Simon and Schuster cuts 35 jobs
- Thread starter Jim Johnson
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Thanks so much!Very well actually. Krad's book had a lot of humor and the forensic science was described well enough to imagine it in my minds eye. It was a taut story and well done.
I recommend it.
The biggest challenge in writing a CSI novel is that it's much easier on the writers of the show to shortcut things because they only have 42 minutes to tell the story, so the science is abbreviated and things go by fast enough that you don't have time to deal with the fact that lab rats don't actually lead investigations or talk to suspects.
But when you're writing a novel you can't just have a music-video montage of guys in white lab coats pushing buttons and tapping on keyboards. You have to actually explain what they're doing, in much more detail than the show really has time for.
It was quite a challenge, and I'm glad it seemed to work for folks...
To be quite blunt - at this point, I haven't disliked a single Palmieri-edited ST book, and I've thought most of Clark's lines have been an absolute mess, especially the TNG relaunch. I know I should be supportive of Clark and the new editors, but to be honest, it was the fake Pocket office in the front of the book that I started looking for. As far as I'm concerned, Marco has been responsible for the direction and shape of the current ST novels that I've liked, and I'm pretty sure I'll be done with Star Trek after the projects he's started slowly start to fade out. I'll keep reading, I'm not doing the BOYCOTT THE EVIL COMPANY THING which I think is really annoying, but I'm just not expecting the same spark.
I'm in the middle of re-reading the Gorkon/KE novels, and reading as those transition from Ordover to Palmieri is staggering. KRAD is a fine author, but the difference between his work under each editor is extreme. ATFW/ATFP? Mediocre. Articles? Amazing. First two Gorkon books? Fun enough. Burning House? Epic.
Same thing with a lot of other Trek authors; I was really looking forward to Greater Than The Sum, but I ended up being disappointed. Then I realized that Bennett's amazing earlier books had all been under Marco, and I understood. And I'm not trying to take anything away from Bennett at all - I think he's a phenomenal author - but it just seems clear to me that Marco's influence really took these books from good to deeply compelling.
Maybe I'm alone in this, but as amazing and as wonderful as this team of authors is, I'm pretty sure that the decline in quality over the next two years will be readily apparent. I'm extremely disappointed.
I sincerely hope that the remaining editors will prove me wrong - I'll be buying everything announced so far, at least, for sure - but I'm no longer optimistic about the next few years of TrekLit. I wish I could be more upbeat, but it's just been such a strong correlation. Marco = awesome. Not Marco = mediocre at best.
I'm in the middle of re-reading the Gorkon/KE novels, and reading as those transition from Ordover to Palmieri is staggering. KRAD is a fine author, but the difference between his work under each editor is extreme. ATFW/ATFP? Mediocre. Articles? Amazing. First two Gorkon books? Fun enough. Burning House? Epic.
Same thing with a lot of other Trek authors; I was really looking forward to Greater Than The Sum, but I ended up being disappointed. Then I realized that Bennett's amazing earlier books had all been under Marco, and I understood. And I'm not trying to take anything away from Bennett at all - I think he's a phenomenal author - but it just seems clear to me that Marco's influence really took these books from good to deeply compelling.
Maybe I'm alone in this, but as amazing and as wonderful as this team of authors is, I'm pretty sure that the decline in quality over the next two years will be readily apparent. I'm extremely disappointed.
I sincerely hope that the remaining editors will prove me wrong - I'll be buying everything announced so far, at least, for sure - but I'm no longer optimistic about the next few years of TrekLit. I wish I could be more upbeat, but it's just been such a strong correlation. Marco = awesome. Not Marco = mediocre at best.
i'm not being funny, but i seriously think you're overestimating the editors' influence. i've never been able to tell the difference between a book written under one editor or another.
Explicitly, I haven't either. But all of the books I've loved, and all of the series that have held together, since 2001 or so (with the notable exception of New Frontier) have been Marco's. And with any individual author, if I list my favorites of theirs, it's always books Marco has edited (again, with the notable exception of Peter David, but that's pretty much it.) It's become a hard thing to ignore, really.
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Margaret originated that tradition, actually, putting "Memory Alpha" in the locations for the Okudas' Encyclopedia.
In the interests of full disclosure, Ed Schlesinger edited A Time for War, a Time for Peace. John hired me to do that finale, and we had agreed that in general the plot would involve Worf's going back to Starfleet and wrapping up various threads and setting Nemesis up, but by the time we got to actually plotting the thing, John was gone and it was Ed.
You mention A Good Day to Die and Honor Bound and A Burning House. What'd you think of Enemy Territory? (And I'm not telling you who edited that one.
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I've had the same experience (though I'm not a fan of New Frontier). I've liked every book of Marco's I've ever read, and disliked every book I've read not edited by Marco since Ordover left (oh, not edited by Marco or KRAD in the case of ebooks and shorts). It took me awhile to figure out the common element between the books liked (and then test the hypothesis blind), but the pattern has borne out. I can only hope that the authors he worked with are able to maintain as high a level as they've shown themselves capable of when working with him, now in his absence.
In the interests of full disclosure, Ed Schlesinger edited A Time for War, a Time for Peace. John hired me to do that finale, and we had agreed that in general the plot would involve Worf's going back to Starfleet and wrapping up various threads and setting Nemesis up, but by the time we got to actually plotting the thing, John was gone and it was Ed.
You mention A Good Day to Die and Honor Bound and A Burning House. What'd you think of Enemy Territory? (And I'm not telling you who edited that one.
Annoying but honest answer: pretty much exactly halfway between
Not my favorite of yours, but with more going on than the first two. Solidly enjoyable.And either way, regarding Ed editing ATFW/ATFP, the point still stands: I think, handily, your best work has been with Marco (and you seem to think so too, if I recall).
My hope is that, since Marco was concentrating on the heavier, arc-based and continuity-laden stories, that Margaret was trying to provide some balance by doing more one-off stories, and that now he's gone she'll dig into the arcs a bit more. But just about everything she's edited has seemed to me to be disconnected and poorly managed, especially the TNG Relaunch, which I found to be maddeningly inconsistent and contradictory.
Interesting. The plot for that one was developed entirely with John. Marco came in late on that one, but he did work on the manuscript.You mention A Good Day to Die and Honor Bound and A Burning House. What'd you think of Enemy Territory? (And I'm not telling you who edited that one.
Annoying but honest answer: pretty much exactly halfway between
I was just curious.
I guess I'll have to fight Allyn for CSI: Baltimore. 'Course, I could so rock the Hon Beehive for the author pic, so I think I should win...
Karen
I guess I'll have to fight Allyn for CSI: Baltimore. 'Course, I could so rock the Hon Beehive for the author pic, so I think I should win...
Karen
I read somewhere that the creators of CSI were thinking of making a series over here (in either just London or more generally in the UK) and I was just thinking that that might be better suited to a book!
Also, does anyone have the rights to NCIS and if so, have any books been published?
And after the new year I'll see if any of the CSI books are in the Library system and give it a go!
^ I'd love to see a tie-in license for NCIS (and I would kick, punch, stab, and gouge my way to the front of the line for potential authors), but Donald Bellasario is reportedly against the notion. The way I heard it (unconfirmed scuttlebutt), is that he wasn't satisfied with tie-in books for one or more of his earlier shows, so nixed the idea of doing it again for NCIS.)
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