the Trill/Parasite arc, and
Ferenginar: Satisfaction Is Not Guaranteed wrapped up the Quark/Ro arc and some of the TV series's Ferengi arc. Meanwhile,
Cardassia: The Lotus Flower continued the Oralian/Bajoran church arc while also introducing a new arc about life on Cardassia,
The Dominion: Olympus Descending introduced the post-Founders Dominion arc, and
Bajor: Fragments and Omens introduced the Mirror Universe arc that
Olympus Descending later continued.
Warpath continued it, and
Fearful Symmetry and
The Soul Key concluded it (from what I gather -- I haven't read the last two yet).
That's a very OBVIOUS plan. Resolving several ongoing threads, introducing new ones, and focusing on one in particular. And, sure enough,
The Never-Ending Story continues the life-on-Cardassia arc, flashbacking to 2371 and then continuing into 2378.
To say that there's no plan is to either lie, not be paying attention to what you're reading, or to not understand what you're reading.
Then we had a mirror universe years-long storyline (delaying the ascendants/the dominion built up stories). And, as mentioned, I'm aware of the excuse in this case, too: it was supposed to be a 2 book quick foray into the mirror universe - well, in the end, it was anything but "quick".
Dude, that doesn't mean there's no plan. That means that they planned to focus on the Mirror Universe arc first and then the Dominion/Ascendants thing. One didn't
delay the other, because the other was never intended to come in an earlier order in the first place.
And, yes, you've had to wait a few real-life years to get the MU arc resolved because of several unforeseen and uncontrollable factors. Get the fuck over it. The publishing world moves slowly, and there can be bumps.
The fans of non-tie-in literature deal with multi-year intervals between installments of series all the time. With the
His Dark Materials series, years went by between the publication of
Northern Lights and
The Subtle Knife, and three years between
The Subtle Knife and
The Amber Spyglass. Ten years went by between the publication of
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone and
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows -- with intervals of one, one, one, three, two, and two years in-between novels.
With the
Dark Tower series, five years went by between
The Gunslinger and
The Drawing of the Three, four years between
Drawing and
The Waste Lands,
six years between
The Waste Lands and
Wizard and Glass, six years again between
Wizard and Glass and
Wolves of the Calla, and only then did one year pass between
Wolves and
Song of Susannah and
The Dark Tower, the final two.
The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien was published in 1937, and
The Lord of the Rings's first volume,
The Fellowship of the Ring, was published in 1954 -- a delay of 17 years.
The Adventures of Tom Bombadil was published in 1962, eight years after
Fellowship. Meanwhile,
The Silmarillion wasn't published until 1977 -- 23 years after
Fellowship, and 40 years from the time
The Hobbit was published.
Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-earth was published in 1980, another three years.
The History of Middle-Earth itself was published in 12 volumes between 1983 and 1996, with intervals of one, two, and three years between volumes. And finally,
The Children of Húrin was just published in 2007 --
seventy years after
The Hobbit!
That's a really extreme example, but I think it illustrates the point nicely: You can't act like a delay of three years for a book to come out is some huge, unreasonable delay that's never been heard of and expect to be taken seriously.
And then there were the "Terok Nor" and "Never Ending Sacrifice" books - essentially one-shots with little connection to the DS9 relaunch.
1. Not every novel in a series, however serialized, has to directly relate to on-going arcs.
2.
Terok Nor was its own series, even if it tied into the DS9 Relaunch, and criticizing them for releasing
Terok Nor makes about as much sense as criticizing them for releasing
The Lost Era or
Vanguard. Not every TrekLit project is about the DS9 Relaunch.
3. They're all
brilliant works more than worth a read.
4. I haven't finished
The Never-Ending Sacrifice, but I'd point out that a book that ends in 2378 is going to inevitably carry on the life-on-Cardassia arc begun with
Cardassia: The Lotus Flower -- itself also an Una McCormack novel.
And now, the plan changed again to include the typhon pact.
I didn't agree with Margaret's decision to change gears when she inherited the DS9 Relaunch, but that is
not evidence that Marco had no plan for his post-
Unity novels.
As I said - after "Unity", the DS9 relaunch books were disjointed, they had no consistent overall planning.
Um, yes they did. You just didn't like them. Which is fine. But don't try to claim that your subjective evaluation of them means they had no plan.
The DS9 relaunch started with Avatar. It then participated in two crossover series, introducing elements out of nowhere (at least certainly in the case of Gateways). It then went to the Gamma Quadrant for four standalone stories, with one developing plot running in the Alpha Quadrant.
Then, taking a break, it backtracked all the way to the beginning to tell Jake's story.
Then, taking a break from even that, it backtracked even further to tell Worf and Martok's story.
Then we got Unity.
That seems pretty disjointed to me! How is what's happened since any different?
Worlds picked up on the Cardassian stories begun by A Stitch In Time, the Andorian stuff developed through Mission: Gamma, the necessary exploration of Sisko's return, and threads on Trill, the Dominion, and Ferenginar left by the series. (Just as the series itself would tend to visit each of those cultures at least once per season.) None of those threads "came out of nowhere", but in fact many of the threads before Unity did (Gateways, Mission: Gamma standalones, LHoD having nothing to do with any of the rest of the series at all).
And Worlds layed the groundwork in at least two of the stories for the Mirror Universe saga! It was all tied together and clearly had a specific overall plan.
Not to mention, Terok Nor provided background for Fearful Symmetry, and The Never-Ending Sacrifice partially built on threads from Worlds: Cardassia, too.
In short: you're completely wrong about this. Just as DS9 had several ongoing subplots that it explored perhaps once or twice per season, the DS9 relaunch was designed from the beginning to be non-linear and varied in its storytelling methods so that it could continue to develop all of the things DS9 established. Stories on Trill, stories on Cardassia, stories in the past, stories in the mirror universe, stories using some characters and not others... it was all part of the series from the beginning.
Quoted for Truth.
I don't agree with the decision to jump DS9R forward for
The Typhon Pact, but to sit there and say that there was no post-
Unity plan is pure bullshit.
. Cliffhangers are a must if you're telling a big interconnected story. It keeps people on the edge of their seat and always wanting more.
