Paradis Review-Spoilers

[Dawg]

Originally Posted by Eric Paddon

To get back to the theme of this thread, I think what is ultimately needed is for some way to get Universal to relax the standards toward the kind of thing that Star Trek fans have with their series. The number of original novels that have been written and published for Trek have been vast and numerous, and I think to their credit, they are not handicapped by all having to conform to one single universe in which they must all complement each other (which is what must happen with published Star Wars trilogy novels). I have read outstanding work like A.C. Crispin's "Yesterday's Son" and it's sequel that I think is superior to any Trek movie other than II, and I have also seen lesser fare that IMO missed the mark ("Ishmael" with its attempt to make Spock descended from Mark Lenard's character from "Here Come The Brides"), but even when good, bad or so-so I am glad that the Trek fans got their chance to show their creativity and give Trek fans a diverse number of stories to choose from.

Galactica, I think at some point, deserves the same. And then the fanbase will have a chance to better make their own judgments.

But in the meantime, I do encourage people to read the fanfic that is available on the net, and let them be the judge of whether or not there are people in Galactica fanfic writing who if they wrote their stories for a property with more relaxed standards of how to get published like Star Trek is, would already have a good deal available on the open market. Thank God the internet has enabled people like myself, Senmut, Maggie Hutchison, Sanna Guerin, and others in this forum like Martok to share their work with a wider audience than would have been possible a decade ago when many of us started to write for the first time just for ourselves to satisfy our curiosity of how things turned out, and have kept writing ever since.

But I loved Ishmael! I thought it was a great novel-length in-joke.

I had the chance a few weeks ago to hear some people who write "media tie-ins" like the Star Trek books. In fact, on the panel was an editor from Pocket Books (the publisher of the Star Trek books) and a couple of authors who really got their start with Star Trek books.

They have a "bible". So does Star Wars for those novels. And each has a studio person with a red pencil who approves (or not) what the author does.

I cannot imagine that Universal does not.

As the authors who spoke indicated, there are many occassions where what they write gets axed or re-written to conform with that studio person's idea of what's supposed to happen, how the characters act, etc.

Paramount has, in my opinion, done it right. They've always been open to outside ideas - most ST series' allowed spec script submissions (that's how RDM got his start, you know). Pocket Books also publishes an annual compilation of fanfic as part of a contest.

Universal has a 26 year history of mismanaging the BSG franchise. Can you really expect them to do a novel series right? You're right, Eric, that it's long past time Universal relaxed a bit and maybe made some money - but given the history I'm not going to hold my breath. They have a stranglehold on what is produced under Richard's name and have no interest, for some reason, to let anybody else have a crack at it.

And now that they're producing the new show, they're even less likely to loosen the strings.

Which means I agree 1000% with the last paragraph of your post.

I am
Dawg

[Eric Paddon]

Originally Posted by Dawg

But I loved Ishmael! I thought it was a great novel-length in-joke.

If a writer could get past the copyright issue though, don't you think they'd try to make Spock descended from Robin the Boy Wonder, since it is part of Trek canon that Amanda's maiden name is Grayson?

Holy Logical, Batman!

[Senmut]

My take on the plot of the book is very simple...

[kingfish]

Originally Posted by repcisg

IBooks is owned by Byron Preiss Visual Publications, with Simon & Schuster as distributor.

I went to Byron Preiss Visual Publications for the info.

And Eric is right, which ever way the cookie crumbles, the books are not doing us any favors.

I found the website for I-Books and e-mailed them as to the future release dates for the original series books (Living Legend and War of the Gods) only to receive a message that the e-mail was undeliverable.

[BST]

Originally Posted by kingfish

I found the website for I-Books and e-mailed them as to the future release dates for the original series books (Living Legend and War of the Gods) only to receive a message that the e-mail was undeliverable.

Kingfish,

Would you mind posting the website address?

