I think his point was that it, and many other recent books, were not connected to Destiny, so it's a mistake to assume that Destiny and its aftermath define the entirety of Trek literature.
The Khitomer Alliance?
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I think his point was that it, and many other recent books, were not connected to Destiny, so it's a mistake to assume that Destiny and its aftermath define the entirety of Trek literature.
kkozoriz1
Fleet Captain
I'll agree with you on that point. However, the main 24th century line is a dark, dark place. The DS9-R-R (relaunch-relaunch) does not look like an optimistic series, if the relaunch ever happens.
With Bashier turning to the dark side and Sisko deciding that abandoning his family is a better thing than fighting for them, I have no interest in it.
Not always. I wouldn't say the books I've written in the post-Destiny timeframe are particularly dark. Over a Torrent Sea was consciously written to be a more peaceful, upbeat tale to lighten the mood after Destiny; I made a point of keeping any kind of combat or violence to a minimum and focusing on exploration and discovery -- to tell a story about life instead of death. And I tried for a light tone in my upcoming Watching the Clock as well, since after all it stars Lucsly and Dulmur, two characters who were introduced in a comedy episode of DS9.
I'd also say that A Singular Destiny and Losing the Peace are fairly optimistic novels; of course they're dealing with the aftermath of darkness, but they're about recovering from it, not being trapped in it. Same with Full Circle/Unworthy -- the characters go through a very dark period, but the core of the story is about how they recover from it, and that's ultimately a very hopeful and optimistic narrative. For that matter, Titan: Synthesis doesn't strike me as any darker than any typical Trek novel. Nor, really, does Seize the Fire. Sure, it's about planets and civilizations being in danger, but so are many Trek stories.
So I really don't see this all-encompassing darkness you allege. I see a return to the normal balance of light and dark that's always been part of Trek storytelling. Yes, the Typhon Pact books are dealing with a Cold War dynamic, but so were the Klingon and Romulan episodes of TOS and the Romulan and Cardassian episodes of TNG. It's nothing new for the franchise.
kkozoriz1
Fleet Captain
It's easy to do a story about returning to the light when the characters have been so dark. It's like you're in a cave and someone strikes a match. It's gotten lighter but you're going to have to get out of the cave or you'll run out of matches. A story about a mass murderer where he kills five people rather than six, as in his previous story, doesn't necessarily mean he's getting over killing.
I don't think the analogy in your final sentence has any relevance here. As for the rest, yes, of course, in the wake of Destiny it's going to take time to recover, and it would be bad writing to have everything magically better and all the darkness forgotten. But that doesn't mean things aren't heading in a more positive direction.
kkozoriz1
Fleet Captain
Just because something is a little less dark doesn't men it's optimistic. Does that express it more clearly?
Getting better as in Bashier abandoning "do no harm" and killing unarmed civilians and shooting an unconscious man in the head "just to be sure"? Or in Sisko leaving his wife and daughter that he promised he would return to, a point that was so important that Avery Brooks convinced the writers to change the ending of What You Leave Behind? Or the President accepting the assassination of her predecessor and giving Ross what amounts to a slap on the wrist? Better that way you mean?
ProtoAvatar
Fleet Captain
Sci, 'people who live in glass houses should not throw stones'.
Your house is not even made of glass, but of playing cards.
Your disaster fetish is not even shared by 'a couple of guys' on this board.
And since when should star trek books conform to your - singular - taste?
As for your affirmation that Destiny's aftermath's books are not dark - you must have some really really high criteria for 'dark' - and again, you're alone in having them.
Several points occur to me in reading along with this discussion.
First of all, the appeal to authority is a logical fallacy. So when Sci claims that only a few readers agree with ProtoAvatar about the tonal darkness of recent Trek literature, and by implication that most disagree, the argument carries no weight. And when ProtoAvatar avows that Sci is alone in characterizing the post-Destiny novels as not dark, and by implication that everybody else disagrees with that, it is likewise unconvincing.
Second, and with apologies to Spock, we can move beyond logic here. Sci feels some books aren't dark, while ProtoAvatar feels those same books are dark. Sure, both can argue the merits of their assertions, but what difference does it make? When it comes down to it, this issue isn't really about whether or not the recent spate of Trek novels has been dark; it's about what Sci and ProtoAvatar (and the rest of us) like. Sci and ProtoAvatar like what they like, and even if one could be persuaded to agree with the other about the darkness or lightness of the tales, no amount of convincing is going to change their feelings about what they've read. One liked this book, one didn't; one liked that book, one didn't. You're both right. Your enjoyment of the Trek literary line is a subjective matter, so how could it be otherwise?
For what it's worth--which should be pretty close to nothing--I actually see both points of view.
First of all, the appeal to authority is a logical fallacy. So when Sci claims that only a few readers agree with ProtoAvatar about the tonal darkness of recent Trek literature, and by implication that most disagree, the argument carries no weight. And when ProtoAvatar avows that Sci is alone in characterizing the post-Destiny novels as not dark, and by implication that everybody else disagrees with that, it is likewise unconvincing.
Second, and with apologies to Spock, we can move beyond logic here. Sci feels some books aren't dark, while ProtoAvatar feels those same books are dark. Sure, both can argue the merits of their assertions, but what difference does it make? When it comes down to it, this issue isn't really about whether or not the recent spate of Trek novels has been dark; it's about what Sci and ProtoAvatar (and the rest of us) like. Sci and ProtoAvatar like what they like, and even if one could be persuaded to agree with the other about the darkness or lightness of the tales, no amount of convincing is going to change their feelings about what they've read. One liked this book, one didn't; one liked that book, one didn't. You're both right. Your enjoyment of the Trek literary line is a subjective matter, so how could it be otherwise?
