Reading the litverse chronologically

[n3aak]

With the Memory Beta chronology and all, has anyone attempted reading the litverse in chronological order?

Bonus points for adding in the comicsverse and TV episodes.

Master level if you read/watch all time travel/flashbacks when they occur and not with the body of the story. I feel like this would unlock some secret knowledge of the universe.

 

[Jbarney]

Hhhhmmmm......I think reading it all in chronological order would be kinda time consuming. The Memory Beta chrono material is good but not entirely precise. The timeline in Voyages of Imagination lays out most of the pocket material in pretty good depth.

Timeliners are at it again. Catching up with all of stories published from the last several years.

 

[Jinn]

With the Memory Beta chronology and all, has anyone attempted reading the litverse in chronological order?

Bonus points for adding in the comicsverse and TV episodes.

Master level if you read/watch all time travel/flashbacks when they occur and not with the body of the story. I feel like this would unlock some secret knowledge of the universe.

Yes! This is literally what I've been doing since 2016 and I'm in 2268 currently. Lots of TOS in the past year...

 

[n3aak]

Hhhhmmmm......I think reading it all in chronological order would be kinda time consuming. The Memory Beta chrono material is good but not entirely precise. The timeline in Voyages of Imagination lays out most of the pocket material in pretty good depth.

Timeliners are at it again. Catching up with all of stories published from the last several years.

Sure but the timeline in Voyages of the Imagination is also over 10 years out of date!

 

[n3aak]

Yes! This is literally what I've been doing since 2016 and I'm in 2268 currently. Lots of TOS in the past year...

Are you doing just Pocket Books or also the Bantam material?

 

[Jinn]

Are you doing just Pocket Books or also the Bantam material?

I'm only doing Pocket stuff, episodes and a few select comics that I liked. I'm reading everything that Cross Cult didn't translate and publish as eBooks for price and space reasons and the Bantam stuff, to my knowledge, was never converted to eBook form. I may check it out when I'm done (circa 2123).

 

[n3aak]

I'm only doing Pocket stuff, episodes and a few select comics that I liked. I'm reading everything that Cross Cult didn't translate and publish as eBooks for price and space reasons and the Bantam stuff, to my knowledge, was never converted to eBook form. I may check it out when I'm done (circa 2123).

Good point. Sounds like you're outside the United States. Here it's actually fairly easy to obtain used copies of the Bantam stuff.

 

[Jinn]

Good point. Sounds like you're outside the United States. Here it's actually fairly easy to obtain used copies of the Bantam stuff.

Yup, I'm from Germany. From what I gather it's fairly easy to get them here too, New Voyages 2 is available on amazon for 6 bucks (including shipping) and I'd imagine that most other Bantam books are similarly easy to find.

 

[ryan123450]

Sure but the timeline in Voyages of the Imagination is also over 10 years out of date!

We’re hoping that won’t always be the case!

 

[Riverside2233]

With the Memory Beta chronology and all, has anyone attempted reading the litverse in chronological order?

Bonus points for adding in the comicsverse and TV episodes.

Master level if you read/watch all time travel/flashbacks when they occur and not with the body of the story. I feel like this would unlock some secret knowledge of the universe.

I'm doing this right now. I watched every episode / series and then started on the Lit-Verse. Currently, I am in 2279 with the New Earth series and 2283 with Elusive Salvation.

I've tried to keep it chronological but I have been going back to the newer / Discovery novels when they are published.

I've used lists from multiple users and tried to check main timelines on Memory Alpha / Beta. @Thrawn @Turtletrekker @ryan123450 have been huge helps along the way. I found a blogger doing this and I have added to their list or edited if I found some different lists. This is their old list:

http://startrekadventure.blogspot.com/2013/09/star-trek-enterprise-broken-bow-diane.html

I'm only doing Pocket stuff, episodes and a few select comics that I liked. I'm reading everything that Cross Cult didn't translate and publish as eBooks for price and space reasons and the Bantam stuff, to my knowledge, was never converted to eBook form. I may check it out when I'm done (circa 2123).

I've been doing this since 2016 as well! Small world.

Actually I am doing the opposite. I've focused on newer publications (mostly post 2000) with some Pocket novels thrown in if they have been suggested.

I haven't done any comics or other materials. Surely the novels will occupy the next decade or so of my life. Lol.

 

[JD]

I'm to busy trying to read the new stuff to go back and do this.

 

[Jinn]

I feel like this would unlock some secret knowledge of the universe.

So, secret knowledge... I don't think I gained a whole lot of knowledge that I wouldn't have when reading the books in a logical order, but I made some connections that I think I wouldn't have made otherwise. For example in one of the Q Continuum books there's a war between (nigh-)omnipotent beings and someone throws an meteor at someone else and that's the meteor that crashes into Earth and kills off the dinosaurs, an event that James Kirk witnesses and even supports in First Frontier. It was kinda neat to see how these events flow into each-other back to back and not years apart from each-other.

