New books - New New Frontier, New Starfleet Academy

I never quite understood the need for a YA Trek line. It's not like Treklit is too "mature" or complicated for young readers. Or is it? I was reading Treklit in that target age, but then the Treklit was a little different in the 70s.

 

Defintion for YA fiction from Wikipedia:

 

I was reading adult novels while I was still in grade school, but that isn't typical. Getting young people interested in reading, or getting them interested in Star Trek, isn't a given. Putting out a line of books that's tailored to young people's interests and preferences is a more effective way of getting them interested than putting out normal adult-type books and just assuming or hoping that younger people will pick them up too. Even if a lot of normal Trek books are accessible to teen readers, the teens can't be assumed to know that. Marketing is about reaching out to an audience and creating interest. So it makes sense to provide ST fiction tailored to the habits and tastes of younger readers in order to hook their interest in ST as a whole. Then they can move on to the mainstream of Trek Lit.

 

Thanks, Therin. That's actually why I've waited for the NF books to come out in paperback, to give that extra time to "heal". I'll be giving Treason a shot, then, after I get through a few of my books on my never-ending pile.

 

I really liked "Myst."

"Brought back the red and blue pages, heard some more invective from Sirrus and Achenar. Jeeze, talk about brotherly love. Keep these guys away from Philadelphia."

And, of course, "Oh, God, I'm starting to write like these guys talk."

 

SEE? Dude was funny!

I'm rather delighted I'm not the only one who thought so.

 

I dunno, I don't recall finding reading the "adult" ST novels as a kid challenging, and I'm hardly a rocket scientist. I've looked over a couple in the used rack, and they seem a little dumbed-down. *shrug*

 

It's not about the actual challenge, it's about perception and interest. Kids aren't going to read Trek Lit if they don't know it would be interesting to them. But if they're already reading YA fiction, then offering YA Trek fiction is a way of catching the attention of teens who wouldn't otherwise be interested in reading normal Trek MMPBs.

It's all about niche marketing. Not everyone automatically likes every format. There are people who like reading MMPBs and trades, but there are also people who only read YA digest-format books, or who only read comics, or who only read manga-style comics, or who only play MMORPGs. It's just good marketing to broaden the diversity of ST tie-ins to encompass multiple different formats.

 

I was thinking more the Blish novels. But I read the TMP novelization at a fairly tender age, and I don't recall being permanently damaged by Sulu's penis.

 

Seems like Pocket Books has renamed the New Frontier book to Blind Man's Bluff.

They also have the Academy books listed as both paperback and hardcover now.

 

I prefer Resolutions. BMB sounds dumb, even for an NF book.

 

Yeah, I'm with BrotherBenny on the title issue. I wonder if we'll ever find out why it changed.

 

Titles probably change more often than you might think. A working title on an outline can get changed for any of a number of reasons, not the least of which is a new title the author liked better than what he/she had when submitting the proposal.

 

But Resolutions is such a generic title. It's already been the title of a VGR episode. Blind Man's Bluff is a much more interesting title. It's the name of a game with centuries of history (Henry the Eighth's courtiers reportedly played it). It's the name of a poker variant in which the player sees all the cards except one's own. It's the name of paintings by Goya and Fragonard. It's the name of a 1998 nonfiction book about submarine espionage.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_man's_bluff

 

I just thought that by the time it was listed on a site like S&S the title would have been finalized, unless something came up.

Hmm, I'd heard the term before but I didn't actually know what it meant. Knowing that now, I can see where that could be saying alot more about the story than Resolutions. I just thought that Resolutions sounded better, that's all.

 

And that may very well be the reason it was changed. I'd forgotten about the VGR episode title, but it wouldn't be the first time a decision was made to change a book title because one of the shows already used it.