Disgruntled Janeway fans: try a carrot

[Gorf]

Kirsten, I apologize for you taking a bullit in the process. Believe me when I say that nobody are directing blame at you.

You're just doing the best you can and working from the directions you've been given.

At least that is how I see it and I'm pretty confident Brit's words were NOT directed at you or meant to be taken as a quote made by you.

It's more a summation of the general sentiment here at TrekLit as we see it.

I wouldn't for a second even think to blame you for this. You didn't decide to move in this direction - somebody else did so don't feel even the least bit guilty for this or that we blame you.

I may decide not buy your book, but it will not be to punish you. It will simply be because I have no wish to read about Janeway's death unless I know you're bringing her back.

Janeway fans - or at least those I know of - actually hold you in great esteem because of Isabo's Shirt and were incredibly excited to hear that you were writing the new Voyager books.

However, TPTB at Pocket Books killed the enthusiasm when they decided to kill Janeway, but that does NOT mean that any of us blame you. Not in the least.

 

[Count Zero]

You've helped me prove that I'm stronger than I thought and that it really doesnt matter how much opposition I meet, how much I'm ridiculed, how many times I'm told I'm wrong, or what the hell you think of me...I just don't care.

What a wonderful feeling. Once I was afraid that people would judge me for what I liked and believed in. I'd say this have cured me. If I can face all of you, I can face anything.

So, having a minority opinion on a message board is the new passion of Christ, or what?

 

[William Leisner]

I'm talking about the Voyager books and you know it. I have zero interest in the rest of the Trek or Pocket line as you say.

Too many other good books to spend my money on.

GREAT!! That means you've taken yourself out of the pool of potential Voyager fiction customers, which means none of the writers or editors need to waste the smallest fraction of a second caring about your opinion!! Thank you!!

 

[Gorf]

So, having a minority opinion on a message board is the new passion of Christ, or what?

No, but learning to take all your crap is a great way to learn not to let people get to you.

 

[Gorf]

GREAT!! That means you've taken yourself out of the pool of potential Voyager fiction customers, which means none of the writers or editors need to waste the smallest fraction of a second caring about your opinion!! Thank you!!

You guys are really starting to crack me up.

You're wrong, but only partly as YOU don't need to worry the least bit about me being a potential customer of YOUR books, but if Pocket Books decided to publish a Voyager book without the cast being split out on a million other books and with Janeway alive and well and the strong woman she is (not the crap they've published in the Voyager line since the show ended, which I gave up on), then I'd definitely be a potential customer.

So far you've only talked about current customers. I'm not one of those, but I'm definitely a POTENTIAL customer IF Pocket Books decide to write something a bit outside their comfort zone and with Janeway and the Voyager cast alive and well and stronger than ever. I always have been.

As I said...I have zero intrest in OTHER Trek books, but I AM interested in Voyager books.

 

[Ktrek]

So far you've only talked about current customers. I'm not one of those, but I'm definitely a POTENTIAL customer IF Pocket Books decide to write something a bit outside their comfort zone and with Janeway and the Voyager cast alive and well and stronger than ever. I always have been.

As I said...I have zero intrest in OTHER Trek books, but I AM interested in Voyager books.

I think this is a weird remark because the "comfort zone" as you say would mean for Pocket Books to have kept the status quo and do with Voyager what they have always done. My argument would be that they have stepped out of the comfort zone and you just are not comfortable with change.

How many more posts till we reach a 1000 in this thread?

Kevin

 

[Gorf]

Whatever dear - I think your crack about suicide bombers were rather weird, not to mention uncalled for.

 

[DimesDan]

So far you've only talked about current customers. I'm not one of those, but I'm definitely a POTENTIAL customer IF Pocket Books decide to write something a bit outside their comfort zone and with Janeway and the Voyager cast alive and well and stronger than ever. I always have been.

As I said...I have zero intrest in OTHER Trek books, but I AM interested in Voyager books.

I think this is a weird remark because the "comfort zone" as you say would mean for Pocket Books to have kept the status quo and do with Voyager what they have always done. My argument would be that they have stepped out of the comfort zone and you just are not comfortable with change.

I was thinking the same thing, if these mythical powers that be did have a comfort zone, removing Janeway from the Literacy universe and allowing her to gallivant across the coffee filled cosmos with Lady Q and effectively killing her would be outside their comfort zone.

 

[William Leisner]

As I said...I have zero intrest in OTHER Trek books, but I AM interested in Voyager books.

That's funny... because in the post of yours I quoted, you were dissing Homecoming, which to the best of my recollection was a Voyager book, and featured a very-much-alive Kathryn Janeway. For that matter, it was also the book that established that Kate was such a fuckingly amazing strong woman that they had to immediately bump her up to Admiral as soon as she got back to Earth.

