Forged in Fire....with some *spoilers*...

[Joel_Kirk]

Rosalind-

I'm with you. I think it'll be easier for me to think of the DS9 books simply as 'the-books-that-take-place-after-the-series'....

 

[Christopher]

Why would they want to include Worlds as part of Season 8? Unity leaves it off perfectly!

But the ending of WoDS9 functions just as well as a point of resolution/transition. It's a cliffhanger, like most DS9 season finales. It also marks the end of the calendar year, making it a closer correspondence to a "season finale" in that sense.

Since the books were very much not designed to follow the structure of television seasons, any attempt to impose a "season" structure on them is going to be arbitrary, forced, and based on a number of ad hoc assumptions. At best it's a rough, flawed analogy. So it shouldn't be surprising that there's more than one interpretation of how to approach it.

 

[David Brennon]

I think the post-series ones are easy to think of in terms of seasons, though strictly speaking the novels contain a whole lot more info than a single one hour episode. The story arcs they follow and the resolutions they come to flow fairly well if you look at them like that. That's not to say that they should be, but my mind automatically went there, I guess because they are books based off a series.

 

[RonG]

Why would they want to include Worlds as part of Season 8? Unity leaves it off perfectly!

But the ending of WoDS9 functions just as well as a point of resolution/transition. It's a cliffhanger, like most DS9 season finales. It also marks the end of the calendar year, making it a closer correspondence to a "season finale" in that sense.

Since the books were very much not designed to follow the structure of television seasons, any attempt to impose a "season" structure on them is going to be arbitrary, forced, and based on a number of ad hoc assumptions. At best it's a rough, flawed analogy. So it shouldn't be surprising that there's more than one interpretation of how to approach it.

I tend to think of the DS9-R novels more in terms of "mega-arcs" (though IMO these arcs work pretty well as "seasons").

By that reasoning, the novels from Avatar to Unity (as well as A Stitch in Time and The Lives of Dax) make up the first mega-arc, while the novels from Worlds of DS9 to Soul Key (along with Never-Ending Sacrifice) make up the second.

Hopefully we'll get to see the resolution of the third arc sometime before 2020

 

[JD]

That's pretty much how I feel too.

 

[Hoshi_Mayweather]

^Honestly, the post-Unity stories didn't have the same punch as the season 8 stories. Possibly due to the, like, 5 years that season 9 took to come out. Seemed like season 9 was lots of setup, not much payoff.

Alright, I'm kinda out of the loop.

Season 8 are the novels up to Unity, right? Season 9 are the novels/stories afterward?

Aside from like 100 pages in the middle where Sulu's entire role in the story is to over and over and over again think about how he wishes he could do something but can't (I swear there was that exact scene, Sulu wanting to run off and be useful, at least 6 consecutive times) ...

I'm reading it now, and it's this part that's taking the longest. Every time I read another scene where Sulu "wants to do something but can't" I lose a little bit more steam. I loved Martin & Mangels Lost Era Sulu book, so i'll just push through, but it is kind of slow...

^^
I've noticed that each author has his or her style that may or may not work for some people.

@Hoshi_Mayweather-

I would like to hear how your boyfriend did with the scholarship! (I saw the questions and the entries, and you really have to know what you're talking about; and you have to say with a strong essay.

I waited too long since I was going back and forth on the book, and the cliff notes...

Next year...next year...)

We haven't heard anything yet...but good luck with you.

 

[Broccoli]

Why would they want to include Worlds as part of Season 8? Unity leaves it off perfectly!

But the ending of WoDS9 functions just as well as a point of resolution/transition. It's a cliffhanger, like most DS9 season finales. It also marks the end of the calendar year, making it a closer correspondence to a "season finale" in that sense.

Since the books were very much not designed to follow the structure of television seasons, any attempt to impose a "season" structure on them is going to be arbitrary, forced, and based on a number of ad hoc assumptions. At best it's a rough, flawed analogy. So it shouldn't be surprising that there's more than one interpretation of how to approach it.

It is also, you know, fun for some people to look at it like that as well.

 

[Christopher]

^It might be fun for some people to imagine Kira Nerys as a French maid, but that doesn't make it an accurate or fair assessment of her virtues and attributes.

 

[William Leisner]

For the record, yes, it is fun to imagine Kira as a French maid. Almost as much fun as it is imagining Ezri Dax as a naughty Catholic schoolgirl.

 

[Thrawn]

I was gonna say. I think he made the wrong point there.

Plus, it may not be a fair assessment of her virtues, but it seems like a pretty fair assessment of her attributes.

Ahem.

Carry on.

 

[Christopher]

Plus, it may not be a fair assessment of her virtues, but it seems like a pretty fair assessment of her attributes.

Only on a superficial level.

 

[Broccoli]

Plus, it may not be a fair assessment of her virtues, but it seems like a pretty fair assessment of her attributes.

Only on a superficial level.

Ding. Ding. Ding. And we have a winner. Of course it is on a superficial level when those fans look at the post-DS9 books as season breakdowns. I don't think anyone (at least here) has suggested otherwise.

 

[Christopher]

And that's the whole point of my analogy -- that it's an interpretation that doesn't accurately reflect the essence of the books. I don't understand what you think we're arguing about.

 

[Joel_Kirk]

For the record, yes, it is fun to imagine Kira as a French maid. Almost as much fun as it is imagining Ezri Dax as a naughty Catholic schoolgirl.

A Bajoran exchange student, learning Earth customs...and Ezri in one of Quark's holosuite programs....

Hmmmmmmmmm......

 

[Rush Limborg]

^I've always been partial to the idea of Ezri playing a "Bond/Bashir-Girl" in Julian's spy program....

 

[Joel_Kirk]

^I've always been partial to the idea of Ezri playing a "Bond/Bashir-Girl" in Julian's spy program....

I could see that happening; they probably would have done that in the DS9 series, but it was close to the end.

 

[Rush Limborg]

^(Curse the "7-season-max" thing anyway....)

 

[Thrawn]

We've now spent more time discussing DS9 in this thread than Forged In Fire.

Which is hardly unprecedented, I just think it's funny.

Though I admit that might be a superficial evaluation that doesn't accurately reflect the essence of the thread.

 

[Rush Limborg]

^Agreed. Kinda awkward...but as you said...not unheard of.

BTW--Thrawn, it just occured to me: We're the same rank.

How the heck did I rise up the ranks so rapidly?

(Not complaining--not at all! Just curious....)

 

[DarKush]

Finished the book today...finally. I put it down months ago and decided to return to it since I've been waylaid by the big snow.

Overall I thought it was a good book, though slow in spots. For the most part it was well written, with great characterization for the principals. There was also some nice insight into the Klingons. Also Qagh turned out to be one of the best villains in Trek lit. Though I felt the plot structure of the book left a little to be desired. The main conflict seemed to happen in the middle of the book-IMO the showdown between Sulu and Qagh-and there wasn't a lot of resolution. Of course I know Qagh had to be left alive for the DS9 episode, but I think the book would've flowed better if the major showdown had happened more toward the end of the book. After the showdown, things just felt anticlimatic and the bio-attack on Qo'noS just felt tacked on and unnecessary.