I just finished this. It was slow going for a bit... I think i was a bit burned out on Trek. But then i blasted through the last 200 pages in an afternoon. Great stuff James. I'll be there for whatever comes next
Titan seems to be going in a great direction. Exploration and intrigue. Get going on the next one Mr. Swallow!
Thanks for the kind words. Actually, m'colleague David Mack is writing the next Titan novel - Fortune of War - and I can tell you from our discussions about the plotline, it'll be a good one...
I've been working on this one for a while now, and I came across something I wanted to ask about. They made a reference to the Dominion attempting to build their own artificial wormhole, which I know happened in the TNG Dominion War books. I wasn't sure if this was actually reference though, since the DW book feature a post-Maquis fate for Ro Laren that's incompatible with the DS9 Relaunch. So is this one of those situations where we ignore the incompatible parts, or was it just a coincidental similarity?
Cool, now I have more motivation to read them. The first TNG book (actually Book 3) is another one I've had for ages, but haven't gotten around to reading. Just want to say I'm loving the book so far, I'm about 300 pages into it, so I'll probably be posting my review in the near future.
Just finished this late last night, and I really enjoyed it. Schims has always been one of my favorite TNG episodes, and this was a great sequel. I really liked the way the book developed the Solanae, they went from basically mysterious, nameless monsters, to a fully developed culture. Honestly, I think what we learned about them here actually makes them more intimidating villains. I really hope we see them again. The new additions to the cast were both good characters. Well, Sarai actually wasn't new, but she does seem to be sticking around now, and she got some nice character development here. Her attitude and history made a nice source of conflict on the ship. Kyzak was really interesting, the whole cowboy on a starship thing was pretty fun. The set up for a potential relationship between him and Melora Pazlar was nice, and I look forward to seeing where it goes. I'm a dog person, so I got a big kick out of Dinac, even though they were technically fox-like rather than dog-like. After seeing so much of the Caitians over the last few years it was nice to see some canines. This one get an outstanding from me.
Did the author get the idea of those of those tentacle creatures from the Replicators from SG-1? They even use the replicator to make more of themselves.
Nope. The "creatures in the replicator" idea was from an unsold story pitch I wrote for Star Trek Voyager.
I see. I still got that vibe from them. That and the Xenomorphs of course. Just finished the novel and I really enjoyed it but I do think Tuvok was screwed over again. Poor guy seems to be stuck as second officer for nearly 20 years now. Vale should have left and he should be the captain now. Would make a more interesting change. So I assume afterwards the Solanae make an alliance with the Iconians? I know that isn’t canon with the novels but this could make a good prelude to that.
I read the novel and play STO. The novel’s Solanae seem too xenophobic/“chosen people”-attituded to ally with anyone other than to form an axis of evil. Whereas in STO they’re just another loyal so-called servitor race of the Iconian Empire/Iconian Whole. However, we only ever see some of their scientists in STO, and they flee when approached. Maybe they’re another faction, rather than representing their kind as a whole.
Personally I think of STO and the Novelverse as two totally distinct universe that just happen to share a few species names/designs
Right. They aren't intended to be compatible. As a rule, different publishers' Trek tie-ins have not shared continuity, except on intermittent occasions. And STO has completely different goals from the novels. Its makers have chosen to design a game that emphasizes conflict and combat, which requires them to portray alien cultures in ways that make them suitable as fighting-game antagonists. The novels take a different approach.
I think I may have said this elsewhere, but my original intent was to create a new name for the "fish monk" Solanagen-based alien species - I was going to call them the "Ciari", after actor Brian Ciari, who played one of the aliens in the episode. However, when we were in the edit phase for Sight Unseen, Pocket Books asked me to use the Star Trek Online name for them - Solanae - instead. The Ciari name still appears, but as the description of a faction of the Solanae we meet in the story. I've played a fair bit of STO myself, so I liked the idea of having a little crossover; and I've occasionally made oblique references to other STO stuff in my other books. But I pretty much follow Jinn's point of view here and see STO as a possible future/parallel timeline kinda thing...
Interesting. I wonder if the editors would insist on the name Undine for Species 8472. I haven’t read a book about them yet.
I think they only appeared briefly in VGR: Unworthy and wenre't named Undine (although Unworthy is from 2009 and therefore predates STO). Honestly, I'd prefer if they would keep the STO terms from the Novelverse termns. Makes it easier to talk about either, IMO. Also, the Elachi/Vertians/Shroomies technically were introduced into the STO universe before appearing in Rise of the Federation, but only by a month, so it was probably too late to rename them anway.