***Warning - the content of this post is exceptionally dry***
So until recently I hadn't really looked up the differences in editions. I had been confused as to why the numbering was different between the US Pocket Books edition and the UK Titan Books edition. I was also wondering why newer books in the UK were being published under Simon & Schuster and not Titan and why I have an Orbit edition of The Entropy Effect. Another query I had was why all the numbering has been dropped. I'd also noticed there are new editions of the older novels coming out from Simon & Schuster.
So until recently I hadn't really looked up the differences in editions. I had been confused as to why the numbering was different between the US Pocket Books edition and the UK Titan Books edition. I was also wondering why newer books in the UK were being published under Simon & Schuster and not Titan and why I have an Orbit edition of The Entropy Effect. Another query I had was why all the numbering has been dropped. I'd also noticed there are new editions of the older novels coming out from Simon & Schuster.
I may have all the answers now (and perhaps a few answers to questions I hadn't asked...)
Pocket Books & Simon & Schuster (US) (UK 1993 - present)
Pocket Books is a subsidiary of Simon & Schuster. Simon & Schuster was sold to Gulf+Western (also owners of Paramount Pictures) in 1975. Simon & Schuster was incorporated into Viacom in 2002.
Pocket Books acquired the license to publish Star Trek fiction in 1978 because Gulf+Western wanted to develop a book line alongside Star Trek: The Motion Picture. Pocket books then became the sole officially licensed publisher for Star Trek novelisations.
The TOS novelisations are numbered to 93 - In the name of Honor (2002) - subsequent installments are left unnumbered.
After Titan Books' final release in 1993, Simon & Schuster published under the Pocket imprint in the UK.
Titan Books (UK)
Titan Books (a division of Titan Entertainment) was the UK publisher for the Star Trek novels as published under Simon & Schuster's Pocket Books. Titan Books has it's own numbering scheme because it started serialisation with Pocket's latest release - Chain of Attack (Pocket #32) - and opted to slot in the older novels between new novel releases. In addition to being out of sequence with Pocket Books' numbering, Titan Books also opted to release the longer Pocket series novels as repackaged 'giant novels' which were also not allocated a number; four 'giant novels' were released in total.
The final numbered TOS novel published in the UK by Titan was The Great Starship Race (1993), and was numbered 62 (Pocket #67), after which, Pocket Books released further TOS novels through Simon & Schuster UK.
Whitman Books (US) & Bantam Books (US)
The final numbered TOS novel published in the UK by Titan was The Great Starship Race (1993), and was numbered 62 (Pocket #67), after which, Pocket Books released further TOS novels through Simon & Schuster UK.
Whitman Books (US) & Bantam Books (US)
Before Pocket Books, Whitman Books published a single volume 'Mission to Horatius' in 1968. Bantam Books then published 16 original Star Trek novels starting with 'Spock Must Die' in 1970 and ending with 'Death's Angel' in 1981. Bantam reprinted their 16 Star Trek novels throughout the 80s and 90s.
Between 1967 & 1978 Bantam books also published TOS episode adaptations.
Ballantine (US)
Published a line of animated series novelisations between 1974 and 1978.
Wanderer Books (US)
Published four books by William Rotsler in 1982 and 1984.
Archway Paperback (US)
Archway Paperback is an imprint of Pocket Books which is a division of Simon & Schuster. Archway published two Star Trek game books in its series of 26 in 1984 & 1986.
Corgi Books (UK)
Corgi Books published seven Star Trek novels from the Bantam Books range starting with 'Spock Must Die' in 1974 and finishing with 'Mudd's Angels' in 1978. In the series of reprints in the 80s, only six were reprinted.
Corgi books also published Ballantine's animated series novelisations.
Orbit Books (UK)
In the UK, Orbit Books published one Star Trek novel 'The Entropy Effect' in (1981). This book was number 2 in the Pocket Books range in 1981 and number 17 in the Titan Books range in 1988.
Simon & Schuster are currently in the process of reprinting selected TOS novels as well as continuing to publish new volumes. I'm not sure how I feel about the covers to be honest! They have decided to do away with the older style painted covers in favour of photoshopped images. While I'm not surprised, I can't say I like the change. The older covers have so much character, and most of the newer covers are just generic, although some are quite pretty.
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| Titan, Pocket & Reprint Entropy Effect Cover. |
Ok, so perhaps the Entropy Effect (urgh Vonda McIntyre) wasn't the best example, but it is one reprint with a redesigned cover I happened upon the other day while on a book hunt. While I'm not fond of the original cover, it does have a certain character to it. I mean, you can't mistake it for any other cover, Sulu with long hair and a droopy tache, the deliciously dated graphics that scream that particular late 70s early 80s aesthetic. The new reprint could be anything, any story with Spock under some kind of psychic strain; I just don't find it that appealing.
Anyway, I hope you found this interesting, it was really for my benefit for getting it all straight in my own head. I realise there are reference books and the like as well as Shatnerverse novels which do not fit into continuity of the Pocket novels, but for the purposes of this post I'm leaving it with this. It's probably for the best, after all, when I was talking to my family about this they maintained a glazed expression for almost the entirety of my excited and interested spiel. I find publishing histories and such quite interesting, but then again, I do tend to like quite dry subjects...
If I find anything else interesting regarding publishing and such I'll add to this post.
References:
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Novels
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Pocket_Books
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Titan_Books
http://www.simonandschuster.co.uk/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Star_Trek_novels
http://www.tonystrading.co.uk/galleries/tvscifibooks/startrek02.htm
http://www.tonystrading.co.uk/galleries/tvscifibooks/startrek02.htm
Jennifer, I have to tell you how delighted I am to see a person go in such detail about ST fan literature! Seeing it through fresh eyes is (ahem) fascinating. I didn't realize until now that the email posts I am getting are actually connected to this web page, so I will comment here instead, so others might perhaps add to the comments. I don't want you to think no one is reading your research!
ReplyDeleteYou made me reconsider The Entropy Effect, which at the time it came out, I considered one of the better written novels. I suppose since I read it and re-read it in my high school years it was one that had a big impact, for precisely the reason you mentioned, which was the hint of slashiness in a mass publication (I was just being introduced to real slash "on the side", through a friend who sent me photocopied samples). I would love to read the novel again to see if my opinion of Vonda has changed. I do remember the novel making news in the press, declaring that a novel had come out in which Kirk dies, so of course I had to read it...
My introduction to the series novelizations began with the Corgi editions, so I appreciate your cover comparisons a great deal as well.
I am moving on to comment on your latest, the Della Van Hise zine... oh my!
Hello Susan - Thank you for reading and commenting! I appreciate the feedback, sometimes it does feel like writing into a void! I don't know how the email posts work, I just put the option there for people to sign up to and let blogger do whatever it does to generate them! I look forward to getting to know other fans through the blog, I feel it's more intimate than facebook groups because the content is more involved and not so transient.
DeleteI hope I haven't ruined The Entropy Effect for you, I was harsh but... Vonda's writing just seems to niggle at me, and you know, once you notice little problems, they soon balloon into big problems. It doesn't help that her 'First Adventure' is an utter travesty... I'm being mean again aren't I? Hehe.
Oh dear, I feel like I'd be 'that friend' who sends the samples, I really am a bad girl (and I have done exactly that, such a bad influence). Oh goodness, if I was in high school reading The Entropy Effect, I probably would have been totally entranced by the slashy hints too, and Kirk's death scene pages would probably have been falling out from being thumbed so much! Vindication for what I had picked up in the series, obviously!
It's good to know the cover comparisons are interesting, I'll try and include more of them in the future.