Voyager- The Relaunch

[Akiraprise]

^ Aghh!!!
I haven't gotten to those TNG books yet. I thought it was a spoiler about the VOY relaunch which I've read.

 

[kimc]

^ Aghh!!!
I haven't gotten to those TNG books yet. I thought it was a spoiler about the VOY relaunch which I've read.

Dang it - I did try!

I've changed the tag so hopefully no one else will find out unless they want to.

 

[kimc]

That's not the Janeway way. Deletion is what that old crow is all about.

There are people who post in this forum who are older than Janeway so knock it off or it's a warning for trolling.

 

[Orac Zen]

Unfortunately, after

Spoiler: TNG books

Janeway underwent a bizarre personality change then was killed of in a Next Generation book of all things

I won't be reading any more re-launch books.

The complete and utter stupidity of that move defies belief. I was...quite disgusted when I read that particular tome, and it's moved me much closer to giving up on the Trek books altogether.

 

[tenmei]

Why so? It was a move nobody expected for a character, who in an Admiralty position would be increasingly hard to fit into a VOY Relaunch set up.

 

[freak]

I have read the Spirit Walk series of books where Chakotay is in command of Voyager. I thought his crew was very interesting and loved the plot twists in the book! The Changling made me wanna do some nail biting. I'm not sure about the Re-launch Voyager books though. I've been getting mixed views from people. I might order it on amazon.com though and just read for myself.

 

[Akiraprise]

They're not unreadable. They just could be a lot better. You'll definitely be able to get through them.

 

[tenmei]

I can't wait for Kristen Beyer's Re-Relaunch

 

[Janeway4Prez]

I thought the first two books, "Homecoming" and "Farther Shore" were rather good. I also believe I seemed to be in the minority in thinking so when they were published. This was before the flux of Borg-drama that have dominated the novels recently so I felt the whole Borg virus was interesting and written well. Then came the 'Spirit Walk' duo-logy and that pretty much ruined the Voyager Relaunch in my opinion. The characters were spread too far apart, given plots that reasonably couldn't all be covered fairly. Plus Golden always tends to go Chakotay-heavy and the books just felt weak, lame and dull.

I've said this before but it's been my experience as a Trek lit reader that the characters tend to be handled better outside the 'Voyager Relaunch' realms. Janeway has appeared in numerous novels as an admiral - from Shatner's books through the 'A Time To ...' series. The recent TNG novels pretty much ruined her character though, reducing her to bone-head, b*tchy, moronic admiral of the week. The EMH doctor made some appearances in the Shatner novels and had a nice role throughout. Tuvok is a main character in the Titan series, handled far better than how Golden wrote him in her novels. Torres/Paris really haven't appeared elsewhere, neither has Chakotay or Kim. Seven's appearances in the recent TNG novels have for the most part been handled well.

I'm glad someone else is finally being allowed to write for the Voyager Relaunch. I think it was a grand mistake on the editors part to not allow anyone other than Golden to write for the series considering her vision seemed to be a bit flawed and flat.

 

[TMara]

I mostly agree. Shipping Tuvok off to the Titan where he gets tortured and beaten up every book was a bad idea. And Janeway making best friends with Mark and wifey is just plain lame. And shipping Belanna off to the Klingon planet was a bad idea also. 7 and Icheb are caged and tortured for almost two books.

And here I thought shipping Tuvie off to the Titan was his once in a lifetime chance to get some "screen time" *at all* in Trek books, considering that Golden pretty much forgot he exists. I think if you put all the scenes together where Tuvie is mentioned in all 4 of her books, you probably couldn't fill 20 pages... (shudder!)

 

[Jack Bauer]

Unfortunately, after

Spoiler: TNG books

Janeway underwent a bizarre personality change then was killed of in a Next Generation book of all things

I won't be reading any more re-launch books.

Based on how it ended I'm not sure that situation is permanent.

 

[Orac Zen]

Why so?

My reasons for basically giving up on the Trek books are many and varied (and this forum really isn't the place to go into them). That particular move (even though I've no doubt some magic solution will be found to undo it at some point) was a last-straw type thing rather than the whole and sole reason.

