Shore Leave

[Allyn Gibson]

As for licensing problems with the Hobus storyline...

... even if Pocket can't do that story itself, surely it would be possible to do stories depicting the immediate ramifications of the fall of Romulus?

That is essentially how Mark Winegartner's Godfather novels work. They weave around The Godfather Part II and The Godfather Part III without actually touching them. The Godfather Part II happens in the middle of The Godfather Returns, and the second half of that book and The Godfather's Revenge build up toward The Godfather Part III, all without actually referencing the movies because they were licensed by the Puzo estate and not Paramount and thus could not touch Paramount's material.

 

[Paris]

I like the idea of slowing down too. I found it odd that they placed The Fall in the last 1/4 of 2385, when so much of 2384, as well as the beginning of 2385, hadn't been touched yet. Hopefully we'll get a tale or two set in that time to help fill it out.

I think they were constrained by what earlier books had established about the time it would take to build the new DS9.

Makes sense. Maybe some TNG or Titan stories could still be told in that missing time? Probably some ebooks at some point..

 

[Therin of Andor]

One, this is not social media

I'm sure that message boards do count as social media, since interactions here can be both informative and social. Certainly I have made many friends here - and met many of them a few days ago, and I picked up conversations like they were people I'd known socially for years.

A quick Google found this: "forums and message boards -- old school social media...":
Why Forums May Be the Most Powerful Social Media Channel for Brands
http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/223493

surely it would be possible to do stories depicting the immediate ramifications of the fall of Romulus?

And if the surviving Romulans claim one of their colony worlds as "New Romulus", most future novels won't have to change much at all.

 

[Christopher]

It might not be a bad idea to do that, though -- to preemptively declare the "Destiny continuity" (for want of a better name) to be an alternate timeline to the canonical Prime Timeline, if there's ever a concern about the ability to continue telling stories in that continuity if future canonical productions contradict or invalidate that continuity. It would, for instance, allow the Destiny continuity to continue having new stories told even afterwards -- thus avoiding the fate of the Star Wars Expanded Universe post-Episode VII.

I'm sure that could be done if it became necessary, but that doesn't mean we should rush to do it. A lot of readers would feel that overtly alternate-reality books would "count" less and would be less interested in them as a result.

As for licensing problems with the Hobus storyline...

... even if Pocket can't do that story itself, surely it would be possible to do stories depicting the immediate ramifications of the fall of Romulus?

I don't know about "immediate," since it'd be hard to deal with those when their direct cause couldn't be openly mentioned.

Anyway, I'd be happy if Pocket just avoided the question for now. No need to rush forward any more than we have already. (Heck, lately I've been going rather far backward...)

 

[T'Bonz]

You should come by more often T'Bonz!

Thanks. I should quit being so lazy.

 

[DimesDan]

One, this is not social media

I'm sure that message boards do count as social media, since interactions here can be both informative and social. Certainly I have made many friends here - and met many of them a few days ago, and I picked up conversations like they were people I'd known socially for years.

A quick Google found this: "forums and message boards -- old school social media...":
Why Forums May Be the Most Powerful Social Media Channel for Brands
http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/223493

Right, what ever. I knew you would claim a counter argument, anyway, can not be arsed.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Thrawn's recollection of the panel discussion meshes pretty well with my own, except I think he's being optimistic about the chances of resolving the licensing issue with Paramount/Bad Robot. I recall someone (Dayton?) using the phrase "never the twain shall meet." I surmise that whatever license allowed Simon Spotlight to publish the YA Starfleet Academy novels has expired.

That's pretty much as I gathered, but still extremely disappointing.

I do appreciate the little "under the radar" nods we've gotten.

I actually asked the other panelists about the swift pace -- I've long found it odd that the books were rushing forward when it was necessary to avoid dealing with the 2387 events of the film -- and they mentioned that they were planning to slow it down now. Not only because of the licensing issue, but because the characters are getting older; as of 2385, Picard is 80 years old, which isn't so bad for a 24th-century human, but still getting up there. Granted, that kind of leaves the books stuck in 2386 and part of '87 (we don't know when in the year the supernova happened) for the foreseeable future. But that's doable; the DS9 post-finale novels took five years to get through 2376. And Voyager is still back in late '81 or early '82.

"What year is it?"

"2386, just like every other year!"

