Spoilers TOS 44 Vulcan's Glory by D.C. Fontana Review Thread

[tomswift2002]

I didn't know how I would like this novel when I started it. 80's TOS novels have not had the best track record for me. But this novel was decent, although at times sparse.

From what I could tell, the book is set 5 years before "The Cage", but 2 years after construction on the Enterprise is finished and the ship has been on a few missions, with Pike having had command for about 6-12 months after transferring, with most of his crew and his first officer transferring as well. So Fontana seems to be using a little bit of "Final Frontier", plus using Robert Aprl, without mentioning him.

I also liked the plot with Spock and T'Priss and I was sad to see T'Priss killed off.

Plus Scotty and his engine room hooch was pretty funny, even though Scotty was real a minor character.

 

[Jinn]

Shouldn't there be a Spoiler tag in the title? And a poll?

 

[Bibliomike]

Vulcan's Glory has some real strengths -- what else would one expect, since it is written by D.C. Fontana? -- but it's uneven, particularly where Scotty is concerned. I retro-reviewed it for the Trek.fm website a while ago (with spoilers):

http://trekfm.squarespace.com/capta...es-book-review-of-vulcans-glory-by-dc-fo.html

 

[F. King Daniel]

My memories of this one are a little foggy, but I remember liking the treatment of Spock and the idea that Vulcans can have sex outside their Pon Farr cycle. Scotty's engine room hooch is doubly funny in retrospect, since they filmed the engineering scenes of the 2009 Star Trek in an actual brewery.

 

[Christopher]

Scotty's engine room hooch is doubly funny in retrospect, since they filmed the engineering scenes of the 2009 Star Trek in an actual brewery.

There was going to be a bit in my Abramsverse novel (at least in the first draft -- not sure if I would've kept it) where some character (McCoy, probably) mentioned to Scotty that the engine room looked like a brewery, and Scotty replied, "Yes -- isn't it glorious?"

 

[borgboy]

I read this book last year, and did enjoy it. A standout part of the novel is Spock's relationship with T'Priss. (The spoiler in the opening post really should be hidden as a courtesy to people who haven't read it)
Scotty being on Pike's Enterprise was a surprising addition but I like it.

 

[Greg Cox]

A fun book. For what it's worth, I lifted the Chief Engineer from this book (whose name escapes me at the moment) and featured her prominently in my own Pike novel. After some consideration, though, I avoided the bit about Scotty being on Pike's crew . . . .

 

[Leto_II]

^ Ah, Caitlin Barry. Yes, I was definitely pleased to see her again (plus Sita Mohindas, from Marvel's Star Trek: Early Voyages series). Makes the whole universe seem more interconnected and interesting that way.

 

[Reanok]

I re-read this book a few years ago and I really liked it.

 

[tomswift2002]

Shouldn't there be a Spoiler tag in the title? And a poll?

Why? This book was first published in 1989, almost 30 years ago. That's like putting a spoiler tag on a review of "Romeo & Juliet". There's no point to it.

As for the poll, it was late at night and I really didn't feel like adding one then, or trying to remember what goes on the poll.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

So Fontana seems to be using a little bit of "Final Frontier"

Fontana actually put a bit in there subverting TFF. There's a stray line referring to Spock as "the only child of Sarek of Vulcan," subtly saying that Sybok didn't exist. Fontana also cleverly had Amanda acting as an intermediary between Spock and Sarek, thus preserving the line about them "not speaking as father and son" for however many years it was in Fontana's own "Journey to Babel."

Yeah, Scotty coming on board the Enterprise along with Spock is a bit funky, but for the sake of a funny and original subplot, I'll go with it. It's also a bit weird that Pike's Enterprise has so many Vulcans serving on it, but you couldn't really have a murder mystery with Vulcan suspects without that, so...

When I was putting together my own TOS chronology, I dated this novel to 2252, about 2 years before "The Cage." I can't recall my exact reasoning, though.

 

[Avro Arrow]

Why? This book was first published in 1989, almost 30 years ago. That's like putting a spoiler tag on a review of "Romeo & Juliet". There's no point to it.

A bit of simple courtesy for those who haven't read it yet?

As for the poll, it was late at night and I really didn't feel like adding one then, or trying to remember what goes on the poll.

Good news, under XenForo you can add a poll after the fact, so it's not too late! The option will be under "thread tools" up at the top before the first post.

 

[Idran]

A bit of simple courtesy for those who haven't read it yet?

