Whatever Happened to Diane Carey?

[Mr. Laser Beam]

AFAIK, Francis Drake Reed wasn't an Englishman. I think he was from Jamaica.

Malcolm Reed would be more likely to be related to April himself, who *was* from England.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Babaganoosh said:
AFAIK, Francis Drake Reed wasn't an Englishman. I think he was from Jamaica.

Yes, and I was expecting a book where Malcolm Reed finally finds a nice young Jamaican girl - one who knows how to cook pineapple upsidedown cake - and settles down. "Francis Drake" is a pretty cool English name Malcolm might be fond of, too.

 

[JoeZhang]

Therin of Andor said:
^ When ENT started I was sure some novelist would draw a link between Francis Drake Reed, of April's crew, and Malcolm Reed.

Small universe syndrome, I know...

Yeah, it can get a bit groanworthy - Spock seems to spend so much time on trips away, you wonder who's running the unification effort!

 

[Jack Bauer]

Busy hosting The Price is Right...

 

[the_wildcard]

Xeris said:
I believe her last novel was Ship of the Line chronicling the maiden voyage of the Big E-E.

Hmm that's where that name sounded familar.....ughhh sorry to say that was not my favorite book.

 

[Therin of Andor]

the_wildcard said:

Xeris said:
I believe her last novel was Ship of the Line chronicling the maiden voyage of the Big E-E.

Hmm that's where that name sounded familar.....ughhh sorry to say that was not my favorite book.

Diane Carey's last ST novel was in 2001, "Gateways: Challenger: Chainmail", with Keller's personal story finishing in "Gateways: What Lay Beyond". "Ship of the Line" was 1997.

 

[the_wildcard]

But back to "Ship of the Line"....ugghhh not my favorite book..

 

[KRAD]

Diane Carey's last ST novel was in 2001, "Gateways: Challenger: Chainmail", with Keller's personal story finishing in "Gateways: What Lay Beyond". "Ship of the Line" was 1997.

Actually, her last ST novel was the novelization of Broken Bow, which came out in October 2001, two months after Chainmail. Her last piece of Trek fiction was "Exodus" in What Lay Beyond.

 

[Holytomato]

"Most Trek TV producers didn't read the books. They were too busy making TV shows."

FASA's Star trek RPG was anointed Paramount Canon tm by Paramount. Even into TNG time.

The Klingon Chancellor was taken from The Final Reflection (used as the basis for FASA's Klingon sourebooks.)

The FASA Romulan ship designs were used as inspiration for TNG's Romulan ship designs.

The Akiraprise was originally in Star V: Starfleet Academy which originally was the Excelsior's original design (Star Trek III) which orginally was in FASA's rpg.

:thumbsup:

You will find the TOS design in ADB's Star Fleet Universe

 

[Turtletrekker]

Holytomato said:

FASA's Star trek RPG was anointed Paramount Canon tm by Paramount. Even into TNG time.

Uhm, no. Even if elements of the RPGs happened to make it on-screen, they were never considered "canon". And so what if it wasn't? Trek "canon" is such a ridiculously irrelevant and meaningless concept anyway. It's ALL fake, so NONE of it is "canon".

 

[HIj'Qa]

EliyahuQeoni said:
I haven't read many of Ms Carey's books, but Final Frontier and Best Destiny stand out as two of my favorite Trek novels. I always wished she'd write more about Captain April and George Kirk.

I wish someone would write more of Captain April and George Kirk.

My take on Diane Carey's work is that she is best with TOS, great details like Gorn roommates, a Klingon's view of Kirk; she can create interseting and varied characters - Eric Siles, Piper!! and Captain April were all written by the same person ; but that her personal interests have come to dominate her writing.

I liked two books of Piper, and two with April. I fear Carey would start to go off the rails [sorry I don't have a more nautical expression here] if she wrote wrote them again. I wonder what DC Fontana or garamet would do with April.

Ship of the Line was a huge disappointment for me. I wish a TNG-loving writer would write the definitive Morgan Bateson novel.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Piper was kind of annoying. Textbook definition of a Mary Sue.

 

[Top41]

Babaganoosh said:
Piper was kind of annoying. Textbook definition of a Mary Sue.

Agreed. I didn't like that character, or the fact that those books weren't told from the main ST characters' perspectives. Some authors can pull that off; others can't.

I did like all the Invasion books though. I'd forgotten she'd written the ST one, but it was good.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Holytomato said:
FASA's Star trek RPG was anointed Paramount Canon tm by Paramount. Even into TNG time.

Huh? Where did you get that idea?

The reason FASA uses certain Klingon terms (that TNG and DS9 then picked up on - Ronald Moore was a fan of author John M Ford) was that John M Ford got a job at FASA while writing "The Final Reflection" for Pocket.

