Spoilers It’s Official... (probably TV spoilers here too)

Kind of wonder though, who from the Litverse would be popular enough that they'd get adapted into the new continuity? At most I just see generalized nods to Litverse characters holding down similar jobs in the new continuity, like having mentioning Admiral Akaar as one of Admiral Clancy's predecessors, or Bacco and Zh'Tarash as former Federation Presidents, that sort of thing.

 

Other characters that comes to mind for me are Vaughn, and Vale.

 

^ Vale in particular could easily be worked into a quick throwaway-shoutout in some scene involving Riker, Troi, and/or Picard if they wanted to.

 

It sounds like from what I'm hearing and reading about Picard it already is pretty irreconcilable with the existing litverse, and that disparity is likely to grow as time goes on.

I think the best we can hope for in the new show is some sort of Easter egg reference to a character or event from the litverse. I'm doubtful that it'll be anything significant. Maybe a name pops up in a conversation (i.e. Lt Chen, Captain Vale) or perhaps a 'remember the time we....' line. The most we might see is as Christopher noted, a character adapted to the new continuity.

I think as novel readers the most we could potentially hope for is that some version of the relaunches continue as an alternate universe (as opposed to the show doing something that preserves the litverse). But I'm not putting any real hope into that scenario. It just doesn't reflect past practice on the part of Star Trek tie-ins, outside a few limited exceptions. Kirsten Beyer, one of the showrunners on Picard, has already said in a prior interview that her Voyager book would be the last in the Voyager relaunches. I think that kind of sums things up. That does not necessarily mean it will be the last Voyager book overall, just the last in the relaunch timeline. Though, not to be negative, I'd frankly be surprised if we saw any future novels tied to the previous spinoffs from TNG (future books will likely be Picard oriented) through Enterprise. As Christopher has also noted, S&S wants to sell books, and they'll probably make more money selling books tied to current running shows. From a marketing perspective it make sense.

I go back and forth on this. Part of me wants to hold out a sliver of hope that the litverse can continue, even in a non-print format. And David Mack's comments that they've thought of ways to soldier on in some fashion have encouraged me to hold onto some faint glimmer of hope. But at the same time those comments were made before the show even started IIRC. And my brain is telling me that it's just not in the cards. I think we've come to the end of the line for TNG, DS9, Voyager and Enterprise stories from the novel end.

 

At this point, it's incompatible with everything from at least Greater Than the Sum/Destiny onward. So far there don't seem to be any blatant contradictions of anything earlier, although it presents an outcome for B-4 that differs in intent, at least, from his subplot in Articles of the Federation.

 

What she said was that it was the last book in her relaunch series, so that doesn't totally rule out the books continuing with a different writer.

We'll apparently be getting at least one more Novelverse book, since David Mack just hinted the other day that we'll be seeing Data and Lal again.

 

The novelverse will exist in some manner, and I'm not talking sentimentally on bookshelves or nodding cameos, as we will continue to see it in Q-centric romps through the multiverse of DTI shenanigans with time travel. I'd be surprised if some type of "explanation" isn't given regarding its fate and extent in a future Myriad Universe book.

It'll just be too much fun not to bring back by some of the more continuity-referencing authors around here.

 

I'd love to share your optimism, but come on. Do you really think the Voyager relaunches are going to be picked up by someone else at this point? I just don't see it. The only thing I'm optimistic about is since she's indicating this will be the final Voyager relaunch novel (and probably the last Voyager novel period IMO), she'll probably tie up some of the major loose ends since the last novel. That doesn't mean everything will be packaged in a nice bow, but it's probably safe to assume she'll resolve some major lingering story lines and at least give us a satisfying conclusion.

I'm still waiting on one last DS9 book. I'm going to keep mentioning that until I see one on the schedule . In the words of Chancellor Gorkon--"Don't let it end this way--give the fans one more DS9 novel" (ok, I added that last part).

 

I started to explore the novelverse in 2011 (9 years ago, in the time between school and university). In Germany, it is not that easy (when your English skills aren't thaaaat good), because while I have thank CrossCult for its distribution of some great novels, they also 'missed' some of them. So I started with the TNG relaunch, but never had the chance to read the "A time to.."-series.

Nethertheless, I fell in love with the novels easily. I read tne TNG relaunch, I read the TITAN novels, I really loved 'Destiny' and then I also started with the VOY relaunch, the famous 8th season of DS9 and the last series I started was NF, while I followed the timeline into the Typhon Pact and The Fall... but at this time, the 'ST novel phase' just ended - some of the reasons were RL reasons, but another argument was, that in my opinion, the novelverse had reached its climax with 'Destiny' and I was a bit dissapointed that 'The Fall' was (in my opinion) not as good as this trilogy. At this time, even nobody knew something about any new Trek TV show, so I used 'The Fall' as an opportunity to end my journey through a novelverse, that was expanding more and more.