Forum rules are you only need spoiler codes for works less than six months old, even if there's no spoiler warning in the thread title or tag. And even rules aside, review threads are always assumed to be spoiler-heavy I thought, even for new books? If you open a thread about "Vulcan's Glory", there's an implicit assumption that people will be talking about details of "Vulcan's Glory" in it.

 

[Avro Arrow]

Forum rules are you only need spoiler codes for works less than six months old, even if there's no spoiler warning in the thread title or tag.

Oh, agreed, that's why I didn't even mention rules! But there's things you "have" to do, and then there are things where it's just nice if you do them. And putting a character death right out there in the OP just seems to me like something you shouldn't do, even though it doesn't violate any rules.

And even rules aside, review threads are always assumed to be spoiler-heavy I thought, even for new books? If you open a thread about "Vulcan's Glory", there's an implicit assumption that people will be talking about details of "Vulcan's Glory" in it.

Perhaps you are right, although I had thought I'd seen the occasional "non-spoiler" review thread before. I admit, I'm probably more sensitive than others about this kind of thing. But somebody who happens along and hasn't even heard of Vulcan's Glory before, might poke into the thread to see if it's generally considered good or not, and instead they're confronted with a character death right in the OP. Now if they do decide to read it, they're going to have that knowledge in the back of their mind.

Anyway, I didn't really mean to derail the thread into another discussion about spoilers. I wasn't even the one who raised the initial concern. But the OP asked "Why?", so I provided a possible answer.

 

[trampledamage]

Since the only threads in this forum that usually get the spoiler tag are the review threads, I find it also usefully works as a flag to those threads. So I've added it. However, since I'm trying to catch up on my reading while recovering from a bout of flu, I won't be adding the poll, tom can add that if he wants to.

 

[tomswift2002]

Fontana actually put a bit in there subverting TFF. There's a stray line referring to Spock as "the only child of Sarek of Vulcan," subtly saying that Sybok didn't exist. Fontana also cleverly had Amanda acting as an intermediary between Spock and Sarek, thus preserving the line about them "not speaking as father and son" for however many years it was in Fontana's own "Journey to Babel."


When I was putting together my own TOS chronology, I dated this novel to 2252, about 2 years before "The Cage." I can't recall my exact reasoning, though.

Wrong "Final Frontier". But at the same time, with the movie "Final Frontier" also coming out in late-1989 (I think the "Vulcan's Glory" was originally published in August of 89---I was actually reading the 2006 reprint so it had the July 2006 date) would Fontana have even known what occurred in the movie? I know she was involved in the TV series, and even TNG and later DS9 a little bit, but was she involved in the movies enough to be able to have seen a script that mentioned Sybok. I'm assuming that Fontana probably started Glory sometime in late-1988, so would she have even seen a script, or would she have been relying on her editor at Pocket to be double-checking to make sure nothing was contradicted.

As for my dating of the book, I relied on a few things. One it's generally been assumed that the Enterprise had been built 20 years before the framing parts of "The Menagerie", and, two in "The Menagerie" Spock says that the events of "The Cage" take place 13 years earlier. So I've got the years 2246 (Enterprise built), 2253 (The Cage) and 2266 (The Menagerie). Now then in "Vulcan's Glory" it is mentioned that the story takes place only 2 years after construction on the Enterprise has been completed. So that would place it in 2248.

 

[Bibliomike]

Besides, as far as anyone knew (well, anyone but Spock and Sarek - did Amanda know about Syobk?) knew at the time Vulcan's Glory is set, Spock was "the only child of Sarek of Vulcan." To say that sentence is some kind of intentional thumb-nosing at the film is reading too much into the text, imo.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

Wrong "Final Frontier". But at the same time, with the movie "Final Frontier" also coming out in late-1989 (I think the "Vulcan's Glory" was originally published in August of 89---I was actually reading the 2006 reprint so it had the July 2006 date) would Fontana have even known what occurred in the movie? I know she was involved in the TV series, and even TNG and later DS9 a little bit, but was she involved in the movies enough to be able to have seen a script that mentioned Sybok. I'm assuming that Fontana probably started Glory sometime in late-1988, so would she have even seen a script, or would she have been relying on her editor at Pocket to be double-checking to make sure nothing was contradicted.

Besides, as far as anyone knew (well, anyone but Spock and Sarek - did Amanda know about Syobk?) knew at the time Vulcan's Glory is set, Spock was "the only child of Sarek of Vulcan." To say that sentence is some kind of intentional thumb-nosing at the film is reading too much into the text, imo.

