Shrinking ST Selection in Bookstores
- Thread starter Mysterion
- Start date
You know what? I've seen ST bookshop displays increase and decrease numerous times in my lifetime.
Increases coincided with: TMP, ST IV, TNG (Season 3ish), TNG (Season 6ish), "First Contact". (Somewhere in there were major marketing pushes for the 20th, 25th and 30th anniversaries of TOS.)
I've also seen, at the height of TNG's popularity, when "Doctor Who" went on hiatus, ST displays being moved from obscure back corners to the front window! (In UK and Australia, the glossy magazine "Doctor Who Bulletin" turned into "DWB" and eventually "DreamWorld Bulletin", reflecting the broadening of interests of aimless Who fans looking for a new TV series they could follow. Many chose TNG.)
I've also chatted to lots of book store managers in the last 30 years. They reckon one major group of early adopters of Amazon to buy their regular fiction online were... Star Trek fans.
Times change. People change. Hairstyles change. Interest rates fluctuate.
My local bookstores carry more SW than ST. And their ST stock has been shrinking as well. And as we all no Wal-Mart no longer sells Star Trek books.
My local library is just as bad. They never carry any Star Trek books unless it is a hardcover. IIRC, the latest ST book they have is the Death in Winter hardcover.
My local library is just as bad. They never carry any Star Trek books unless it is a hardcover. IIRC, the latest ST book they have is the Death in Winter hardcover.
More accurately, the Wal-Marts in your area no longer sell Trek books. Two of the three in my immediate area have them. When I last was in one of them (a couple of weeks ago), they had copies of Forged In Fire and Sword of Damocles.
It's all about what sells. In your area, Wal-Mart can't move the Trek books, so they quit stocking them, but that's apparently where Trekkies in my area continue to get their Trek fix.
^ Wal-Marts stock books according to the needs of their customers. Every Wal-Mart I've been in has had wildly a different book selection from every other Wal-Mart I've been in. (I've only been in a few, 'cause we don't have them here in NYC, one of a billion reasons why this is the greatest city in the world. 
)
(I've only been in a few, 'cause we don't have them here in NYC, one of a billion reasons why this is the greatest city in the world. )
Which ones were those? The one I goto over on Shawnee Mission Pkwy almost never has them (though I've seen a couple before).
^ The one in Lee's Summit had the most recent releases when I was there a couple of weeks ago. The one in Independence had Trek stuff when I was last there, but it's not one I regularly go to and it's therefore been a while.
A goodly number of Trekkies in Lee's Summit, apparently
A goodly number of Trekkies in Lee's Summit, apparently
I have been in a couple of Borders lately and noticed that the number of SW books greatly outnumber ST books, and I never see ST books in WalMart or grocery stores. I live on the west side of KC, so maybe most Trekkies live in Lee's Summit. LOL
Could it be that ST books have in recent years been longer story arcs or multiple book series? People who impulse buy a book would be sorely burned if they opened it and realized they needed a prequel to really enjoy the novel. Just a thought. I don't know if SW books are stand-alones or multi-book series, to tell the truth.
Could it be that ST books have in recent years been longer story arcs or multiple book series? People who impulse buy a book would be sorely burned if they opened it and realized they needed a prequel to really enjoy the novel. Just a thought. I don't know if SW books are stand-alones or multi-book series, to tell the truth.
^^Story arcs and series don't require you to read preceding volumes to enjoy a given volume. It would be self-defeating to write a book in such a way that it couldn't stand on its own, for precisely the reason you describe. Reading the earlier volumes might provide a fuller experience in certain ways, but in any well-written series, you can pick up any volume and easily understand the story, because any necessary information is provided.
And I'm pretty sure that there are plenty of multi-book series and story arcs in Star Wars fiction as well. Indeed, I gather that SW novel continuity is a lot tighter and more interdependent than ST novel continuity is.
And I'm pretty sure that there are plenty of multi-book series and story arcs in Star Wars fiction as well. Indeed, I gather that SW novel continuity is a lot tighter and more interdependent than ST novel continuity is.
And the storytelling is worse. I started reading Legacy of the Force or whatever that trilogy was called and I got bored very quickly. Give me Trek anyday.
I'll be reading plenty of Trek this year hopefully, when I get one of the eBook readers since the Sony PRS-505 is supposed to be hitting Europe so I won't need to worry about shrinking shelf space. I'll just buy all of mine online.
I'll be reading plenty of Trek this year hopefully, when I get one of the eBook readers since the Sony PRS-505 is supposed to be hitting Europe so I won't need to worry about shrinking shelf space. I'll just buy all of mine online.
There were only three at the time I started to read them. I got halfway through the first and then donated it to the local library. Glad I didn't buy the second.
It will be the reverse by about October this year. All stores will be responding to the the media blitz that will herald the coming of... JJ Abrams' "Star Trek".
When TMP and ST IV were being promoted thusly, there was a massive increase of the visibility of Star Trek products everywhere.
In fact, with ST IV, it was a huge emphasis on the Star Trek novels and guide books (because a lot of the kiddie ranges developed for TMP failed to sell as expected). From "Chain of Attack" onwards, Pocket ST novels were clearly branded with the large, recognisable ST logo on their spines and covers. Bantam Books even rereleased their entire backlist with covers that emulated the new Pocket look.
Prior to this, Bantam Books looked more like other, regular, b/w spined, science fiction novels. And the early Pocket range was under the "Timescape" imprint, to make them look like a more mainstream science fiction title. It's hard to believe when "Spock's World" and "The Lost Years" came out as blockbuster hardcovers, the words "Star Trek" weren't even on their spines.
You will...
No, I'd say it's more likely a combination of ST collectors using online sources, as I said earlier, stores using a cyclic display system that responds to current demand from customers, and ranges of audience ages. ST has appealed to a much older audience than SW for a long time. The SW audience gained new younger members with the prequel trilogy, and many of those little kids are now old enough to read novels written for adults.
When was Star Trek at maximum kid appeal? TOS in prime time syndication, TAS, the G-rated ST:TMP, the huge family hit of ST IV, TNG in prime time syndication, "First Contact". Most little kids never saw DS9, VOY or ENT because they aired too late at night.
Yeah this has always pissed me off. Star Wars books galore and a handful of Trek books. I don't even go to local book stores to find Trek books. I just go straight to Amazon and have em' shipped 2nd Day. Back when I carried a PDA I could could find pretty much any Trek book I wanted on eReader.com. But I'm back to hard copies for now.
That late? I would think TPB would want to start building up on the visiblity of Trek about now, since the teaser is out and people have been informed that more Trek is on the way. But, I'm not in the marketing biz, so I might not understand how that kind of stuff works.
I picked a month at random, by which time I figured most places would have caught up, or started to dedicate wall or floor space to displays. Toys and action figures. Posters. Mugs and keychains. There will be a gradual increase in ST visibility from now until December. It won't come all in one lump.
The novelization, assuming there will be one, won't be available too early, and a lot of the marketing will hang from the new movie, not the ST novel backlist.
"Kirk's Guide to Women" is supposedly due in February. There's a new Shatner biography coming in May. Isn't "Star Trek 101" due in September? And so on.