So, you weren't interested in Voyager books when KJ was alive, and you're not interested in Voyager books in which she's dead (of which a total of none have been released). So I hope you understand my skepticism now when you say making her undead is going to be the thing that turns you around.

 

[Ktrek]

Whatever dear - I think your crack about suicide bombers were rather weird, not to mention uncalled for.

Whatever! It was meant to be a little twisted humor. Sorry you didn't find it funny.

Kevin

 

[DimesDan]

As I said...I have zero intrest in OTHER Trek books, but I AM interested in Voyager books.

That's funny... because in the post of yours I quoted, you were dissing Homecoming, which to the best of my recollection was a Voyager book, and featured a very-much-alive Kathryn Janeway. For that matter, it was also the book that established that Kate was such a fuckingly amazing strong woman that they had to immediately bump her up to Admiral as soon as she got back to Earth.

So, you weren't interested in Voyager books when KJ was alive, and you're not interested in Voyager books in which she's dead (of which a total of none have been released). So I hope you understand my skepticism now when you say making her undead is going to be the thing that turns you around.

Can we have someone, say Scotty hit her over the head repeatedly with a cricket bat and will we be using the Zed word?

 

[Thrawn]

GREAT!! That means you've taken yourself out of the pool of potential Voyager fiction customers, which means none of the writers or editors need to waste the smallest fraction of a second caring about your opinion!! Thank you!!

You guys are really starting to crack me up.

You're wrong, but only partly as YOU don't need to worry the least bit about me being a potential customer of YOUR books, but if Pocket Books decided to publish a Voyager book without the cast being split out on a million other books and with Janeway alive and well and the strong woman she is (not the crap they've published in the Voyager line since the show ended, which I gave up on), then I'd definitely be a potential customer.

So far you've only talked about current customers. I'm not one of those, but I'm definitely a POTENTIAL customer IF Pocket Books decide to write something a bit outside their comfort zone and with Janeway and the Voyager cast alive and well and stronger than ever. I always have been.

As I said...I have zero intrest in OTHER Trek books, but I AM interested in Voyager books.

Any decision they make pisses off somebody, Gorf. Any decision pisses off somebody. Any decision takes potential customers and turns them away. Any decision.

In this case, the main character death allowed in the Trek universe is one of the most compelling reasons I have to continue reading the stories. I didn't purchase the books when they all stood alone and had happy endings; I wasn't interested. I was a "potential customer" then, willing to buy if they wrote the right things, and eventually they did. That choice turned me into an actual customer, and you into a "potential" one. Anything they did to make you happy would turn someone else away.

Period. You. CAN. NOT. ARGUE. THIS.

It makes 'writing the books that the fans want to read' a self-defeating proposition. It cannot be done. I mean, sure, there are relative numbers; that is, it's certainly possible that more people would've bought this book with Janeway reproducing with Chakotay as if they were bunnies as opposed to flying off with a Q. But there's absolutely no way to tell until after the fact. And the fact...hasn't happened yet. (Though the only evidence I can find, Amazon sales rankings, seem to indicate Full Circle is selling brilliantly already. Which is admittedly flimsy, and there are many counterarguments, so I take it with a grain of salt. I'm just saying, there NO evidence so far that this has hurt sales. And it certainly seems that Before Dishonor did just fine.) But generally, the only way to tell if "the fans" approve of something is to do it, and wait and see what happens. And again, a few people complaining on a messageboard doesn't exactly count as any kind of trend; if they try to look at fan response at all, it would be through sales numbers or possibly large-scale conventions and stuff. But I'd guess not even then.

Mostly, the best way to ensure that any kind of creative process produces devoted fans is to make it the very best you can make it, believe passionately in the story you tell (or painting you paint, or whatever) and hope for the best. And I don't see any evidence that this choice was made out of any ulterior motives; everyone involved seems to genuinely think that this was the best story they could tell.

And since any story will have some people pissed off, so they can't win that way, what more can you ask for other than that they do the very best they can? If you disagree, please, feel free to talk about it, explain why, and no one is saying you should buy anything you don't want to buy. But aside from "I don't like this story", I don't think there's anything else you can realistically bitch about.

 

[joyofvgr]

In this case, the main character death allowed in the Trek universe is one of the most compelling reasons I have to continue reading the stories. I didn't purchase the books when they all stood alone and had happy endings; I wasn't interested. I was a "potential customer" then, willing to buy if they wrote the right things, and eventually they did. That choice turned me into an actual customer, and you into a "potential" one. Anything they did to make you happy would turn someone else away.

Wow. I actually signed on this evening to tell you the exact same thing, Thrawn, and you've beaten me to it. I was going to say that obviously you are a fan of the Trek novels and have been reading them a lot longer and more extensively than I ever have. I have always been somewhat of a Star Trek fan, but never to the extent I am now. That's largely due to Voyager. Now just when I was getting ready and excited to buy my fifth Voyager Novel, the rug was pulled out from under me.

