2026 Novel Releases

[The Wormhole]

We've got news on novels for 2026! Kicking off the year, a Picard tie-in To Defy Fate by Dayton Ward currently scheduled for a February 17 release. No blurb or plot details available yet.

Also, for any interested in such things, a paperback reprint of SNW Toward the Night is scheduled for April 14.

 

[ryan123450]

Nice. I was afraid the Picard tie ins would be over. Hopefully it’s more related to S3 that 1 or 2.

 

[Markonian]

We've got news on novels for 2026! Kicking off the year, a Picard tie-in To Defy Fate by Dayton Ward currently scheduled for a February 17 release. No blurb or plot details available yet.

Forty-one CAN dollars for a book‽ Daaaarn that’s steep.
Also, I’m surprised they release a novel for a show that’s ended. Who’s the audience for this?

 

[DGCatAniSiri]

Forty-one CAN dollars for a book‽ Daaaarn that’s steep.
Also, I’m surprised they release a novel for a show that’s ended. Who’s the audience for this?

The price is probably gonna come down - I've seen several items go up on Amazon at inflated prices, then drop by the time release day comes around.

And "the audience" is Trek fans - Picard only ended a couple of years ago, even acknowledging the turnover rate of production and how a lot of streaming platforms are all about taking things in a fast food style, that doesn't remove the interest in more Trek books. I mean, we have, within the last few years, had TNG and DS9 novels released, and those shows ended more than twenty years ago, saying nothing of the amount of TOS novels that always have an audience. And even going further back, it was... 2008-ish, I think, that the tie-in novels for Buffy, a show that ended in 2003, stopped. There being a few post-series tie-ins is far from unusual.

Plus there's still calls for a Seven and the Enterprise-G centered spinoff, a show based on characters who were introduced on Picard. Depending on who and what this novel ends up focusing on, approving another Picard novel could be part of how Paramount is testing the waters for how profitable something like that could be.

 

[Avro Arrow]

Also, I’m surprised they release a novel for a show that’s ended. Who’s the audience for this?

Really, if you’ve read a TOS novel after 1969, a TNG novel after 1994, a DS9 novel after 1999, a VOY novel after 2001, or an ENT novel after 2005, then this seems like a bit of an odd question.

Forty-one CAN dollars for a book‽ Daaaarn that’s steep.

Toward the Night was $39, and they seem to go up by a couple of dollars every year recently, so this seems right in line, unfortunately.

Hopefully it’s more related to S3 that 1 or 2.

I think personally I’d rather have something that focuses on the Picard characters, rather than more stuff with the TNG characters. (I am counting Seven as a Picard character, though.)

 

[Christopher]

Plus there's still calls for a Seven and the Enterprise-G centered spinoff, a show based on characters who were introduced on Picard. Depending on who and what this novel ends up focusing on, approving another Picard novel could be part of how Paramount is testing the waters for how profitable something like that could be.

That seems unlikely, given that the size of the book audience is within the margin of statistical error for the TV audience. Also, I don't think the people who approve novel manuscripts are in the same department as the people who commission new series.

 

[ryan123450]

I think personally I’d rather have something that focuses on the Picard characters, rather than more stuff with the TNG characters. (I am counting Seven as a Picard character, though.)

A Captain Shaw adventure!

 

[Starbreaker]

I haven't read a Trek book in about 5 years but I would read a Picard book right about now.

 

[Turtletrekker]

I think personally I’d rather have something that focuses on the Picard characters, rather than more stuff with the TNG characters. (I am counting Seven as a Picard character, though.)

Agreed 100%. I want more Elenor and Soji. The only thing I would want to see spin out of season 3 would be Data and Soji meeting.

 

[Greg Cox]

Really, if you’ve read a TOS novel after 1969, a TNG novel after 1994, a DS9 novel after 1999, a VOY novel after 2001, or an ENT novel after 2005, then this seems like a bit of an odd question.

You beat me to the punch. If any fandom has a history for supporting tie-in books long after the TV series are cancelled, it's STAR TREK.

Says the guy who is still writing TOS novels . . . .

 

[JonnyQuest037]

Really, if you’ve read a TOS novel after 1969, a TNG novel after 1994, a DS9 novel after 1999, a VOY novel after 2001, or an ENT novel after 2005, then this seems like a bit of an odd question.

Every TOS novel I've read has been after 1969.

I attribute this largely to me not being born until several years after.

 

[Greg Cox]

There being a few post-series tie-ins is far from unusual.

Heck, they're still publishing Murder She Wrote novels on a regular basis. More than sixty books to date, with the most recent one published in December 2025.

And that show was cancelled nearly thirty years ago.

 

[JD]

Forty-one CAN dollars for a book‽ Daaaarn that’s steep.
Also, I’m surprised they release a novel for a show that’s ended. Who’s the audience for this?

And even going further back, it was... 2008-ish, I think, that the tie-in novels for Buffy, a show that ended in 2003, stopped. There being a few post-series tie-ins is far from unusual.

There are actually still Buffy books coming out, since 2022 there's been a Spike novel, an alternate universe novel focused on some of the bad guys, a trilogy about Willow's witch/Slayer daughter.

 

[Markonian]

And "the audience" is Trek fans - Picard only ended a couple of years ago, even acknowledging the turnover rate of production and how a lot of streaming platforms are all about taking things in a fast food style, that doesn't remove the interest in more Trek books. I mean, we have, within the last few years, had TNG and DS9 novels released, and those shows ended more than twenty years ago, saying nothing of the amount of TOS novels that always have an audience. And even going further back, it was...

Fair enough.
But this isn't a novel for a beloved 20th century Trek show, this is a book about one of those mayfly streaming shows that lasted, what, 3 seasons of 10 eps each?

 

[Christopher]

Fair enough.
But this isn't a novel for a beloved 20th century Trek show, this is a book about one of those mayfly streaming shows that lasted, what, 3 seasons of 10 eps each?

They're all Star Trek. A lot of people are into the whole franchise, not just a single part of it. And Picard in particular has obvious appeal to fans of TNG, the second-most popular Trek series overall, as well as to fans of Voyager and Seven of Nine.

 

[Tuskin38]

Fair enough.
But this isn't a novel for a beloved 20th century Trek show, this is a book about one of those mayfly streaming shows that lasted, what, 3 seasons of 10 eps each?

and that matters why?

 

[David cgc]

PIC is also the show that has the most other series feeding back into it, so the books have a pretty diverse subject matter that's belied by the series title. They've generally been more "Star Trek Universe" books than very specific to the PIC storyline. We had a TNG continuation (finally) tying into ST09 (monkey's paw finger curls), a stealth TTN novel, a more-or-less standalone civilian adventure book, a more-or-less novel-only-starship adventure that could've easily have been a DS9 Relaunch title, and most recently, a VGR sequel that was tied in tightly with Prodigy.

DSC started off similarly, with a Cage novel, a TOS prequel, and (eventually) a stealth SNW novel, though the most recent one actually took place during the run of the show, featuring the main characters, in the kind of setting and situation they might encounter within a regular-degular episode, and it was even in the same universe the show takes place it (no shade on Dead Endless, I loved the glimpse at the low-key, episodic adventures of the alternate Discovery, plus it had an extremely useful metaphor that's become my key thought-technology for dealing with the philosophical implications of branching timelines and alternate universes).

My point is that the PIC line has generally been the substitute for the one-off and no-subtitle Trek novels we got as treats in the good old days, and I don't mind that.