D.C. Fontana confirmed the intention behind the line to our own @Therin of Andor at a con:

http://www.trekbbs.com/threads/sybok-20-years-later.43982/page-2#post-1281534

TomSwift, apologies for my error as to which "Final Frontier" you were talking about. That wasn't initially clear to me when reading your comment.

 

[Bibliomike]

"She smiled and winked."
I don't know, you could be right, but that doesn't sound like an explicit confirmation to me - sounds like a writer having fun with a fan (in a nice way) ... maybe an acknowledgement she felt the same way. The calendar seems wrong for it to be so, as TomSwift says above... but, I wasn't there, and Therin was, and I don't have any explicit proof of my hypothesis, either.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

As for my dating of the book, I relied on a few things. One it's generally been assumed that the Enterprise had been built 20 years before the framing parts of "The Menagerie", and, two in "The Menagerie" Spock says that the events of "The Cage" take place 13 years earlier. So I've got the years 2246 (Enterprise built), 2253 (The Cage) and 2266 (The Menagerie). Now then in "Vulcan's Glory" it is mentioned that the story takes place only 2 years after construction on the Enterprise has been completed. So that would place it in 2248.

I just double-checked my TOS Chronology. I misremembered which year I'd put Vulcan's Glory in. I actually put in 2254, maybe a few months before "The Cage." My reasoning was largely based on the biography of Spock that Number One gives during the crew briefing with Pike. Here are the highlights from my timeline:

-Mar. 2230 - Spock is born on Vulcan (38 years before "Amok Time" in 2268, based upon Leonard Nimoy’s age.)
-2237 - Spock bonded with T'Pring at age 7.
-Mar. 2244 - Secret launch of the Enterprise in the Final Frontier novel. (based on Jim Kirk's birthday)
-2246 - Spock enters Starfleet at age 16, after choosing not to enroll at the Vulcan Science Academy.
-2248 - Spock's scheduled marriage to T'Pring (6 years before VG.)
-2249 - Spock graduates Starfleet Academy after 3 years on the accelerated Vulcan course. Amanda attends her son’s graduation ceremony on Earth. (She states it's been "5 years" since his graduation in VG.)
-2249 - Ensign Spock begins 3 years as an assistant science officer on a space cutter in the Sol system.
-Late 2250 - Christopher Pike promoted to Captain. Number One becomes Christopher Pike’s first officer. (She's been Pike's first officer for 4 years, first on the Yorktown and then on the Enterprise.)
-Mid 2251 - While on a visit to his parents in Mojave, Captain Christopher Pike is introduced to Janeese Carlisle by mutual friends. Pike and Carlisle soon become lovers. (2 & 1/2 years ago, according to VG.)
-Early 2252 - Spock (age 22) promoted to Lieutenant J.G. & serves on the Artemis as third officer & science officer.
-Late 2252 - T’Pris’s husband, Lt. Sepel, is killed in a violent alien encounter on Lindoria while both are serving the USS Musashi. (T’Pris has been a widow for “just over a year” in late 2253.)
-Dec. 2253 - Christopher Pike learns that his lover Janeese Carlisle has fallen in love with one of her instructors at Starfleet Academy.
-Late Dec. 2253 - Spock (age 23) returns to Vulcan for the first time in nearly 8 years. He agrees to delay his marriage with T’Pring until the time of his Pon Farr. (Month & Spock's age given in VG.)
-Late Dec. 2253 - Spock is promoted to Lieutenant & transferred to the Enterprise as second officer and science officer. Lieutenant (J.G.) Scott (age 33) transfers aboard the Enterprise as an assistant engineering officer. (11 years, 4 months & 5 days before Kirk takes command of the Enterprise in April 2265.)
-Jan. 2254 - The main events of VG. (2 weeks after Spock arrives on the Enterprise.)
-2264 - Sarek & Spock break their silence. Spock visits his parents on Vulcan. The visit is a strained one because of Sarek’s disapproval of Spock’s career choice. (This was a bit of conjecture on my part, as Amanda says in "Journey To Babel" that Sarek & Spock have not spoken as father & son in 18 years, but she also says that Spock has not been home in 4 years. If you add 4 years to their 18-year estrangement, it allows Spock’s service record to stretch back to 2246, which jibes with Vulcan’s Glory.)

I don't remember references to the age of the Enterprise in the novel, but I'll keep an eye out for them if I ever go back to my Trek timeline.