Today, now, that I know, that it will have an ending, I'm a bit tempted to buy and reach the few missing books of this universe, just to complete it (and I think, that there will be some good novels left, too). If I had one last wish about the novelverse, it would be a last great trilogy or something like 'Destiny', a trilogy at the end to end all novels in this 'parallel universe'. Please, another climax for one last time!

 

Yeah, that would be even better than just a final DS9 book. Some epic crossover trilogy or something that ties up major loose ends. I always hoped the novels would at least get us to the destruction of Romulus and some of the aftermath and it's immediate effects on the Typhon Pact.

Sadly I think the time for that is past now since Picard apparently gave some more details about the destruction of Romulus and likely to give more as time goes on. That and it sounds like the show and the novels are already irreconcilable make it highly unlikely.

That 2018 lull in books really set things back. Had books continued during that period we probably could have had some epic finale before the Picard show started to close things out. But by the time the books came back online Discovery had already started and then Picard was announced putting the future of the relaunches in doubt.

I think the only reason we even got "Collateral Damage" was that it was a TNG work and S&S was probably hoping to capitalize on the then-upcoming Picard show (I find it notable S&S reverted to the TNG logo from the TNG TV series as opposed to the novel logo they've been using for over 10 years now--probably hoping that got them extra buyers). And the only reason we're even getting a new Voyager book was because it was contracted a few years back.

 

I suspect you're spot on about all of this.

 

I think it's more likely just that books take a long time to get made, so there tends to be a lot of lag time. Thus, when a new status quo takes effect, there can still be a few books left over from the old status quo trickling out afterward. Like how Pocket got the Trek novel license in 1979 but there were still a few more Bantam books that came out in 1980-81.

 

I'm sure that's a big part of it. Like I said, that year long hiatus didn't help. That's a whole year's worth of stories that could have moved things forward a bit more (granted not all those books would have been relaunches, but we would have had a few more). David Mack's interview was pretty enlightening. I had hoped to see some hint in "Collateral Damage" about Picard, even if it was just a passing reference to something but I learned from that interview that just wasn't possible. By the time the final draft was turned in we still had almost nothing about where Picard was going other than the name of the show so there was simply no way to include any reference.

But I do think using TNG-TV series era logo on "Collateral Damage" instead of the long used novel era logo was an attempt to sell more books hoping casual TNG fans looking forward to Picard would pick it up. I don't begrudge S&S, after all, they WANT to sell more books. I think if there was no Picard show it would have just carried the familiar novel logo like the past relaunch TNG novels.

And I think the fact that there are no announced newly commissioned relaunch novels probably tells it all. I think we've reached the end of the road for the relaunches. I think the more time passes the less likely it becomes we'll see them in the future.

 

Ok, I must have missed something here. Was there an official announcement? I can't find anything. I just stalked David Mack's Twitter page all the way back through the middle of January, and there's nothing. I went to Google and didn't find anything. I don't doubt at all that there was some sort of announcement, but I totally missed it and I'm trying to find it. I space off a lot.

 

There is no announcement. Just that the writers “have a plan.”

 

There doesn't need to be an announcement. Why would they step in the same pile of shit that Star Wars did with their Extended Universe? They will simply slow the output to a point there are no more books telling those stories and the new universe books will slowly pick up the slack.

 

So, I'm a little disappointed, but not devastated, as it's to be expected.

To be honest, it doesn't effect me in a major way, as I am more a TOS fan, and I tend to read the TOS books more. I've read a few of the relaunch/post NEM books, but I honestly have never taken to the TNG books the way I have the TOS books. Possibly because there was a lot less TOS on screen, so there was always more of a hunger to see my faves in action.

Take heart. The fact that they utterly exist out of whack with any screen continuity has never kept novels such as Strangers From the Sky, The Final Reflection, and Federation from being beloved reads and re-reads. My all-time favorite trilogy, the Crucible series, exists in its own little continuity, and this has never subtracted any of its value. Good writing is good writing. And fun writing, too: looking at you, Shatnerverse.

This was all inevitable. Think of it as an opportunity to open things up, not close them off.

 

Yeah. Think of all the new canonical characters, species, events, and concepts we'll be able to base future novels on.

 

I misunderstood what was going on. I need to learn to not post before I've had enough coffee and not distracted by real world things. If I could just figure out how to posts GIFs, I'd post the Homer Simpson retreating into the bush GIF right about now.

 

Probably not, but we still don't know with absolute certainty what is going to happen. I wasn't meaning to say that there will be more Voyager Relaunch books, I was just pointing out that what she said was not a definitive statement that To Lose The Earth will be the last one.

There might be at least one more, @David Mack hinted in another thread last week that we will be seeing Data and Lal at least one more time.