nope, I have no problem with Vaughn being the focus of a book or four.
Focus on Vaughn is fine. No focus on anyone else is less than ideal in my view, and no focus on anyone at all, as has been the case since Warpath, is even worse
The Soul Key
- Thread starter toughlittleship
- Start date
Focus on Vaughn is fine. No focus on anyone else is less than ideal in my view, and no focus on anyone at all, as has been the case since Warpath, is even worse
When Stessi (sp) dies.
I can probably count on one hand the number of times I've cried in the last... ohh... 5, 6 years? Very cold. But that part was touching.
Ah, yes. Thank you for sharing!
I'm afraid I still don't understand what the problem is here. The schedule on DS9 books has been slow lately because of delays: frustrating, yes, but nothing to do with "neglect" of the series as has been suggested several times on this thread. Some people also aren't enjoying the Ghemor-alternate universe plot as much as previous stories in this series and feel that recent offerings in the relaunch haven't been as strong as the older ones. Fair enough, of course, although I disagree. However, why are people seemingly suggesting that this means the relaunch is in trouble or failing or being neglected? Not every story arc can please everyone. I know a lot of people didn't particularly like the Andorian reproduction plot as much as some of the other arcs, but that apparently didn't put them off the series. We're getting two books this year, which equals 2005's number of offerings. The rapid pace in the first few years can't be maintained forever, particularly with the number of series we have now and the limited number of available slots. As for TV characters being under-represented, I'm not buying that. Kira is the focus of the current story arc, and Sisko has just been sent on a mission of great importance. According to "Destiny", Dax will play a major role in resolving the current crisis, too. I'm guessing O'Brien will show up again in "The Never-Ending Sacrifice". Odo hasn't been seen for a while, yes, I'll give you that. I apologise if I'm missing something, but I still don't see the problem here.
I will get the next DS9 relaunch books but I am also one of the readers who lost a lot of the enthusiasm I had in the past. Things tend to get overly complicated and it didn`t help that some writers seem to think it is a good idea not to spell things out clearly but to play games with the readers. I certainly felt that way about the several Kiras and Illianas.
I was confused and sometimes even irritated then. I haven`t read these books for ages and by now, there is a lot I don`t remember.
I have no idea any more who the Ascendants are and the various religious factions surrounding the Prophets.
Hopefully these coming books will be able to rekindle my interest and refresh my memory properly without dumping more confusion on me.
Well, I may of course be dead wrong, but to me the clues are pointing towards important connections between the Ascendant storyline and the alternate universes/timelines storyline.
What everyone seems to be forgetting is that DS9 was the only serialised Trek show and the post-finale books have kept that - Avatar to Unity serving as a de facto season 8 and with Worlds of DS9 to The Soul Key serving as (a truncated) season 9. Season 10 would pick up with The Never Ending Sacrifice and move on the Ascendant storyline, I hope.
The other 24th century series haven't all been merged into a meta-arc as some are saying. The Typhon Pact is likely to be TNG/Aventine-focused arc only since Titan is back out there exploring and will be too far away to get back and Voyager and co. are back in the DQ, both of the latter telling their own stories which may or may not have any bearing on the Typhon Pact.
I would rather keep DS9 as it is than artificially move it forward like what was done with Voyager. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed Full Circle, but the fact that the previous Voyager post-finale novels have been less than stellar IMO meant that something had to be done - even if I didn't like completely how they did it.
The other 24th century series haven't all been merged into a meta-arc as some are saying. The Typhon Pact is likely to be TNG/Aventine-focused arc only since Titan is back out there exploring and will be too far away to get back and Voyager and co. are back in the DQ, both of the latter telling their own stories which may or may not have any bearing on the Typhon Pact.
I would rather keep DS9 as it is than artificially move it forward like what was done with Voyager. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed Full Circle, but the fact that the previous Voyager post-finale novels have been less than stellar IMO meant that something had to be done - even if I didn't like completely how they did it.
The DS9 relaunch has always been about taking risks and trying experiments in how it moves the storyline forward. It hasn't been a linear "and then A happened, and then B happened, and then C happened, and then D happened, and you can skip the book in which C happened if you're not interested in C" kind of series. It's always been about having a lot of interconnected, ongoing stories explored in different ways, through novels in Trek crossovers, through short story collections, through the Mission: Gamma/Rising Son stories mirroring each other, through the Worlds of DS9 stories moving stories forward while exploring individual cultures in detail, through the Fearful Symmetry flipbook. There's always a lot going on, and skipping books is not a good idea.
As for the whole it's all one big post-Destiny Typhon Expanse story now... crossovers can be interesting as an occasional event, but there are a lot of fans who aren't interested in every series. Should, for example, people who like DS9 but not TNG have to read the latest TNG novel to see what's going to affect the next DS9 novel? Do we really need an endless crossover for all 24th century series? I like continuity, I like Destiny, I'm intrigued by the Typhon Pact, but I don't want all the Trek I read to be about that one storyline.
