What do you think about the transition book, "The Lost Years"?
- Thread starter Spock .
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Don't you mean the transition between the original series and Star Trek: The Motion Picture?
Pretty much all tie-in stories are about showing what the characters did offscreen. Of course the screen franchise doesn't "need" that information, or it would be onscreen, but the appeal of tie-ins is to explore the bonus stories and satisfy the readers' curiosity about them.
As for this particular question -- how the 5-year mission ended and what happened in between it and ST:TMP -- it's been explored a surprising number of times in the books and comics, with at least eight distinct version to date: The Lost Years; DC Comics' Star Trek Vol. 1 Annual 2 "The Final Voyage" by Mike W. Barr et al.; my own version alluded to in Ex Machina and depicted in Forgotten History; "Empty" by David DeLee in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds 10; "A Bright Particular Star" by Howard Weinstein et al. in DC Vol. 2; the version in David R. George III's Crucible trilogy; IDW Comics' Mission's End by Ty Templeton et al.; and the version described in David A. Goodman's The Autobiography of James T. Kirk. Although some only show the last mission itself while others delve into what came afterward.
Pretty much all tie-in stories are about showing what the characters did offscreen. Of course the screen franchise doesn't "need" that information, or it would be onscreen, but the appeal of tie-ins is to explore the bonus stories and satisfy the readers' curiosity about them.
As for this particular question -- how the 5-year mission ended and what happened in between it and ST:TMP -- it's been explored a surprising number of times in the books and comics, with at least eight distinct version to date: The Lost Years; DC Comics' Star Trek Vol. 1 Annual 2 "The Final Voyage" by Mike W. Barr et al.; my own version alluded to in Ex Machina and depicted in Forgotten History; "Empty" by David DeLee in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds 10; "A Bright Particular Star" by Howard Weinstein et al. in DC Vol. 2; the version in David R. George III's Crucible trilogy; IDW Comics' Mission's End by Ty Templeton et al.; and the version described in David A. Goodman's The Autobiography of James T. Kirk. Although some only show the last mission itself while others delve into what came afterward.
Nothing is needed. Besides, if it isn't on screen no one is beholden to follow it. Many of the novels, comics, video games attempt to fill in spots of the story that haven't made it to TV.
I always liked these lost era filling novels and there have been a lot.
I enjoyed the Lost Years back in the day. There are also the Lost Era books that take place between Generations (the Enteprise-B segment) and Encounter at Farpoint. There are also others not specifically tied to the Lost Era like the Stargazer books which depict Picards early command of the Stargazer (as an aside I always wished those had continued as Picard was in command for years and I think Stargazer only touched on the first year and Christopher picked up the end in his Buried Age novel---there are a lot of years in between and with the new Picard series on the air it might be interesting to see that era of his career explored again).
Another lost era can be considered the time between Enterprise and Discovery. There have been a number of Enterprise books that takes us to the earliest years of the Federation.
And finally there are some gaps between movies. Between TMP and TWOK for instance is about 10 years, give or take, and then between TFF and TUC. Oh, and there are some books that fill in the gaps between each of TNG movies.
I enjoyed the Lost Years back in the day. There are also the Lost Era books that take place between Generations (the Enteprise-B segment) and Encounter at Farpoint. There are also others not specifically tied to the Lost Era like the Stargazer books which depict Picards early command of the Stargazer (as an aside I always wished those had continued as Picard was in command for years and I think Stargazer only touched on the first year and Christopher picked up the end in his Buried Age novel---there are a lot of years in between and with the new Picard series on the air it might be interesting to see that era of his career explored again).
Another lost era can be considered the time between Enterprise and Discovery. There have been a number of Enterprise books that takes us to the earliest years of the Federation.
And finally there are some gaps between movies. Between TMP and TWOK for instance is about 10 years, give or take, and then between TFF and TUC. Oh, and there are some books that fill in the gaps between each of TNG movies.
Picard commanded the Stargazer for 22 years (actually I've always thought the original idea was just that he served aboard it for 22 years, with a large percentage of that time as its captain, but it got simplified over time), and the novel series covered only the first 6 months, about one month per book. So, yeah, there's a great deal of unchronicled time. Maybe Picard will create new interest in revisiting that part of the timeline. I think I read that episode 2 mentions an old Stargazer crewmate of Picard's.
Yeah, so it's even less time than I envisioned it. I sometimes wonder did Michael Jan Friedman have plans on continuing the series beyond the first couple of books or was that all he planned to do at the time?