I think the best part about my weird reading order is the 20th century. Watching the 20th century time travel episodes and reading the major novels in that time period (From History's Shadow, The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh Volume I Elusive Salvation and The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh Volume II) in the 100% correct timeline order is oddly satisfying and I'd actually recommend it. The novels and episodes all flow into each other and out of each other very seamlessly. Of course all these novels are very good in their own rights, but combining them with the episodes to one mega-story is an additional point of awesomeness.

Also, there are two Captain Proton adventures that I probably would have missed if it weren't for my weird reading order.

The 22nd century is a lot more boring; it's basically three flashback chapters from some books and then the normal Enterprise reading/watching order. The 23rd century is of course a chronological nightmare, but I think I've made senes of 2267 and 2268 now.

 

[DGCatAniSiri]

I do aim for a roughly chronological read of Trek books, though TOS is just an absolute nightmare to try and figure out, with some not offering an explicit timeframe beyond ‘five year mission’ and some of the novels from the eighties having the odd hiccup (I think it’s Web of the Romulans that is explicitly following from ‘Tomorrow is Yesterday’ while proceeding to have Chekhov as part of the bridge crew, not to mention the ones that assumed a second five year mission...)

That’s enough of a headache on its own, I am not even thinking of trying the ‘chronologically by chapter’ route. I think my head would explode. It’s one thing to read them book by book - chronologically is as good of a shelving order as anything else. Jumping around just seems needlessly complicated.

 

[Christopher]

some of the novels from the eighties having the odd hiccup (I think it’s Web of the Romulans that is explicitly following from ‘Tomorrow is Yesterday’ while proceeding to have Chekhov as part of the bridge crew

Double, Double did the same thing -- it's supposed to be an immediate sequel to "What Are Little Girls Made Of?", yet not only is Chekov there, but there are references to events that happened in the third season.

 

[Jinn]

Double, Double did the same thing -- it's supposed to be an immediate sequel to "What Are Little Girls Made Of?", yet not only is Chekov there, but there are references to events that happened in the third season.

Well, Double, Double is supposed to be months after "What Are Little GIrls Made Of?" so we must conclude that all of TOS actually takes place within months in 2266. At least that leaves time for all the novels in 2267-2270

 

[Christopher]

Well, Double, Double is supposed to be months after "What Are Little GIrls Made Of?"

I'd forgotten that part. Yet that should still be during the latter half of first season, whereas the book must be some time after "The Enterprise Incident," since there's a line saying that the Federation has obtained cloaking technology but doesn't use it.

 

[Jinn]

I'd forgotten that part. Yet that should still be during the latter half of first season, whereas the book must be some time after "The Enterprise Incident," since there's a line saying that the Federation has obtained cloaking technology but doesn't use it.

I chose to ignore that line in favor of the story's overall flow that fit way better in 2266. It's still an unfortunate contradiction though.

 

[n3aak]

So, secret knowledge... I don't think I gained a whole lot of knowledge that I wouldn't have when reading the books in a logical order, but I made some connections that I think I wouldn't have made otherwise. For example in one of the Q Continuum books there's a war between (nigh-)omnipotent beings and someone throws an meteor at someone else and that's the meteor that crashes into Earth and kills off the dinosaurs, an event that James Kirk witnesses and even supports in First Frontier. It was kinda neat to see how these events flow into each-other back to back and not years apart from each-other.

I think the best part about my weird reading order is the 20th century. Watching the 20th century time travel episodes and reading the major novels in that time period (From History's Shadow, The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh Volume I Elusive Salvation and The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh Volume II) in the 100% correct timeline order is oddly satisfying and I'd actually recommend it. The novels and episodes all flow into each other and out of each other very seamlessly. Of course all these novels are very good in their own rights, but combining them with the episodes to one mega-story is an additional point of awesomeness.

Also, there are two Captain Proton adventures that I probably would have missed if it weren't for my weird reading order.

The 22nd century is a lot more boring; it's basically three flashback chapters from some books and then the normal Enterprise reading/watching order. The 23rd century is of course a chronological nightmare, but I think I've made senes of 2267 and 2268 now.

And that is absolutely what I mean by secret info. Awesome, now I'm excited.

 

[tomswift2002]

Double, Double did the same thing -- it's supposed to be an immediate sequel to "What Are Little Girls Made Of?", yet not only is Chekov there, but there are references to events that happened in the third season.

Chekov’s even In “Enterprise: The First Adventure” which takes place prior to “Where No Man Has Gone Before”.

 

[Christopher]

Chekov’s even In “Enterprise: The First Adventure” which takes place prior to “Where No Man Has Gone Before”.

But I think he's at least portrayed as a 17-year-old cadet on some kind of work-study rotation. It's not actually changing his age like the Kelvin films did (or like E:TFA itself did with Rand, making her inexplicably a teenager rather than a contemporary of Kirk).