So I agree with you. What ended up making you more of a fan, has actually scared off the potential fan in me. At least for now. I'm still in the "wait and see" group.

 

[Thrawn]

Man, the review thread for Full Circle is going to be such a clusterfuck

 

[Trent Roman]

That's funny... because in the post of yours I quoted, you were dissing Homecoming, which to the best of my recollection was a Voyager book, and featured a very-much-alive Kathryn Janeway. For that matter, it was also the book that established that Kate was such a fuckingly amazing strong woman that they had to immediately bump her up to Admiral as soon as she got back to Earth.

Do you practice being blantantly disingenuous, or does it come naturally? Gorf has already stated why she didn't like Homecoming: she thought it was a shite book. Which it was. As were it's immediate follow-ups. Tell me, is there something extraordinarily complicated about the desire to have quality books with living characters that, absent a genuine response, you call only fall back on mockery and derision?

Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman

 

[William Leisner]

^ I apologize for using insult and derision, which you have such disdain for.

Now here, pay attention: Gorf said s/he wasn't interested in any Pocket Voyager books, because s/he only got halfway through Homecoming.

In other words, even if Before Dishonor never happened, s/he would not have had the intention of buying Full Circle. That decision was made before Janeway's death. And regardless of the quality of Kirsten's book (or, apparently, the quality of Golden's three other books, which s/he never bothered forming a first-hand opinion of). What's disingenous here is all the whining and pouting and foot-stomping by "fans" demanding a role in the editorial process when they're never going to buy the books, no matter what.

 

[Brit]

^ I apologize for using insult and derision, which you have such disdain for.

Now here, pay attention: Gorf said s/he wasn't interested in any Pocket Voyager books, because s/he only got halfway through Homecoming.

In other words, even if Before Dishonor never happened, s/he would not have had the intention of buying Full Circle. That decision was made before Janeway's death. And regardless of the quality of Kirsten's book (or, apparently, the quality of Golden's three other books, which s/he never bothered forming a first-hand opinion of). What's disingenous here is all the whining and pouting and foot-stomping by "fans" demanding a role in the editorial process when they're never going to buy the books, no matter what.

That isn't true, there were (and I repeat were) many fans looking forward to Kirsten Beyer's Voyager Books. There would have been plenty of recommendations given to Gorf. These are the fans that will not be buying the book now, and they will not be giving recommendations. These are the fans that have stopped their Amazon subscriptions of Trek Books. We should not have to buy the stuff we don't want to read in order to have an opinion. Finally just because we have made the decision to stop buying books doesn't mean we will not change our minds if and when Trek books are written that take our wants into consideration.

Brit

 

[Thrawn]

Clarify - were you buying all Trek books, simply getting notified about all Trek books, or buying all Voyager books, or something else that "amazon subscription" would mean that I'm unaware of?

 

[Trent Roman]

What's disingenous here is all the whining and pouting and foot-stomping by "fans" demanding a role in the editorial process when they're never going to buy the books, no matter what.

Fans haven't got any say in the editorial process whether they buy no books or every book ever produced. I don't think it is disingenous, however, for a person disinvolved with the line generally to state why they are unattracted to the line, and yes, the reasons for such can change even as the overall status as a patron does not. In this case, a reader tried a book, found the quality lacking, and did not patronize the line for that reason. At this point in time, a change in the level of quality seems to be in the offing, but it coincides with a editorial direction that said reader finds offputting in the extreme, and thus will continue not patronizing the line. Different reasons, same situation.

Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman

 

[Lynx]

Then have some faith in the stories, and the authors. And if you've never had faith, don't expect it to suddenly change.

Right...I'll have faith in the crappy stories they've published in the Voyager line since the show ended? Nah. They split up my crew and killed my captain. Don't think so.

Then you'd do better writing pen-and-paper complaints to Simon & Schuster, and organising a campaign that Pocket might notice. Not just bitchin' on a bbs.

Who says I didn't already do just that?

And Ktrek - that's below the belt and way beneath all of you.

But I should thank you all.

You've helped me prove that I'm stronger than I thought and that it really doesnt matter how much opposition I meet, how much I'm ridiculed, how many times I'm told I'm wrong, or what the hell you think of me...I just don't care.

What a wonderful feeling. Once I was afraid that people would judge me for what I liked and believed in. I'd say this have cured me. If I can face all of you, I can face anything.

Not to mention that there are a lot of people who support you too when it comes to the "Janeway issue".

So far you've only talked about current customers. I'm not one of those, but I'm definitely a POTENTIAL customer IF Pocket Books decide to write something a bit outside their comfort zone and with Janeway and the Voyager cast alive and well and stronger than ever. I always have been.

Me too!