On a related note

[james_davis_nicoll]

What should go on a Top Ten "In retrospect, what the hell were we thinking" list of once-popular SF?

Comments

[carloshasanax.livejournal.com]

Some embarrassing trends, like Laurenn J. Framingham, haven't even crested yet. But I think these two are in a persistent vegetative state:

John W. Campbell's editorship. Because what science fiction really needed was an injection of Confederate Psychic magazine!

The Star Trek novel. There have been, what, two good Star Trek novels? out of six hundred sixty-six? and now you can't even give them away at rummage sales?

[scifantasy.livejournal.com]

More than two, at least in my opinion. But central to that--it's arguably not fair to relegate all Star Trek novels to the bin together; short of relegating all tie-in fiction, that is. Nothing is inherently bad about a Trek novel except insofar as something is inherently bad about a media tie-in (a claim I will not make).

[tacticalbuddha.livejournal.com]

There have been, what, two good Star Trek novels? out of six hundred sixty-six?

Diane Duane, _The Wounded Sky_ and _Spock's World_

Barbara Hambly, _Ishmael_

John M. Ford, _The Final Reflection_ and _How Much For Just the Planet?_

That's five. I'm guessing you're using a different value/standard of "good" than I am, but sure, tastes vary.

What are your two picks?

[asyouknow-bob.livejournal.com]

(Well, to be fair: as an approximation, "164 bad out of 166" is not very far at all from "161 bad out of 166".)

Arguing that the Star Trek novels are really only "97% bad" and not "99% bad" is a quibble.

[rbos.livejournal.com]

Julia Ecklar's "Kobayashi Maru" was a favourite of mine.

[deor.livejournal.com]

I'm rather fond of it - some of the short bits were quite good - but the mind-boggling stupidity of the final solution to the frame story puts me off recommending it.

[rbos.livejournal.com]

hm, well, I was 14 at the time, it's likely I'm remembering it better than it was. :)

[carbonel]

Also Janet Kagan's Uhura's Song.

[jeriendhal.livejournal.com]

Ditto, along with the Ford and Duane novels mentioned above. I also have a weird fondness for "Bloodthirst" which I can't really explain.

[roseembolism.livejournal.com]

I have to admit that I liked "Battlestations", partially because of the reversal they did of Mary Sue archetype.

I also enjoyed "Spock Must Die", if only for Scotty's line about wanting five minutes with the guy who decided that Federation uniforms didn't need pockets.

[amberite.livejournal.com]

The one preceding Battlestations with the same characters, Dreadnought, is a relatively decent actiony yarn up until, suddenly, the Plot Is Revealed! with character motivations that make no sense, and the main character and her Vulcan buddy digress into a bizarre three-page objectivist rant. I must have skipped over that as a kid somehow. It's worth mentioning that this book was a first novel.

Battlestations was pretty good, and I don't remember any other of Diane Carey's being bad exactly after that.

[roseembolism.livejournal.com]

I haven't actually read any of her other stuff- has she done non- Trek novels?

[amberite.livejournal.com]

Not that I know of, but she wrote a whole bunch of Trek novels.

(I see that there's a bibliography here, which is lots of Trek novels and a few other tie-ins.)

[amberite.livejournal.com]

Uhura's Song by Janet Kagan is a fantastic gem of a book in any context. Non-Star-Trek-fans can read and like, nay love, the thing as an individual work, especially if they have any interest in linguistics or anthropology or in simple joy and wonder...

And Diane Duane's Romulan-related books are quite good, too.

Vonda McIntyre wrote a few Star Trek novels - they were, as all things she writes, more Vonda McIntyre-flavored than Star Trek flavored. The Enterprise is simply a more lyrical and psychedelic place with her on board.

[(Anonymous)]

Uhura's Song was extremely enjoyable and very well imagined. It was somewhat less well written.

[amberite.livejournal.com]

I differ on that; having re-read it last month, I find the writing holds up very well.

[19-crows.livejournal.com]

Who or what is Laurenn J. Framingham? Googling revealed nothing.

[jamesenge.livejournal.com]

She writes a popular series about an ostensible vampire slayer. Laurenn (or Laura) J. Framingham is how Chris of the Invincible Super Blog munges her name.

[kgbooklog.livejournal.com]

She writes a popular series about an ostensible vampire slayer. Laurenn (or Laura) J. Framingham is how Chris of the Invincible Super Blog munges her name.

I was wondering about that too; I knew who he was talking about and at first I thought that might be her real name, but it seems no one else uses it. Did he ever explain why he's munging it? It doesn't even look insulting to me.

[jamesenge.livejournal.com]

It might be just apotropaic magic to ward off the attention of someone who has the vanity to google his/her own name. On the other hand, he doesn't munge Anita Blake's name, so... maybe not.