Novel? (spoilers)

[Judith Sisko]

I didn't want to leave this to Amazon delivery, so I called up our Barnes & Noble, and they had the books ready to go in the stock room.

However, the clerk said their records flagged a "hard street date" of May 12 (Tuesday) for sales.

So, she reserved a copy for me, and I'm going to pick it up on Tuesday. I hope they didn't screw up.

That's what happened to me at my bn. I even whined and showed them my movie ticket stub to prove that I had already seen the movie, but they still said "no."

I DID get the soundtrack while I was there though, and almost have it committed to aural memory.

Me, too. I had it on a loop on my iPod last night. I really wanted that book;but the soundtrack is a big help. I am going to appreciate the music a lot more when I go back again this week.

Being familiar with the soundtrack made my second viewing much more enjoyable than the first (and the first was plenty enjoyable already.)

 

[Jeri]

^ ^ Hey, Judith, we crossed posts here -- did you see the audio version is read by Zach Quinto in my immediately previous post?

 

[Greg Cox]

I've read somewhere that the novel only has about 200 pages. Now, even saying the font would be set in a very small corps and the novel's dimensions would be bigger, that's still a hell of a thin little booklet in my eyes. So I don't think I'll get it.

Just goes to show how little story there is here.

Or maybe Foster only had a couple of weeks to write it?

(Just to be clear, I have no idea if that's the case, but, trust me, movie novelizations tend to be written on very tight deadlines, and often you don't have time to write 100,000 words.)

 

[Overgeeked]

I've read somewhere that the novel only has about 200 pages. Now, even saying the font would be set in a very small corps and the novel's dimensions would be bigger, that's still a hell of a thin little booklet in my eyes. So I don't think I'll get it.

Just goes to show how little story there is here.

Or maybe Foster only had a couple of weeks to write it?

(Just to be clear, I have no idea if that's the case, but, trust me, movie novelizations tend to be written on very tight deadlines, and often you don't have time to write 100,000 words.)

But, to be fair, the writer also has an early draft of the script so most of the heavy lifting is already done.

 

[Greg Cox]

Actually, the hardest part is finding ways to flesh a 100-page script (with lots of white space) into a 250 page novel. I always figure I need to generate three or more pages of prose out of every script page.

Which can be trickier than it sounds!

 

[Kirk's_Tights]

I preordered the novel from Amazon UK, but yet they haven't been able to deliver it on time due to the fact that it sold out. This is quite annoying, really, as I was hoping to see if they included any of the deleted stuff from the film in the book.

So has anyone here managed to get a hold of the novel, and if so, is there any major extra scenes that weren't included in the film or just a few more lines here and there?

I haven't gotten the book yet but I can imagine how many people want to get it now that the movie is out and general interest has rapidly grown.

 

[Jeri]

Well, I'm going to be there when the doors open at 9 a.m.

 

[Lythia]

Finished! Typos... ugh, seriously? From almost page one. Not good.

Lots of stuff doesn't match up with the movie - thankfully it's mostly minor. And I did like the reasoning for certain other things being explained - no spoilers, but there is one line from Spock about why he didn't just throw Kirk in the brig and instead stranded him on Delta Vega.

I wish the entire interchange between Kirk/Orion babe/Uhura as done in the book would have ended up in the film. This is strangely enough one of the scenes where Kirk shows us he knows more than we might think he does. I say strangely enough, because most of the rest of the time, I didn't truly care for Kirk in the novel all that much. And I adored him in the movie.

There are some annoying omissions from the novel, too.

I'd love to know what the time frame for writing the novel was. In some ways it reads as though Kirk hasn't even been cast yet (Baby James has brown eyes? Nope. Chris Pine has the bluest eyes, and infant eye color doesn't work that way. If they're brown, they stay brown - they may lighten up. But they certainly don't change to blue). Minor but jarring for me as I help catch babies for a living (and I found the description of Spock's birth on Vulcan quite fascinating ).

But mostly it reads as though it was written very quickly and that the editors had a bad day at work.

Overall, as a novelization, I'd give it about a C-. Nothing terribly special here. And I'd have rather seen a hardcover or a MMP. I hated handing over that amount of money for an ever so slightly bigger paperback. My suggestion is borrow it. Or pay a bit more for the special signed hardcover copies about to be released.

I really wanted to enjoy it as much as I enjoyed the movie. Too bad.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

I bought it yesterday at Borders in Aus. I usually buy all my Trek in Dymocks but my Trek contact there said the novel was no longer listed as incoming, she did not know why.

This is the first novelization of a film I've read since The Phantom Menace, LOL. I really don't like novelizations but I like this film SO MUCH I am ready to read anything. Trying to find Countdown now.