For the first time in twenty years, a significant Star Trek milestone will pass without a movie or television episode to mark it. But while there will be no new big- or small-screen adventures for the crew of the Starship Enterprise when the series turns forty in early September, the legacy of Star Trek will be celebrated on the printed page thank to Pocket Books.
From now until the end of the year, Pocket Books is taking a break from the rotation of Trek series in the novels to focus exclusively on the original series era. The celebration, which began last month, includes a new trilogy of novels focusing on the “big three” by popular author David R. George III, a short story celebration and the re-print of four classic Trek novels with re-designed covers.
The celebration began last month with Margaret Wander Bonano’s Captain Pike centered novel Burning Dreams. This is the story of Pike before, during, and after his time as captain of the Enterprise and promises to be the definitive Pike novel.
September sees the first of David R. George III’s Crucible trilogy. The first installment, Provenance of Shadows, is about Doctor McCoy. The second volume, The Fire and the Rose, centers on Spock and is due for publication in October. The final installment, The Star to Every Wandering, centers on Kirk. Each novel in this series takes place around the big events of the Hugo-award winning original episode “City on the Edge of Forever.”
In December, Diane Duane returns with her long awaited novel The Empty Chair, the fifth in the Rhinansu series. In addition, a trade paperback of the first four novels in the series will be published later this year.
In addition, there is a short-story collection called Constellations that includes stories from many of the more popular Trek writers currently working today. There is also an e-book series, Mere Anarchy, coming out that will focus on every era of classic Trek from pre-TV show to the movies.
Pocket is also republishing four of the most popular Trek novels. Last month saw the re-issue of Margaret Wander Bonano’s Strangers from the Sky, a novel that tells of the first meeting between humans and Vulcans (it was later contradicted by the events of First Contact but it’s still a great story) and Vulcan’s Fury, the story of Spock’s first mission on the Enterprise, written by original series writer and script-editor, D.C. Fontana. September sees the re-issue of the first original Pocket Trek novel, The Entropy Effect, by Vonda McIntyre, as well as Jan and Gar Reeves-Stevens’ Federation, where the TNG and TOS crews meet for the first time. (It was later contradicted by Star Trek: Generations, but it’s still, in many ways, a better story.)
As if that weren’t enough, the latest novel from the writing team of William Shatner and the Reeves-Stevens hits stores in September. Captain’s Glory is the final installment of a trilogy in the “Shatner-verse” and the ninth from this best-selling Trek writing team.
So anyone know how many books that is actually is now?
🙂