Anything new on David Mack's new trilogy??

[Mr Silver]

If I can be hypothetical for a minute...

Say I wanted to write my own series of Trek novels that didn't follow the current continunity and started prior to the current timeframe, would that be acceptable?

 

[NSTrekfan]

There were a lot of coincidences in the set up of Destiny though:

- It just happened to be a human that we know about that is living with the Caelair
- Starfleet just happened to find the wreck of the Columbia
- Titan just happened to find the Caelair planet
- The Borg just happened to pick this time to make their big push against the Federation
etc, etc, etc.

Not a deus ex machina but a pretty unlikely sequence of events in very widely spaced locations.

 

[Idran]

If I can be hypothetical for a minute...

Say I wanted to write my own series of Trek novels that didn't follow the current continunity and started prior to the current timeframe, would that be acceptable?

I'm not a Trek writer myself, but I'm pretty sure those that are have said that that's more than acceptable. People write in the novel continuity because they choose to, and from what other writers here have said, Pocket Books rarely if ever assigns books or anything like that.

 

[Stevil2001]

I guess the force of coincidence that Vulcans are named after a Roman god of fire would demand the same sort of relationship then, right?

I like to think their name is actually something like V'lkaan and human listeners just Romanized it, like rendering Srbija as "Serbia."

You know you're going to have to use that in a book now, right? V'lkaan is too good not to.

It's been done already. I forget which, but there's some sourcebook that gives the "real" name of Vulcan as ti'Valka'ain.

 

[Sci]

I like to think their name is actually something like V'lkaan and human listeners just Romanized it, like rendering Srbija as "Serbia."

You know you're going to have to use that in a book now, right? V'lkaan is too good not to.

It's been done already. I forget which, but there's some sourcebook that gives the "real" name of Vulcan as ti'Valka'ain.

Aren't there supposed to be multiple Vulcan languages, though?

 

[CaptainDonovin]

Nothing's been announced. We're still in development. When I have something that I'm allowed to share, I will.

Until then, just chill, folks.

I live in Minnesota, will be chillin' real cold in a few months.

I actually forgot about the trilogy. Sweet, gives me something else to look forward to.

 

[TerraUnam]

There were a lot of coincidences in the set up of Destiny though:

- It just happened to be a human that we know about that is living with the Caelair
- Starfleet just happened to find the wreck of the Columbia
- Titan just happened to find the Caelair planet
- The Borg just happened to pick this time to make their big push against the Federation
etc, etc, etc.

Not a deus ex machina but a pretty unlikely sequence of events in very widely spaced locations.

Trek is always like that, all fiction is like that. But Titan found New Erigol because the otherwise normal star had "blacked out" without a trace of a supernova. Logical enough, and covering a star does broadcast your location to the entire galaxy if you think about it.

Finding Columbia was just another "Look what I found" start that every Trek show used to start most episodes.

The rest is a result of the fact that Trek Lit writers are contract-bound to follow what is established on TV and the movies. (The ENT novels had permission to depart a little on this but the permission had to be sought.) David Mack has elevated the weaving the disparate and often contradictory TV elements into a singular, unified whole when writing Trek novels. He has managed to turn a weakness into a strength.

In fact the Voyager episode "Unity" was a big inspiration on how the whole idea of the Gestalt/Collective actually worked. It's clear David Mack took the ideas from this episode an fleshed them out.

 

[NSTrekfan]

No question Mr Mack did a great job weaving things together. I just felt that it all seemed a little too coincidental. I think it would have worked better if there had been some of the story set-up done in earlier books. As it was it made everything seem to happen all at once. Titan and Aventine being well away from the Enterprise which was back in the Federation and yet all three were dealing with the same threat at the same time. Different aspects but all related. Not a big problem but it did make it seem somewhat forced to me.

 

[Christopher]

Say I wanted to write my own series of Trek novels that didn't follow the current continunity and started prior to the current timeframe, would that be acceptable?

In theory, yes. The internovel continuity is a choice, not a mandate. There have been novels that were separate from the novel continuity in recent years, such as the Crucible trilogy, the Shatnerverse novels, and The Children of Kings. Indeed, lately the New Frontier series seems to be disregarding the main novel continuity, although the main continuity often acknowledges NF.

Of course, you'd have to convince the editor that your series was worth doing and hope the editor could convince the sales department that it was profitable. Most likely you'd have to lead off with just one novel and see if it sold well enough to warrant more. Planning a whole series is getting ahead of yourself.

 

[Stevil2001]

You know you're going to have to use that in a book now, right? V'lkaan is too good not to.

It's been done already. I forget which, but there's some sourcebook that gives the "real" name of Vulcan as ti'Valka'ain.

Aren't there supposed to be multiple Vulcan languages, though?

Well, yeah. (We used at least four different names for Vulcan in The Tears of Eridanus.) I'm not saying that V'lkaan would contradict ti'Valka'ain, I'm saying both names do the same thing: present names with extra apostrophes in them that could feasibly be Anglicized as "Vulcan."

 

[captcalhoun]

V'l'can

V'l'c'n

V'l C'n

Vul C'n

 

[Stevil2001]

V'l'c'n

Also known as the Peter David Strategy of Presenting Improbably Earthlike Names.

 

[captcalhoun]

wouldn't that be F'l cun?

 

[F. King Daniel]

Predicition: Picard steps down.

 

[ryan123450]

It would be more interesting if he (or someone) died.

 

[Sci]

It would be more interesting if he (or someone) died.

Well, it'll be a wash, then. David Mack never kills anyone.

 

[ryan123450]

Lol. I meant Picard, Worf, Crusher, or LaForge.

 

[Bob Karo]

I think the better question is:

Just how many fictional coffins do we need to stockpile?