Thanks,

BST

[kingfish]

http://ibooksinc.com/contact.htm

[BST]

Originally Posted by kingfish

http://ibooksinc.com/contact.htm

Thanks, Kingfish.



BST

[Micheleh]

I'm back. You could've PM'd me, you know, I would've modified it myself.

Eric and I push each other's buttons, that's just how it is. I'll just ignore it from now on.

Richard did hint about the possibility that Universal may abandon it's rights to the OS books if the new series becomes the focus of novelizations. I'll let you know if I hear anything else. This would be good news for potential OS writers.

[repcisg]

Thanks Micheleh,

I thought about PMing you but I had already made a public statement, I thought it best to leave it that way.

It would be good news if Universal abandons its rights, but don’t count on it. And even if they did you can bet Glen will be in there to pick them up, or try.

Still if they release their rights to the public domain, we could see a number of books in less than a year.

[kingfish]

Micheleh does Richard pick his writers or are they assigned by Universal?

[Eric Paddon]

Originally Posted by repcisg

Still if they release their rights to the public domain, we could see a number of books in less than a year.

I'd be ready! Except for crossover stories, which open up the whole can of worms again (though I'd like to know what legal hurdles had to be cleared for that Trek "Ishmael" novel) on rights, I think quite a few people I know would just transfer what they've got on their hard drives and existing fanfic sites like Robert Hanczyk's to a publishing presentable format and flood the market in an instant.

[jewels]

I've been enjoying the novels as just a fun thing and not being super analytical about them.
But I can understand that there are some glaring problems both with consistency within the novels themselves (mostly editing issues) and some continuity issues with everything already established in the series.

I loved Resurrection for that incredible epic battle that takes about the last 75 pages. It was the first of Galactica that I had seen for 23 years though, at the time I read it, so I wasn't clear on the characters myself then. I was utterly delighted, just to have them back! A little salve on the G80 scar of Starbuck marooned and Apollo dead. (Can I say I still haven't forgiven GL for that?)

My favorite pet peeve, though it is consistently persistent, is the Dr. Wilker/Dr. Salik job swap. At least when the error is made it is carried through throughout the successive novels, so someone only reading the novels might not be bothered by it. There is a continuity within the novels themselves in some regards, even if they don't synch up with the show continuity.

Some of the things aren't Richard's fault though too: Universal rewrote the end of Paradis, Richard didn't see the new ending (something around 20 pages) before it was in print. Let's just say that we were robbed of a more valid ending. My favorite thing about Destiny is that it did restore some of what was messed up by the anonymous rewriter of Paradis' final pages.

I think a lot of the bothersome things are a combo of the limited time (therefore attention) that iBooks allows to all involved--there isn't factchecking/ample correction time factored in (the general rule of thumb is the time it should take x3 or x4 is the time it will take). Different co-writers have different writing styles and different depths of understanding the source material. Stan Timmons really bugged me with his constant use of rogue to desribe Starbuck; there's a writer that needs a thesaurus! The really serious handicap anyone that writes a BG novel for publishing (or any other franchise work) is that you can't read the fan fiction that has good continuity, lest you inadvertently pick up someone else's idea and slide down that slippery slope. That's why producer's generally won't accept scripts from just anyone too.

Also, when Richard's books began, if I'm understanding what Universal distrubuted in the US on VHS, the only readily available videos in the U.S. didn't include key episodes. For Living Legend, War of the Gods, I know my personal videotape collection has PAL to NTSC tranfers because that's all I could find in 2002. If you watch the commentary track of Saga on the DVD, note Richard's surprise at the restored locker scene with Athena--he'd only seen the theatrical movie version recently as that's what was available prior to the DVD boxset and the locker room scene wasn't shown. It was in the PAL tape. I've not asked Richard, but I've thought that the organic/cyborg Cylons in RH's novels fell in more closely with Thurston's '80s novels (those were available fairly easily).