Plus Golden always tends to go Chakotay-heavy and the books just felt weak, lame and dull.

She does make it perfectly clear which characters she likes best, essentially ignoring everyone else in the process.

The recent TNG novels pretty much ruined her character though, reducing her to bone-head, b*tchy, moronic admiral of the week.

This is one of the reasons I'm rapidly losing what interest I had in the Trek books. It would have been nice if that particular Trek cliche was avoided, but no such luck.

Tuvok is a main character in the Titan series, handled far better than how Golden wrote him in her novels.

That wouldn't be difficult, given his near-invisibility in Ms. Golden's works. She's made her total lack of interest in the character quite clear.

I'm glad someone else is finally being allowed to write for the Voyager Relaunch. I think it was a grand mistake on the editors part to not allow anyone other than Golden to write for the series considering her vision seemed to be a bit flawed and flat.

QFT. This isn't really the right forum to air my views of Ms. Golden's writing but you've summed them up pretty well - and much more tactfully than I'd have managed.

And here I thought shipping Tuvie off to the Titan was his once in a lifetime chance to get some "screen time" *at all* in Trek books, considering that Golden pretty much forgot he exists. I think if you put all the scenes together where Tuvie is mentioned in all 4 of her books, you probably couldn't fill 20 pages... (shudder!)

Probably not even that many. Don't get me started on Ms. Golden's treatment of Tuvok.

(And he's still not yours, TMara. )

 

[Turbo]

In response to the ongoing spoilers, here's Kirsten Beyer's take on it from the Full Circle discussion thread in TrekLit. Spoilers for the DS9 and TNG Relaunches ahoy:

Spoiler: DS9 and TNG Relaunches

*Sigh* It wasn't my intention to be insulting, and if that was the case then I apologize.

Thank you. No worries.

Perhaps I simply shouldn't come into these threads, since my passion can get a jump on my judgment. But I liked Janeway, despite (and perhaps sometimes because of) all the flak she received, and I just feel that she's been treated abominably of late in the fiction.

On the contrary...I'd hate to see you go. And please understand, for the reasons you state and a million others, I loved Janeway. Loved her. For all that Kate Mulgrew did, and a lot of what the series writers did.

But in many ways I honestly felt Janeway was treated abominably long before the books got a hold of her and I do feel your pain.

Worse yet, I can't understand why, since it seems like there were so many possibilities to pursue. It seems like it's jumping the gun.

As to that, unfortunately I can't give you the answer you are seeking. And there were times when I thought (because I did know long before you did) hell, if they're going to kill her, maybe we should just wrap the series up. After all, what is Voyager without Janeway?

But the more I thought about it, the more I could see that there was still great potential there and I got really excited about the idea of exploring it.

DS9 and what was done between Sisko's disappearance and his return was actually a huge inspiration for me. I'm also a huge Sisko fan, but I wouldn't trade a moment of the DS9 relaunch arc when no one knew if he'd ever return and everybody was moving on with their lives on the assumption that he wasn't. If Sisko's still around, do we get to spend as much time getting to know Vaughn? I keep having to remind myself when I read about him that he's created just for the books and wasn't actually part of the TV show.

As time goes on and we unveil the new stories, I hope that you'll be pleasantly surprised by the possibilities that are still on the table.

When we last saw Janeway, she was having a conversation with a Q. If the intent was that Janeway should be understood to be completely and irreversibly deader than the proverbial parrot pining for the fjords, with no reset button of any kind ever, not only should that scene not have appeared in Before Dishonor, Q should have been completely absent from the book.

FWIW, when I first began developing the material that would become Full Circle, I was told only that Janeway would die. I did not learn of the Q angle until I was handed the galleys of BD, which was many moons later.

So much of what I created was based on the premise that she was not mostly dead, but dead dead.

Also bear in mind that FC covers the period from 2377 - well before Janeway's death in mid 2380 - through the beginning of 2381. For those who love Janeway there's plenty of Janeway still to come. BD is hardly the last word on this character.