For what it's worth--which should be pretty close to nothing--I actually see both points of view.
ProtoAvatar
Fleet Captain
DO read ZSG.
Akaar, other admirals, the president's advisor said directly that there exists a state of cold war; that the only reason the Typhon Pact doesn't attack, but resorts to 'cloak and dagger' is because slipstream gives a semblance of equilibrium to the typhon pact/federation forces, despite the federation losses to the borg.
A well placed federation intelligence operative said that if the federation lost slipstream to the typhon pact, it will become a second rate power in as little as a year - no long-term 'exploration' involved ('exploration', Sci?).
At the end of the book, the president said directly that the situation is just like last centuries' situation with the klingons - a cold war with a good chance of becoming hot.
You know, government officials can be wrong.[...]Jack Pack
Not when it comes to recognising they're in a state of cold war.
Nor when it comes to assessing such an unbalanced military situation.
Jack Pack - in ZGS, their predictions proved accurate. In DS9, their predictions were overturned when Sisko (one person aka statistically unpredictable) managed to bring the romulans into the war much earlier than predicted.
That would be after the Americans/English and the Soviets divided Europe among themselves at Yalta. Stalin gained carte blanche to do what he wants with most of estern Europe - and he did what he wanted, now that he had the complicity by inaction of the west.
I argued that, on this board, my view has more support than Sci's. Which makes Sci's posturing unsupported to the point of being amusing.
Beyond the board - not I nor Sci know what is the dominant opinion.
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That's certainly true as it applies to any individual novel. No single reader should expect that every Trek novel will appeal equally to their personal tastes.
But where it becomes counterfactual is when a poster asserts that all Trek novels are identical in tone or style to a certain book or books they didn't like. That's just a false generalization. For well over a decade, the Trek publishing line has been characterized by its diversity and breadth.
Except for the fact that me, and a bunch of other people have all agreed with what sci is saying when this discussion has come up in the past. You've even been involved in those discussions, so you know for a fact that your last statement in 100% wrong.
ProtoAvatar
Fleet Captain
Really, JD?
You think 'Destiny' is not dark?
My last statement you quoted remains 100% correct.
My first statement - referring to Sci's self-righteous attitude, supported by little, also remains correct.
If anything, you only attacked my second quoted statement.
You think 'Destiny' is not dark?
My last statement you quoted remains 100% correct.
My first statement - referring to Sci's self-righteous attitude, supported by little, also remains correct.
If anything, you only attacked my second quoted statement.
And my point is that it doesn't matter whether your view has more support or not. It could be that everybody on this board but Sci agrees with you, and it would still not demonstrate the correctness of your opinion. For most of recorded history, most humans believed that the universe was centered about Earth; that didn't make them right.
Nor does it matter which is the dominant opinion.
More to my overall point, your enjoyment of the books is completely subjective. Sure, you can discuss why you liked or didn't like a particular book or line of books, but even if those reasons are faulty--and I'm not suggesting that they are--you would still have had the same experience in your reading. For you, the simple facts of you characterizing a number of the books as dark, and of you disliking dark stories within the Trek universe, means that the books didn't satisfy you. It's as simple as that, and nobody will be able to convince you either that you did enjoy the books, or that you should have. To me, it seems pointless to try.
I never said nor implied that my tastes were widely reflected anywhere. What I did say was that claiming that some people posting on this BBS equals "many readers" is unsupportable.
They shouldn't. That's why I listed numerous Trek novels that were not DEST follow-ups and which had a variety of tones. I just object to someone trying to say what a Star Trek book should or should not be or do. Star Trek is many, many things, and encompasses many styles and genres and formats. Once again, I never said or implied that my tastes should predominate.
A Singular Destiny has dark moments, but I don't think it's dark. It, like most KRAD novels, goes out of its way to create a hopeful, optimistic tone. Losing the Peace is darker (though not nearly as dark as Destiny, nor nearly as dark as real-life refugee situations), but also has a very inspirational ending. Over A Torrent Sea had dark moments but was mostly inspirational. Full Circle was dark at many points, though that mostly extended from Janeway's death in Before Dishonor rather than from Destiny. Synthesis did not strike me as particularly dark, nor the first half that I read of the Full Circle follow-up whose name I can't recall. Zero Sum Game is dark. I haven't read more than a few chapters of Seize the Fire and haven't yet seen a copy of Rough Beasts of Empire.
So, on the whole, I'd call the Destiny follow-ups mixed.
What I specifically said about the post-DEST novels, though, was that they are life-affirming. That's not the same thing as claiming that they're not dark, though I can see where I did not word it clearly enough for that to come through. Specifically, my point was that darkness is not the only thing there, and that even a relatively dark work can be deeply life-affirming and uplifting in its conclusion. I just saw, for instance, the Broadway musical Next to Normal -- it's a very dark, heartbreaking musical about a mother suffering from bipolar disorder, but it's also one of the most beautiful, hopeful musicals I've ever seen. So it has been with the Trek novels (excepting Zero Sum Game, which I agree was pretty much constructed as pure darkness).
Question for you.
Is Europe today a better place than it was in 1935?
^ I'm not following. 
^ I'm not following.
You will; I'll explain.
But first: Is Europe today a better place than it was in 1935?
^ I'm not following.
You will; I'll explain.
Please do.
If you're referring to the League of Nations, I hardly think that the Federation is quite so weak. If it was, how could it have survived this long?
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