Bantam and Del Rey

Starting back in, oh, 1998 or so, the Trek novels have had an increasing push towards forming one continuity like the Star Wars novels. Of the 34 novels/novellas/anthologies being released this year (that excludes reprints, but includes the eBook-only series of novellas), only three aren't intended to be a part of the continuity (two of which could very well be brought in later, and the third of which is the annual anthology of fan-written stories, which editors don't have enough control over--or time to have control over--to keep continuous).

Yes, there's been some gaffes along the way--but they're no worse than what's happened within the pre-planned The New Jedi Order.

 

DR's contract is actually up at the end of 2005. I don't know if they've been given an extension or not.

since there are no more planned movies, the contract for book rights (and other licenses) can be picked up cheaper. the reason: the movies support book sales. without support from active movies, many book lines dwindle.

 

I donno, they did pretty good in the 1990s... I would bet that with the amount of fans out there, there'll be plenty of more books.

 

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Starting back in, oh, 1998 or so, the Trek novels have had an increasing push towards forming one continuity like the Star Wars novels. Of the 34 novels/novellas/anthologies being released this year (that excludes reprints, but includes the eBook-only series of novellas), only three aren't intended to be a part of the continuity (two of which could very well be brought in later, and the third of which is the annual anthology of fan-written stories, which editors don't have enough control over--or time to have control over--to keep continuous).

Yes, there's been some gaffes along the way--but they're no worse than what's happened within the [/b]pre-planned[b] [i]The New Jedi Order[/i].[/b][hr][/blockquote]Not saying that any new form of continuity plays a part of their value, it's that they're simply crud.

No offense meant to anyone in here, but it's been observed that many TrekkieBooks readers are from a limited demographic which psychologically finds the constraint, the known-familiarity of recurring characters and environments, preferable to the intellectual labor of coping with new characters and milieux in an original, non-[i]Trek[/i] SF novel. Now, don't misunderstand me; this is not [i]necessarily[/i] a bad thing, since consumers come in all grades, and there has been a market for recurrent-episode prose series since printing costs plummeted in the 1800s.

However, we must bear in mind that mass-produced series books historically have rarely managed to contribute anything new, or instructive, or particularly intellect-stretching. It should be noted that the main impetus for this changeover seems to correlate strongly to the incursion of Trekkie Fandom into SF Fandom, beginning in the late sixties; these were people who were psychologically habituated to brief, simplistic plotlines that wind up in an hour, and to recurring characters whose relationships and personalities do not change over time.

The "episodic nature" of the classic recurring-role TV series mandated this; networks did *not* like sequential episodes, because they wanted to be able to show episodes whenever they felt like it. This militates strongly against any form of character growth or long-term plot development, and predisposes the habituees to unchanging characters and situations. Gilligan & Co. can *not* get off the island, or there's no longer any show.

As David Gerrold wrote in his book [i]The World of Star Trek[/i]:

[blockquote][color=purple]"The interest of the Trekkies in [i]Star Trek[/i] was so all-consuming that it threatened to swamp everything in sight. They didn't want to hear about Asimov's laws of robotics or Heinlein's method of grokking. They only wanted to talk about Kirk and Spock and the [i]Enterprise[/i]. And to them, that was the sum total of science fiction.

"Naturally, some of the SF fans reacted negatively. What they held dear was being ignored in favor of what was to them merely a laudable effort. The science fiction fans still [b]watched[/b] [i]Star Trek[/i]. They simply didn't believe it was the most perfect creative effort any form of science fiction had ever seen."[/blockquote][/color]Granted, there have indeed been a number of novels (the ones penned by the Reeves-Stevenses; several of Peter David's entries, [i]The Final Reflection[/i], among others) which have risen above the straitjacket to produce some truly fine work, but these are the exceptions that prove the general rule.

 

where exactly does Ballantine come in to the picture?

 

Excellence Wrote:
One superweapon after another, or fleets. You had the 200 Katana Dreadnoughts, then the 40 Black Fleet ships. But you can't really blame Anderon and the Jedi Academy Trilogy. That was still early in the publishing years, when superweapons were a novelty and not overused.

Well dont blame Zahn on the 200 Dreadnaught fleet, he was before Anderson. though you can blame MacDowel for the Black Fleet, his books were good but... i hatd the Qela and im forever mad at em for making Luke sleep with that person (forgot her name) that is SO out of character

if mara found out....

 

where exactly does Ballantine come in to the picture?

Del Rey is part of Ballantine.

 

o... so i take it Ballantine is part of Randomhouse

 

Yes.

 

BDD took a turn for the better towards the very end of its run ; what with the last X-wing books (especially Starfighters of Adumar ), VoTF wrapping up the adult novels saga (or so we thought ), I,Jedi and the SWAJ anthologies. I think the TF.N reviewer for I,Jedi commented that it was a pity the license was going to be switching soon.

Considering the number of successes (TTT, X-wings, HoT, Han Solo trilogy, I,Jedi, Tales of..., Shadows of the Empire, etc) the number of Bantam stinkers aren't that great (among them, course of the travesty that was Bounty Hunter Wars ). With Del Rey, especially with their prequel offerings, we've had a few truly great items and a lot of plain average SW (e.g. Rogue Planet, The Approaching Storm).

Actually, i'm not sure which i prefer.

 

Well I agree Bantam had some terrific books, TTT among them.... I particularly enjoyed X-Wing series and even JAT back when it first came out.... although there were some stinkers, - Bounty HUnter Wars, Black Fleet Crisis, The Crystal Star and Children of the Jedi (and the two sequel storylines)

But I wouldn't say the Del Rey books were all average....

Star By Star was brilliant, Traitor incredible and I loved The Final Prophecy and The Unifying Force....

Shatterpoint was great, and I absolutely loved Tatooine Ghost.

So Del Rey has made just as many excellent books in my opinion, more average to good books and less terrible books.... so I would say Del Reys doing better at the moment....

 

As I said, DelRey has the advantage of prior books, to take a look at continuality and what worked and what didn't.

 

So Del Rey has made just as many excellent books in my opinion, more average to good books and less terrible books.... so I would say Del Reys doing better at the moment....

I don't agree that they've made as many great books.

Another thing to consider though is that with NJO being 19 books, in order to read the good ones, you probably need to get through a bunch of mediocre ones first.

I also give Bantam a lot of credit for doing anthologies, which Del Rey seems dead set against.

 

i agree DelRey makes tons of good books, while Bantam made poor books and great books, i prefers Bantam!