As I say, what makes you assume the Ascendant arc won't be linking up with the Ghemor-alternate universe arc?
You are taking a very optimistic view. I do hope it is warranted, but I confess I think the current state of affairs suggests that some serious effort needs to be made for the DS9 relaunch not to die of attrition.
The deranged Kira clone killing spree arc (LoL?) will probably join up with the Ascendant arc eventually, but at the current pace I don't think many readers will remember or care by the time that happens.
At what point do "inevitable delays" or whatever become outright neglect? Does it matter? If people stop reading because you haven't been continuing the story, and what story there is begins to seem obsolete and irrelevant when compared to TNG/Voyager/Titan stories and Destiny-style crossover stories, then whether or not we choose the term "neglect" or some other term hardly matters.
The DS9 relaunch was extremely successful. I find it hard to believe that its success can be maintained given how the material has been handled in recent years.
A couple of other points:
This is the second time in the last page or two that it has been revealed that *gasp* all the crews won't be appearing in all the novels in some kind of permanent crossover event. That is not the point that is being made with regard to DS9's absence from the TNG/Voyager/Titan/Destiny-Typhoon Pact continuity that has been established.
Naturally a given ship can spin off on its own adventures, but to the extent that Destiny is seen as successful (and I think it will be seen as such), there will be more events of this kind that TNG, Voyager and Titan will be spun in and out of just as they were with Destiny. Their stories will be imagined as a coherent whole, and this will be the main "relaunch" storyline where any major Federation and galaxy-shaping events occur.
Overall, this is good. It makes sense to continue the story of TNG/DS9/Voyager era Trek in this way. What doesn't make sense is excluding DS9 and most of its characters from this main storyline.
I believe this is a false problem. Each crew can certainly have its own storyline. As has been pointed out already more than once, Voyager and Titan are having such storylines right now. I don't think we are in danger of having some kind of giant amalgam Star Trek blob where everyone is appearing in every story.
What would be disappointing, and probably untenable in the long term, is a situation in which DS9's story is paddling along at a snail's pace several years behind the main storyline.
That situation would leave us with the following major negatives:
1) DS9's story will have to be limited to whatever areas of the Trek universe are not dealt with in the main storyline, and events in the DS9 story won't have any impact on the wider context of the Federation. Moreover DS9 is not a starship, so it is not so easy to send these characters off to have their own adventures. More than any other series, DS9 needs to be anchored in the larger context of the Federation and the galactic situation as a whole. Thus running behind the main story will have a more detrimental impact on DS9 than it would on any other series.
2) Most of DS9's characters will be excluded from future Destiny-style crossovers when they happen, and (if Destiny is seen as a success) they will happen.
3) The bulk of Pocket's creative and financial resources will be devoted to the main story, especially if it is the most financially successful, which I think is extremely likely. The drop in quality and frequency of DS9 books (that we have already witnessed) would therefore be more likely to continue, rather than less likely.
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As I say, what makes you assume the Ascendant arc won't be linking up with the Ghemor-alternate universe arc?
I'm not I just found that part boring and am looking forward to plots that are directly focused on the Ascendants.
Are you being deliberately obtuse? The DS9 TV show had a pretty major galactic event, the Dominion War, and it was further back than TNG and Voyager. The fact that DS9 is further behind means that the writers can foreshadow future events which will come to fruition in TNG/TTN/VOY if they so choose.
Destiny was a massive undertaking and while it was very successful, due to the fact that there is now just a single editor for the Trek lines (as well as other tie-in franchises) at Pocket, I don't see Margaret Clark creating another one any time soon. The Typhon Pact arc will be hard enough to manage.
This is total BS. Pocket's creative resources are the writers and they are working on all the lines of Trek: Vanguard, Titan, New Frontier, Voyager, DS9, Next Generation, TOS, Gorkon, MyrU, MU, CoE, etc...and the financial resources are paying them to do that. There is no bias toward the "main story" no matter what the month-by-month publication schedule looks like.
No, sir. You are the one taking a very pessimistic view:
I mean, sweet Jesus, you make Marvin the Paranoid Android look like Pollyanna. And all this doom-and-gloom without having clue #1 about what will be in The Soul Key, without knowing if or how The Never-Ending Sacrifice will contribute to the post-WYLB storylines, and without knowing what Pocket's plans for DS9 are beyond the end of this year. One has to wonder why you're interested at all in the DS9-R if all it does is inspire such horrible depression.
(BTW, that was a really despicable insult to the writers and editors, equating the delays they've faced to "outright neglect." You owe them a round of apologies.)
I think you are overestimating the clarity of your point of view.
The DS9 television series did (of course) deal with events throughout the Federation, but it certainly wasn't behind TNG or Voyager at the time. DS9 had inherited all the alpha quandrant material from TNG and was responsible for continuity in the entire Federation (everywhere but the Delta Quandrant). It was the primary source of continuity in the Trek universe from season 3 onward. That's what allowed an event like the Dominion War to take place during the television series.
