I'm working my way through the first book of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series. Length-wise, they own the Trek books.
Star Trek Paperback Novels Are Too Long
- Thread starter Dayton3
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I'm working my way through the first book of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series. Length-wise, they own the Trek books.
Talking about books published seven years ago is not relevant when your first post was talking about the state of Trek books now.
As for the arguably more interesting topic drift about The Stand... the originally published version was the first Stephen King book I read that I disliked. A longer version holds no appeal for me.
For what it's worth, my two longest Star Trek novels to date are Articles of the Federation and The Art of the Impossible, which I also think (and many have agreed) are my two strongest Trek novels. Make of that what you will.
(TAOTI will be unseated from the #2 spot when A Burning House comes out next month, however.)
(TAOTI will be unseated from the #2 spot when A Burning House comes out next month, however.)
HEL-lo, what's all this then.
This is good news... hopefully the size of the book will help offset the time we've been waiting for the further adventures of the Gorkonites. 
Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman
Let's see:
1972: "Where's Star Trek!? :SOB:"
2008: "Stop giving us Star Trek!!!!
"
One of my friends listened to the audio version of "Enterprise The First Adventure". She said the audio version G U T T E D the prose version. It became the Kirk and Spock Show tm. No Bones, no Scotty, no Janice, no Nyota, no Hikaru.
I know, let's have a Star Trek Reader's Digest that condenses the prose novels. :thumbsup:
the DS9 Millenium Omnibus is a w e s o m e!
1972: "Where's Star Trek!? :SOB:"
2008: "Stop giving us Star Trek!!!!
"One of my friends listened to the audio version of "Enterprise The First Adventure". She said the audio version G U T T E D the prose version. It became the Kirk and Spock Show tm. No Bones, no Scotty, no Janice, no Nyota, no Hikaru.
I know, let's have a Star Trek Reader's Digest that condenses the prose novels. :thumbsup:
the DS9 Millenium Omnibus is a w e s o m e!
I couldn't agree more. Any writers who put out a Trek novel longer than a couple hundred pages should be drawn and quartered.
What?
Lengthwise, maybe, but for story the Trek novels have them beat a million times over. IMHO, I found the same recycled plots in each book and it got so bad that I sold them after managing to read less than half of the fourth book. I much prefer long ST books because the stories they tell are so engaging. I'm reading Resistance at the moment and it is really good, such interesting characterisations--and the story is well told as well (and I'm only 72 pages in).Julio Angel Ortiz said:
I'm working my way through the first book of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series. Length-wise, they own the Trek books.
Your harky back to the days when the guidelines for wrting Trek books were a lot more stringent. I remember coming up with an idea for a novel & got to writing about 5 chapters, while waiting for the British arm of Pocket to send their guidelines through. I read them and using them as a reference went through what I had written. Needless to say, that by the time I was finished all my hard work was nothing more than recycyling. I know that the current authors still have to follow certain guidelines and have their work cleared by Paramount/CBS, but they have the opportunity to do things in the Trek Lit universe that they wouldn't have been able to do 10-15 years ago. I feel the reason for the fact that the 'older' Trek novels were so short is because of that reason. To be quite frank, with the high standard of writing that we have been treated to in the last 6-7 years, to complain about the high page count is just a bit dim.
Congratulations on keeping this post to three sentences, man. :thumbsup:
Runes of the Earth, The Last Chronicles of Thomas Convenant Series #1 by Stephen R. Donaldson comes in at 560 pages in trade paperback format. I'm reading the ebook version on my Sony Reader PRS-505. I don't mind the long page count. It gives us a cnace to get to know the characters and the land in which they are in.
Xeris-mas said:
Lengthwise, maybe, but for story the Trek novels have them beat a million times over. IMHO, I found the same recycled plots in each book and it got so bad that I sold them after managing to read less than half of the fourth book. I much prefer long ST books because the stories they tell are so engaging. I'm reading Resistance at the moment and it is really good, such interesting characterisations--and the story is well told as well (and I'm only 72 pages in).Julio Angel Ortiz said:
I'm working my way through the first book of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series. Length-wise, they own the Trek books.
I was definitely referring to length, not story content. I've found the Trek books more enjoyable and easier reads. I must be a masochist to keep trying to get through the book (I keep stopping and going back to it).
No, it's just a reflection of an industry-wide trend. The "preferred" length for a paperback novel has been steadily increasing over the decades. Go to any used bookstore and you'll find that paperback novels in general back in the '60s tended to be 150-200 pages, with the average length going up over time.
And the length isn't entirely arbitrary. Our contracts specify a target length to aim for, though we have some leeway around it. If the editor contracts you to do a 100,000-word book, you try to turn in something between, say, 90K and 110K. If the editor contracts you to do an 85,000-word book, you aim for 75-95K. Trek books are generally longer these days because the editors are asking us for longer books, because audiences in general have come to prefer longer books.
Oh, and the phrase you're going for is "You hearken back" or "You hark back."
I seem to recall zipping right through these, which is a sure sign that they were good, regardless of length.
I reread Dillard's Bloodthirst over the summer, certainly a book from the "good ole days." Despite its shorter length, I didn't find it any shorter than the good Trek lit of the present. It was what it was, a good, classic Trek novel. If the current books are good, their length will be irrelevant.
I think a book should be as long as it needs to be to tell the story. I suppose I personally prefer reads in the 300 page length, but I'm not opposed to a longer read if the story is engaging. Since we have only one mmpb release a month now I would think that even an average reader can get through a 500 page book in a month! If you prefer shorter novels you might try buying an ebook reader and purchase some of the Star Trek ebook only titles. I myself am considering purchasing the Sony Reader and converting over to the electronic format. I'm not sure I can do it as I really love paper books but the Sony Reader is so easy to read and lightweight and stores quite a few novels in it's main memory. I'd be interested to hear others opinions and experience with the Sony Reader.
Kevin
Kevin
"Mr. Excalbian Duplicate of Abraham Lincoln, how long should a Trek novel be?"
"Long enough to reach the last page."
"Long enough to reach the last page."
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