*cue Doctor Who "The Wedding of River Song"-style bizarro universe*

 

[Relayer1]

It might not be a bad idea to do that, though -- to preemptively declare the "Destiny continuity" (for want of a better name) to be an alternate timeline to the canonical Prime Timeline, if there's ever a concern about the ability to continue telling stories in that continuity if future canonical productions contradict or invalidate that continuity. It would, for instance, allow the Destiny continuity to continue having new stories told even afterwards -- thus avoiding the fate of the Star Wars Expanded Universe post-Episode VII.

I'm sure that could be done if it became necessary, but that doesn't mean we should rush to do it. A lot of readers would feel that overtly alternate-reality books would "count" less and would be less interested in them as a result.

As for licensing problems with the Hobus storyline...

... even if Pocket can't do that story itself, surely it would be possible to do stories depicting the immediate ramifications of the fall of Romulus?

I don't know about "immediate," since it'd be hard to deal with those when their direct cause couldn't be openly mentioned.

Anyway, I'd be happy if Pocket just avoided the question for now. No need to rush forward any more than we have already. (Heck, lately I've been going rather far backward...)

The 'count less' situation is somewhat ridiculous given that they're all made up stories, but I can personally attest that it's true - I do feel that way.

I certainly have no problem with slowing down or even backtracking and gap filling, but I don't want to lose all forward momentum. That the Litverse is expanding and developing is a huge part of why I'm invested in it.

Using the Godfather analogy (and I‘ve read them) would seem to be the best option if the rights issues cannot be resolved. Foreshadowing is still on the table if done so as not to be overly specic - we could still have some resolution to Spocks story. Assuming all readers have seen the new movies isn't a stretch if the reasons for the absence of both Spock and Romulus (and Remus ?) cannot be directly referenced.

It could be a rather knowing 'dance' around specifics for a while, but considering Fosters novelisation to be the only mention required in Treklit could work, and indeed may have to.

 

[Enterpriserules]

With the Star Trek books I think that they can do it, with only what we saw on screen and make it work with the books. For me the real problem was the Countdown comic and that does just not fit with the trajectory of the books. Otherwise, it would be the logical, next-big-epic-event.

 

[Relayer1]

With the Star Trek books I think that they can do it, with only what we saw on screen and make it work with the books. For me the real problem was the Countdown comic and that does just not fit with the trajectory of the books. Otherwise, it would be the logical, next-big-epic-event.

Countdown's already been canned. It's not in continuity with the novels and as it's not 'on screen canon' the novels have no obligation to follow it.

 

[Enterpriserules]

With the Star Trek books I think that they can do it, with only what we saw on screen and make it work with the books. For me the real problem was the Countdown comic and that does just not fit with the trajectory of the books. Otherwise, it would be the logical, next-big-epic-event.

Countdown's already been canned. It's not in continuity with the novels and as it's not 'on screen canon' the novels have no obligation to follow it.

Which is great, because I really did not like it. But the books following what we saw in '09 have a lot of room to create something quite epic. Just hoping Gell Kamemor survives, I really love that character!

 

[Jedi Ben]

This is all welcome news to me. I've been unhappy about the rapid pace of the books chronology since the end of Destiny. If the authors and Margaret now have a reason to slow down, I think it will end up effecting the storylines and character development in a positive way. And if this licencing issue drags on for too long, I would absolutely love for some books to go back and fill in some of that skipped over time since Destiny. And this would be the perfect opportunity to tell the Ascendants storyline. Not to mention the opportunity for Voyager's slower (better) pace to create less of a difference

It'd be great to get the Ascendants story concluded.

 

[JD]

I'm glad to hear that the books are going to be slowing down, the big time jumps between books has been one of my biggest complaints for the last several years.
As for the Hobus Supernova, I am a little disappointed to hear that there are issue keeping the books away from it. I was hoping once the books made it to that point in the timeline we'd get a big Destiny style crossover dealing with it and it's aftermath. I hope they can at least still deal with the loss of Romulus in some form, that's to big of a game changer to have to just ignore it.
I'm not sure what the think of the idea of just setting the Destiny universe/Novelverse/whateveryouwantocallitverse aside as an alternate timeline. Personally, I'm interested enough in the what the books have been doing that I would continue to read, and look forward to the books no matter what, but I have a feeling a lot of potential readers might be turned off if they found out the books "didn't count" anymore.

 

[terpette]

Dear gods, I'm out of the loop. I have no idea what anyone's talking about. Of course, I also didn't get to hit any of the book panels, what with being tied to the STARFLEET recruiting table a good portion of Shore Leave Sunday, and the pocket program having so little info on what panels were actually ABOUT. :P