Events in the Federation as a whole have already been mapped out for several years beyond DS9's story, and will continue to move forward. They can move forward with the involvement of DS9's characters, or without them. I hope that it is with them, at least eventually.
It was successful, ergo it will happen again. Not for a few years probably, but eventually there will be another crossover event. It would be disappointing if most of the DS9 characters are not involved.
Despite your insistance that it is "BS," Pocket's Star Trek line is like any other business, at least as far as I know. It needs to turn a profit, and whatever is most financially successful will be focused upon. That doesn't mean there is bias toward a given group of characters by any means. For example, I don't gather that Voyager novels have sold very well in the past, but there certainly has been an effort to change that with Full Circle spinning out of Destiny.
I expect that if sales of the DS9 relaunch novels don't continue to be good, something similar would be attempted.
Certainly, for argumentative purposes in this thread anyway
However, if anything I have said here has insulted any writer or editor, I most sincerely apologize. I can only imagine the vast undertaking of organizing all this material
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Is there a reason why David Mack only did Warpath, and then wasn't asked to work on the rest of the story? I would have really preferred that he was given this job. It would also have kept those delays from happening with the DS9-R continuations.
How do you define "rest of the story?" As in DM should be the sole author of the DS9-R? because it doesn't have an "end" to that "story." And this would definitely cause much delays in the DS9 books if only one author were working on them.
Ah, but then we might have missed out on "Destiny". Even more DS9-relaunch wouldn't be worth losing out on "Destiny".
Let me clarify. I meant he probably should have done the rest of the 'alternate Kiras' arc. Not the entire DS9-R (although that would be cool).
^ There are two reasons: No one asked me, and I haven't had the time.
Marco's intention for the DS9 post-finale books was to have it incorporate a range of authorial voices and styles. He originally had intended for an author named Leanna Morrow to pen Fearful Symmetry. Figuring the DS9 saga was covered, he assigned me to other projects. There was no way he could have known at that time that Morrow would ultimately have to withdraw from the DS9 project.
In addition to the fact that he had someone else in mind to write Fearful Symmetry, he also had asked me to work on the third book of the Star Trek Vanguard series, and I had been tapped to write my Wolverine novel, Road of Bones, around that time. I was also starting development on my proposal for The Calling around then.
By the time it became apparent that there were also issues complicating the completion of Fearful Symmetry by its second author, Olivia Woods, I was already deeply enmeshed in the Star Trek Destiny trilogy, and I was contractually committed to at least two books after the trilogy: The 4400: Promises Broken and Star Trek Vanguard: Precipice.
Bottom line: There's no great conspiracy at Pocket to make a mess of the DS9 books, and no one at Pocket has given up on them. Sometimes things just get messed up and don't go as planned, no matter how hard the writers and/or editors try to prevent it.
These things will get sorted out soon, I think. Just be patient, folks.
Marco's intention for the DS9 post-finale books was to have it incorporate a range of authorial voices and styles. He originally had intended for an author named Leanna Morrow to pen Fearful Symmetry. Figuring the DS9 saga was covered, he assigned me to other projects. There was no way he could have known at that time that Morrow would ultimately have to withdraw from the DS9 project.
In addition to the fact that he had someone else in mind to write Fearful Symmetry, he also had asked me to work on the third book of the Star Trek Vanguard series, and I had been tapped to write my Wolverine novel, Road of Bones, around that time. I was also starting development on my proposal for The Calling around then.
By the time it became apparent that there were also issues complicating the completion of Fearful Symmetry by its second author, Olivia Woods, I was already deeply enmeshed in the Star Trek Destiny trilogy, and I was contractually committed to at least two books after the trilogy: The 4400: Promises Broken and Star Trek Vanguard: Precipice.
Bottom line: There's no great conspiracy at Pocket to make a mess of the DS9 books, and no one at Pocket has given up on them. Sometimes things just get messed up and don't go as planned, no matter how hard the writers and/or editors try to prevent it.
These things will get sorted out soon, I think. Just be patient, folks.
Simply that that's never been the DS9-R's MO. Marco created the project to use multiple authors and points of view, and many different types of story, from multi-series crossovers like Section 31 and Gateways to four-part epics like Mission Gamma to parallel novellas like Worlds of DS9 to flip-books like Fearful Symmetry. It was never intended to be one person's project (unlike the VOY-R, which was intended to be exactly that).
Marco wanted the variety that comes with multiple authors and the unique things they can bring to the table. I like to think that Margaret will follow that intention when she takes over. And anyway, the 'alternate Kiras' story was never all David Mack's in the first place. It was set up in multiple earlier stories, from J Noah Kym's "Fragments and Omens" to DRG3's "Olympus Descending" to Sarah Shaw's "Saturn's Children." Just because you like what Mack did with it (as we all do) is no reason for him to be the only one to write from then on.
EDIT: or basically exactly what Dave just beat me to saying.
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