But there is over 20 years largely untouched by the novels, including that pivotal time when his best friend was aboard, Jack Crusher.
I don't imagine Picard would have much effect on the crew complement already explored so someone could conceivably fill in the gaps between the last Stargazer novel and "The Buried Age" using the existing crew and stories as a framework to start from.
Yeah, he is visited by his doctor, Moritz Benayoun, who refers to having been on the Stargazer together.
Love the first Lost Years novel. It was loads of fun. The other ones they did (Flag Full of Stars, Recovery) weren't so good.
If there's a good story to be told, I'm happy with "gap filling". But if it's just connecting the dots for the sake of it, it's not worth it.
If there's a good story to be told, I'm happy with "gap filling". But if it's just connecting the dots for the sake of it, it's not worth it.
In a way you can add another to the list. IDW's Star Trek: Year Five series. Which apparently is telling the entire final year of the Enterprise five year mission. Which I'm sure will culminate in what the final mission in that year was, for this particular story.
There are countless stories set in the fifth year of the mission -- arguably most TOS tie-ins are, whether they label themselves that way or not, since the animated series can be considered the fourth year -- but this is specifically a list of extant stories depicting its actual end and how it occurs. At the present time, Year Five has not yet told that story, and we can't know for a fact that the series will stay in print long enough to reach it. (Wasn't Boldly Go intended to run a lot longer than 18 issues?) If it does happen on some future date, it will go on the list at that time, but this is the list as of right now.
From everything I remember reading from interviews of the writers for this series, its planned for, I believe, a 24 issue run. The book even has a writers room. Where it will be 12 "episodes" in a sense, told in 2 parts each, adding up to the 24 issue run. The writers said the story will conclude the 5 year mission.
^But that hasn't happened yet. If and when it does, I'll add it to the list. But today is not that day.
Lost Years is probably my favorite Trek novel ever. One of the few books I’ve read more than once. I thought Dillard got Kirk, Spock and McCoy down pat.
I read Flag Full of Stars when it first came out and enjoyed it, (nowhere near as good as the first), but I came to find later that it wasn’t well received at all apparently. But I remember enjoying it as a teenager. Kinda like a Jaws 2: fun, but inferior to the original.
I tried reading Traitor Winds like 4-5 times and just couldn’t get past the first few chapters. I own the fourth book by Dillard but keep meaning to finish Traitor Winds. Was the fourth one good?
I read Flag Full of Stars when it first came out and enjoyed it, (nowhere near as good as the first), but I came to find later that it wasn’t well received at all apparently. But I remember enjoying it as a teenager. Kinda like a Jaws 2: fun, but inferior to the original.
I tried reading Traitor Winds like 4-5 times and just couldn’t get past the first few chapters. I own the fourth book by Dillard but keep meaning to finish Traitor Winds. Was the fourth one good?
M
marlboro
Guest
I really liked the first book. Not so crazy about the sequels. I think the idea of a (sort of) TOS Relaunch was a good one, but it seemed to have been hamstrung by behind the scenes issues and some bad luck.
Still, I think that first book is very much worth reading. Well, minus the bad guy's corny line in the climax, that is.
Still, I think that first book is very much worth reading. Well, minus the bad guy's corny line in the climax, that is.
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Ive had the first book on my bookshelf for years. I've finally started to get around reading it this past week. I'm really enjoying it so far.
M
marlboro
Guest
The L.A. Graf writing team excels at giving the non-big four TOS characters their time in the spotlight. Their weakness is that the plots of their stories never seem to hold together. Traitor Winds starts strong, but quickly falls apart. It's a mystery story, but the mystery is no more difficult to unravel than an episode of Scooby Doo.
Here's an old comment I posted after reading Recovery:
fwiw, you might want to take my opinions with a grain of salt. My taste in reading material is highly suspect at times.
I don’t know why but I never cared for Vonda McIntyre’s books. I guess I don’t like her writing style. I didn’t care for her Treks II-IV novelizations (though they contained interesting “deleted scenes”). I wasn’t that crazy about Entropy Effect or Enterprise either. But I guess this is a different topic. I do like JM Dillard and Diane Carey, and Judith-Garfield Stevens. Shit, I guess I prefer Treks women writers.
I love all of the diane Carey TOS books I've read of hers. But her TNG ones, just no. Those can go away. Lol. For me personally she completely nails the characterization of the TOS characters, but for TNG it's just bad, imo.
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