Shore Leave rocks.
A lot of good news on this list; the schedule looks both diverse and looks to be moving the storylines forward. The covers are also nice-looking and stylistically diverse for the books I intend to purchase, although it is That Shot of Picard Again, and the VOY one looks a bit bland. I wonder if the devastated city shown on the unorthodox but highly effective
Singular Destiny is the same floating city we see on the covers of the first two
Destiny books, or a Federation city that has come under attack (presumably during the events of
Destiny. And why the galaxy as a puzzle, with pieces missing? Intriguing. For Titan, is that everybody's favourite Pacifican navigator on the cover,
au naturel? More support for the pelagic planet hypothesis, I wot.
Speaking of intriguing,
Seven Deadly Sins is an unexpected but I think welcome surprise--and, damn, they finally scheduled that Pakled epic they've been teasing us for years now! I'm just surprised it wasn't Wardilmore who wrote it (assuming the authors are in order, since they're not arranged alphabetically... which also conveniently aligns Klingon-Boy with his native subject matter). Shame about the suggestive typo in
Dayton's name.
Soul Key puts me in the mind of that Prophet-related trinket that got stole back in
Fragments and Omens, which also leads me to hope well get development and possibly general conclusion to the Crisis of Infinite Kiras arc, which, due to scheduling, feels like it's dragged on too long now. But on the plus side, two (count 'em - two) DS9R novels next year is a soothing balm. And, ooh: Cardassian virtuoso
Una McCormack writes
Never Ending Sacrifice... the only downside is it probably won't be the epic itself (speaking of which, when are we going to see
Burning Hearts of Qo'nos on the schedule? C'mon, if you can do the Pakleds...). And Myriad Universes is already getting a Volume III! I've not read the first two, obviously, but I still think that kicks ass, given the sheer scope and potential of the premise. Top it off with additional entries into VOY and TITAN from
Kirsten and
James, and you've got a promising year indeed.
But. (Yeah, you know me, I'm a but-man.) I am concerned that the next entries into the ongoing stories of New Frontier and Enterprise are listed as being trade paperbacks. Is this correct? If so, are the trades replacing hardcovers as the format for 'event' novels? Does that mean we'll get a mass-market reprint down the line, unlike we usually do for trades, since these stories are (presumably) part of ongoing arcs? Because, if not, I must say I am disappointed by the format change. Now, I've kissed and made up with trade paperbacks over the last few years but I still prefer mass markets for sheer portability. In particular, I've come to appreciate what trades offer that regular paperbacks do not: room for a lot more content. So unless these two trades have the equivalent of three books in them (and I recall that the Romulan War had previously been announced as a trilogy, so I see the possibility there), I'm going to feel stiffed. Where
The Good That Men Do was a letdown, and unless
Kobayashi Maru really wows me, I think I'm just going to leave this one on the shelf rather than bother with the troubles of a trade.
Since I don't want to end the post on a negative note when there's such good news, I want to say again that it looks like a heck of a literary harvest coming down the line (as long as Monsanto doesn't mess with the packaging!).
Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman
EDIT: It only just occured to me to ask (must be the late hour), but will the Klingon portion of the Star Trek Se7en be used as an opportunity to bring back some of our buddies from the Gorkon?