I've never been a big fan of time-travel (except for BttF and Bill & Ted), but this sounds really cool. Can't wait to see/read it.
Announcing STAR TREK: DTI and other CLB news
- Thread starter Christopher
- Start date
Congrats, Christopher. Sounds like a fun project.
Of course, now question for the next one will be, DTI: Miami or DTI: New York?
Cue Roger Daltry...
Of course, now question for the next one will be, DTI: Miami or DTI: New York?
Cue Roger Daltry...
Someone needs to work up a YouTube video...
DULMERDTI: Bajor?
It looks like someone is trying to prevent Sisko from finding the Bajoran Wormhole.
LUXLEY
You're right. The Bajoran Prophets. . .
*puts on sunglasses*
LUXLEY (CONT'D)
. . . Are running out of time.
*YYYYYEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH*
Really looking forward to this. Not only do I have a fondness for the "standalone" Trek novels such as Articles of the Federation and A Singular Destiny, but I've enjoyed everything I've read of Christopher's thus far. I particularly like the way he approaches science in his Trek work, utilizing "real" science alongside Trek science. I'll be very interested to see how this approach works with time travel.
DULMERDTI: Bajor?
It looks like someone is trying to prevent Sisko from finding the Bajoran Wormhole.
LUXLEY
You're right. The Bajoran Prophets. . .
*puts on sunglasses*
LUXLEY (CONT'D)
. . . Are running out of time.
*YYYYYEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH*
I was waiting for that.
I daresay it's probably going to be my biggest challenge when it comes to reconciling Trek with plausible science. But I've been mulling over the problem for years, so this is my chance to consolidate all that mulling and get it into print. And now that I'm applying myself to it seriously for this book, I'm coming up with even more ideas.
And I know what Lucsly & Dulmur's first names are going to be, but I'm not telling. And I'm getting a handle on their characters too. Next I need to work on developing the rest of the DTI staff.
I always got the impression the various Trekkers themselves didn't really understand time-travel and how everything works ("for all you know, we could be in an alternate timeline right now" etc.)
That said, Spock Prime didn't try to undo the damage done by Nero in STXI, so maybe he knew something (or rather, something was discovered/learned/confirmed prior to 2387) that Janeway and Kirk Prime didn't know.
What's the (relative) present in this book? 2282? 2287?
"A mad Romulan has flown his Space Octopus into a black hole! They've fallen into the past! Whaddowedo??"
"Err...get lunch? It's almost 12:30. If we're still here afterwards we'll deal with it then."
That said, Spock Prime didn't try to undo the damage done by Nero in STXI, so maybe he knew something (or rather, something was discovered/learned/confirmed prior to 2387) that Janeway and Kirk Prime didn't know.
What's the (relative) present in this book? 2282? 2287?
"A mad Romulan has flown his Space Octopus into a black hole! They've fallen into the past! Whaddowedo??"
"Err...get lunch? It's almost 12:30. If we're still here afterwards we'll deal with it then."
That sounds wonderful. I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to hearing what you've come up with.
Tease!
Yeah, time travel does have a way of happening to amateurs. Which is bound to be frustrating as hell to the people who actually make a career out of it.
Uhh, somewhere around a century after that. You wrote "22" when you meant "23." Beyond that, it's too early to say what the precise range of dates will be.
This is great news, and I'm looking forward to this.
Christopher, can you say at this stage whether you'll be retconning Trek time travel to fit the JJTrek model, or will you include that as part of a larger picture. That is, some timetravel creates an alternate timeline (a la JJTrek), and some timetravel does involve travelling back within a character's own timeline then returning to same (a la Trials and Tribbleations, Yesterday's Enterprise, First Contact, et al).
Understand if you can't answer that yet, so no worries if you can't comment.
Christopher, can you say at this stage whether you'll be retconning Trek time travel to fit the JJTrek model, or will you include that as part of a larger picture. That is, some timetravel creates an alternate timeline (a la JJTrek), and some timetravel does involve travelling back within a character's own timeline then returning to same (a la Trials and Tribbleations, Yesterday's Enterprise, First Contact, et al).
Understand if you can't answer that yet, so no worries if you can't comment.
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^Whoops. I officially forgive whomever was responible for the Eugenics Wars DS9 dating blunder.
I don't suppose you'll come up with some grand unifying theme for every stardate system ever? I was thinking about that the other day, and figured that the dating system in STXI might be the equivelent of FASA's "reference stardates", and that the Jellyfish may have been launched on (Earth) stardate 2387-point-something, Federation stardate 68somethingsomethingsomething-point-something. But that's probably for another thread.
I don't suppose you'll come up with some grand unifying theme for every stardate system ever? I was thinking about that the other day, and figured that the dating system in STXI might be the equivelent of FASA's "reference stardates", and that the Jellyfish may have been launched on (Earth) stardate 2387-point-something, Federation stardate 68somethingsomethingsomething-point-something. But that's probably for another thread.
I think that was already implicit even before the movie. After all, we've already seen that some time travels don't change the timeline ("Assignment: Earth," The Voyage Home) while others do. And we know from the Mirror Universe and "Parallels" that timelines can coexist without one eradicating the others. So clearly there's no singular way in which it happens. Sometimes the branches of a river diverge into separate rivers, sometimes they merge back together, sometimes the river doesn't branch at all. There doesn't have to be only one way it manifests, and ST was showing multiple results of time travel going all the way back to the original series.
Anyway, the model used in the new film is grounded in real quantum theory and is much more scientifically plausible and logically self-consistent than the "overwriting" model. It's basically the same model of time travel I already accepted before the movie was ever made. So that's going to be my starting point anyway. The trick is figuring out how the "overwriting" kind of time travel can be justified within that model. And I do have an answer for that, and it will be established in the book (hopefully in an integral fashion that doesn't feel like a continuity lecture).
I don't think that's even possible.
Cool, sounds like it'll be an interesting read. Thanks for the quick response.
This sounds fantastic! I cannot wait for this book as I love Time Travel stories (even the standard run-of-the-mill ones) and since this isn't a 'standard' time-travel story that should make it that much better. My only concern with it was allayed with this quote:
Since you've got that at the forefront of your mind I'm confident it won't come across as a Temporal Mechanics text book.
Since you've got that at the forefront of your mind I'm confident it won't come across as a Temporal Mechanics text book.
I *dare* Christopher to do that. Especially if he actually works the theme music in.
Since you've got that at the forefront of your mind I'm confident it won't come across as a Temporal Mechanics text book.
Well, given the subject matter and the characters involved, I think a certain amount of exposition-heavy scenes will be unavoidable, though hopefully I can make them entertaining. What I meant is that I want the exposition to make sense in-universe, to feel like the characters discussing things that are relevant specifically to them, rather than feeling like the writer is just using the characters as mouthpieces to answer readers' questions about how different depictions of Trek time travel can be reconciled.
To ToddCam: Lucsly & Dulmur are a team, man. You can't ask me to break them up. However, this book isn't just about them. It's about the whole agency. There will be multiple characters of various sexes and species, and there will be multiple plotlines focusing on the various DTI members and their various responsibilities.
And to Mr. Laser Beam: I'm not a fan of David Caruso, so don't expect any CSI: Miami nods. If anything, I think Lucsly's more like Gil Grissom than Horatio Caine.