I think Richard et all have done a decent job at trying to build on the Galactica base and give it more depth than a 45 min TV program could do in 1978. I see that whole Kobolian bloodline thing in Resurrection as a miscommunication with a collaborator who chose to over-emphasize the wrong thing, compounded with a ditzy publisher. :roll: Adama's family did have that aristocratic lineage in the series, but it wasn't something that did anything more than give them a generations old military vocation and a love for their culture's history, civilization and people, IMO. That Apollo would study and develop some of the skills his father demonstrated in WotG, isn't that far afield for me. Fits in with his star-searching side we see in the final scene of The Hand of God. Rebellion was just the mess that an unedited 1st draft is always, which is unfortunate because so many things built on later are started there. (We did already mention the publisher is a bit daft, didn't we?)

Destiny was one that I liked a lot: the plot base was a logical one, but some of the twists were unexpected, especially the ending. I loved the "who was where" part of the ending and the relationships rekindled there. Baltar was amazingly transformed over the last few books and it was a fitting choice he made.

I think the real unfortunate, short-sighted thing (on Universal's part) about Richard's novels, is that so far no one else has been able to "crack the code" to get into the right folks at Universal to get more BG stories published. His pick up some 20 yahren after the HoG, there's 20 yahren more stories to be told.

The thing I most love about his books is in my mind's eye, I can see what a continuation could feel like and I know it could kick some box office arse. Idealistic heroes in Vipers are just way too much fun.

[Gunstar Aries]

Couldn't've put it better meself...

I've read quite a few of the books. I like them, but then I'm a pretty voracious reader. I try not to overanalyze any sci-fi. Gift horse in the mouth and all that.

What I think BSG needs instead of a studio approval system is a continuity nazi like Strazynski has in Fiona Avery. She's supposed to be the arbiter of all things B5, and has the right to tell an author if his work is within the continuity of not, though fanfic isn't in her domain, it is encouraged by Strazynski. Seems like a winning formula for me, a lot of the B5 books are good, solid stuff, as is most of the fanfic....

Any volunteers to be the BSG:TOS continuity guru?

Regards,

GA

[Eric Paddon]

"Any volunteers to be the BSG:TOS continuity guru?"

Right here!

[kingfish]

IMHO bring back Christopher Golden.

[jewels]

I like Linaweaver almost as much as Golden, but Golden rocked. At least Linaweaver has a love of making a scene written as visually as a film is--which is something that has to be there for Richard's stories to work at all. It was the standard that he set in working with Golden and which got totally confused in Rebellion.

Eric would be good as our "continuity guru" for character and backstory checking. I would even put Repcisg in there too, and Michael Faries if he'd want to read BSG stuff again. For ships I don't know if anyone on the planet knows as much about the ships as Titon.

[kingfish]

Golden made Richard's ideas real. The characters had flare and were the ones we loved from tos. Linaweaver has them behaving like in the os Star Trek episode Mirror, Mirror.

[BST]

Originally Posted by jewels

Eric would be good as our "continuity guru" for character and backstory checking. I would even put Repcisg in there too, and Michael Faries if he'd want to read BSG stuff again. For ships I don't know if anyone on the planet knows as much about the ships as Titon.

Sounds like quite a staff you've got there, Jewels.

[jewels]

Originally Posted by BST

Sounds like quite a staff you've got there, Jewels.

Staff, hmmmm: Mix well with a certain producer named Tom, add an FX studio named Zoic and you'd have quite a freaking movie. Well, we might need Dirk to sweet talk Glen into letting them run with the show, but....quite a freaking movie.
Dirk as Starbuck would just about do it for me, just cause I know he'd only do it if it was right.

I know, I need to stop dreaming, but it's fun!

I need a glass of ambrosa after that thought, who's buying?

[repcisg]

Just for you Jewels

[Gunstar Aries]

A round for the house!! Jewels, you sure know how to throw together a lineup. Remind me to consult you when I decide to write my great galatic novel....

[bsg1fan1975]

Originally Posted by kingfish

IMHO bring back Christopher Golden.

He did a wonderful job!