You will find...

Doesn't make any of the FASA materials canonical, nor does it "annoint" them.

"The Entropy Effect" coined Hikaru Sulu. Doesn't make all of "The Entropy Effect" canonical either.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Babaganoosh said:
Piper was kind of annoying. Textbook definition of a Mary Sue.

I disagree. She was a clever parody of Mary Sues.

Piper gave us a unique look at Kirk, Spock and McCoy, and rarely ever saved the day; usually she was amazed as Kirk and/or Spock pulled another rabbit out of their sleeve when times were getting tough.

 

[Christopher]

I don't think Piper was a Mary Sue at all. A Mary Sue is a guest star who's better at everything than the heroes and wins their undying worship and lust. Carey made a point of having Piper be three steps behind Kirk the whole time. She was a newbie, a screwup, struggling to figure out the crises she was in and coming up with awkward strategies to deal with them. And she didn't sleep with Kirk, Spock, or McCoy, or even flirt with any of them. So she's hardly a textbook Mary Sue or even a parody thereof.

The Piper novels were sort of the prototypes for "Lower Decks." These were adventures that were mainly driven by Kirk's actions and decisions, but we experienced them from the perspective of Piper, who was somewhat central to the events but not as much so as Kirk.

Of course, even a Mary Sue can be done well. Evan Wilson in Uhura's Song fits the definitions of a Mary Sue pretty closely, but she's such an intriguing character that it works anyway.

The problem is, of course, that in fandom, "Mary Sue" no longer has a single clear definition, and people end up using it essentially to mean "a character I don't like."

 

[Steve Roby]

Christopher said:
I don't think Piper was a Mary Sue at all. A Mary Sue is a guest star who's better at everything than the heroes and wins their undying worship and lust. Carey made a point of having Piper be three steps behind Kirk the whole time. She was a newbie, a screwup, struggling to figure out the crises she was in and coming up with awkward strategies to deal with them. And she didn't sleep with Kirk, Spock, or McCoy, or even flirt with any of them. So she's hardly a textbook Mary Sue or even a parody thereof.

And by the end of the first book, IIRC, she was promoted to Lieutenant Commander, putting her at the same level as Scotty and McCoy and above more experienced officers like Sulu. I seem to recall that at the beginning of the second book she was hanging out with Kirk and a few other select officers on a sailing ship.

She wasn't a textbook Mary Sue, no, but she was treated a lot differently from the average officer aboard Kirk's Enterprise.

 

[Christopher]

^^Yeah, you're right about that part -- I did find her rapid promotion rather implausible. And I guess she was more Mary-Suish in Battlestations! than in Dreadnought! Still, I think it was somewhat more plausible in her case than in some other cases.

Perhaps the most classic Mary Sue ever to appear in pro Trek fiction, IMHO, was Elizabeth Schaeffer (sp?) in Bantam's Death's Angel by Kathleen Sky. She was a super-tough secret-agent type, belonging to a breed of agents who were looked on as awe-inspiring, legendary figures. She won Kirk's love, was tougher than Kirk and smarter than Spock, etc.

Wait a minute, Sola Thane from Triangle by Marshak & Culbreath also fits the bill. She was another super-competent, legendary Federation agent, and the titular polygon was among her, Kirk, and Spock. She even helped Spock through his second pon farr, IIRC. Or else she induced it through her sheer magnificence, I forget which.

At least Piper started out as a low-rung character and earned a more prominent status through her actions. So she was... a Merit Sue!

 

[OmahaStar]

Steve Roby said:

Christopher said:
I don't think Piper was a Mary Sue at all. A Mary Sue is a guest star who's better at everything than the heroes and wins their undying worship and lust. Carey made a point of having Piper be three steps behind Kirk the whole time. She was a newbie, a screwup, struggling to figure out the crises she was in and coming up with awkward strategies to deal with them. And she didn't sleep with Kirk, Spock, or McCoy, or even flirt with any of them. So she's hardly a textbook Mary Sue or even a parody thereof.

And by the end of the first book, IIRC, she was promoted to Lieutenant Commander, putting her at the same level as Scotty and McCoy and above more experienced officers like Sulu. I seem to recall that at the beginning of the second book she was hanging out with Kirk and a few other select officers on a sailing ship.

She wasn't a textbook Mary Sue, no, but she was treated a lot differently from the average officer aboard Kirk's Enterprise.

Now, now, Steve. Don't confuse him with facts.

 

[ClayinCA]

Christopher said:
At least Piper started out as a low-rung character and earned a more prominent status through her actions. So she was... a Merit Sue!

Awwwwwwwwwwww, man!