www.ftlpublications.com/bwebook.pdf Boldly Writing: A Trekker Fan and 'Zine History 1967-87, by Joan Marie Verba I came across this a week ago, and have been reading through on my phone bit by bit since. It's an interesting chronological trip through the world of Star Trek fanzines. Reading the comments about Wrath of Khan from Interstat in 1982, one could be forgiven for thinking it's 2009 and they're talking about JJ Abrams' movie. Most like it, some hate it, some refuse to accept it as canon, some see it as incompatibe with other Treks... we fans haven't changed much!
This will be an invaluable guide in my fanzine hunting. I just scored 15 issues of Saurian Brandy Digest earlier today.
When I see a fanzine or story I like the sound of, I've been looking them up at fanlore.org. They tend to have a bit more information on each (including quotes from this book), scans of the artwork, and in a few cases, links to online versions of the stories themselves.
Yep. "Best of Trek" has some similar complaints about TMP, from TOS fans who saw it as totally incompatible with TOS and wanted it declared an alternate universe story.
I can see that, as TMP introduced the notion of the "New Humans" stuff that Decker was supposed to be into. Everything was just so clean, tidy, and perfect... not at all like the old, familiar "Wagon Train to the Stars" that people were used to. I once wrote to Interstat... didn't get any letters published, though. BTW, somebody's selling a pile of these Interstat 'zines on eBay for $$$.$$.
Well, that was really only covered by the novelization. The fan fic crowd seemed mainly to object to Kirk becoming an admiral, no one remembering or mentioning Nomad, Spock abandoning humanity, McCoy leaving the Enterprise, the new uniforms that looked like pyjamas, and Klingons turning into "Munchkins".
^Right. Not only did the "New Humans" stuff never get a mention in the actual movie, but it only looks weird in context of our modern knowledge of 24th-century Trek continuity. At the time TMP and the novelization came out, fans wouldn't have had any reason to decry the idea of a rising "New Human" movement as any kind of continuity problem, since they had no idea what the future of the Trek universe might be like beyond the timeframe of TMP.
Excellent book! I found it on the internet a few years ago and bought it off Joan's site. Having been a part of the "History", I can tell you it's very accurate. Brought back lots of great memories!
I very much enjoyed reading through. I was suprised to see a few pro names, like Peter David (and you, Paula!), started out writing for fanzines. Very cool.
Della Van Hise and Jean Lorrah were big names in the early fanzine days, too. And Greg Bear had a sketch in Bjo Trimble's "ST Concordance". Margaret Clark was active in fandom, too. Many years ago now, when I mentioned to a few Aussie ST fanfic writers/readers, with origins back to the very early days, that the old DC Comics' ST lines had just got a new editor named Margaret Clark, they gaped at me, "Not THE Margaret Clark?"
Margaret Clark was active in fandom, too. Many years ago now, when I mentioned to a few Aussie ST fanfic writers/readers, with origins back to the very early days, that the old DC Comics' ST lines had just got a new editor named Margaret Clark, they gaped at me, "Not THE Margaret Clark?"[/QUOTE] Apparently Margaret got around! I used to go to a lot of collating parties in Lansing Michigan for "Warped Space" (which I wrote extensively for early on). Years later, when I encountered Margaret via her positions at DC and later Pocket Books, she told me that she'd actually seen me at some of those parties, but never introduced herself.