As to the future, I can't speak to what others may choose to do with the mostly dead angle. Personally, I'm going to honor the intent of BD as it was originally conceived, which is that Janeway died. For all we know, when any of us die there's a snarky alien with delusions of omnipotence waiting to offer us our beverage of choice. Is it heaven or is it Iowa? How come some people get to go check out the nifty corn field and some people aren't invited? I don't know.

I just know that it doesn't automatically follow that because the Q showed up that means Janeway can, or more importantly should just come back - at least right away.

YMMV

Personally, I'm quite excited about Full Circle, based on Kirsten's comments. She really seems to get the characters (or at least Janeway), which is a huge step up from Christie Golden.

 

[Lynx]

I mostly agree. Shipping Tuvok off to the Titan where he gets tortured and beaten up every book was a bad idea. And Janeway making best friends with Mark and wifey is just plain lame. And shipping Belanna off to the Klingon planet was a bad idea also. 7 and Icheb are caged and tortured for almost two books.

And here I thought shipping Tuvie off to the Titan was his once in a lifetime chance to get some "screen time" *at all* in Trek books, considering that Golden pretty much forgot he exists. I think if you put all the scenes together where Tuvie is mentioned in all 4 of her books, you probably couldn't fill 20 pages... (shudder!)

I can also mention that Tuvok is not particularily prominent in the Christie Golden book The Murdered Sun" which takes place in the first season of the series while he plays a more prominent role in the excellent Christie Golden book "Marooned" which takes place in Voyager's season 3.

However, sending him off to Titan is not a good idea. I think that's the greatest problem with the relaunch for me, that the main characters are so split up. And I do have some problems with the new characters as well. It's hard to imagine Voyager without Kes, Neelix, Paris, Torres, Tuvok, The Doctor and Janeway herself. Instead we have Vorik as a main character, that new Doctor who I simply find a bad replacement to the EMH.

And Harry as security chief!

 

[Akiraprise]

That's probably one of my biggest issues too. With the Niner relaunch the series left them all pretty much at DS9. With the VOY relaunch everybody is split up. It's like Star Trek: Voyager version 2.0

 

[Defcon]

That's probably one of my biggest issues too. With the Niner relaunch the series left them all pretty much at DS9.

Mmh, let's see.

DS9 has Worf, Odo, Miles and Keiko O'Brien, Jake & Ben Sisko (for most of the books) off the station.

Voyager has the Doctor, Tuvok, Seven of Nine, Janeway, Torres and Icheb off the ship.

So it's pretty much an equal number of people not on their old post in both series.

 

[Danoz]

I mostly agree. Shipping Tuvok off to the Titan where he gets tortured and beaten up every book was a bad idea. And Janeway making best friends with Mark and wifey is just plain lame. And shipping Belanna off to the Klingon planet was a bad idea also. 7 and Icheb are caged and tortured for almost two books.

Blood lust?

Janeway's relationship with her former lover and his... lover.. was weird. All of a sudden Janeway and wifey are like best friends.

I actually liked the Klingon story arch.. one of the more interesting parts.

 

[Turbo]

That's probably one of my biggest issues too. With the Niner relaunch the series left them all pretty much at DS9. With the VOY relaunch everybody is split up. It's like Star Trek: Voyager version 2.0

For me, it wasn't the fact that the crew was split up that was the problem, but the fact that the replacement crew was so boring. The best characters in Christie Golden's relaunch novels were Dr. Kaz and Libby Webber, and that's not saying much.

 

[kimc]

Unfortunately, after

Spoiler: TNG books

Janeway underwent a bizarre personality change then was killed of in a Next Generation book of all things

I won't be reading any more re-launch books.

Based on how it ended I'm not sure that situation is permanent.

Perhaps but here are no guarantees. Given the characterization before the big event I'm not exactly holding my breath here.

 

[Bacl]

I have read the Spirit Walk series of books where Chakotay is in command of Voyager. I thought his crew was very interesting and loved the plot twists in the book! The Changling made me wanna do some nail biting. I'm not sure about the Re-launch Voyager books though. I've been getting mixed views from people. I might order it on amazon.com though and just read for myself.

Yeah, read those too. I wish they'd taken risks like that in the actual show. Who was it who said the best Voyager episodes were the ones with reset buttons, because the writer's didn't limit themselves?