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Updated January 2010
Over the last four decades, several hundred books about Star Trek have been published. A few have almost been published, but for reasons unknown were dropped from a publisher's schedule. A couple have been published in forms different from those intended by their authors, rewritten dramatically by other authors because of Paramount or Pocket objections. And, more recently, at least one has been published and then destroyed by order of Viacom/Paramount lawyers.
Of all the lost books, perhaps the most (in)famous is Gene Roddenberry's The God Thing. In 1977, Starlog quoted Roddenberry's executive assistant, Susan Sackett, as saying that Bantam would be publishing Roddenberry's novel, based on a proposed but rejected script for the first Star Trek movie. Twenty years later, it has yet to be published. Because a lot of information is available about this book, I've created a separate page for it.
Fiction Academy by J.M. Dillard Nonfiction and Miscellaneous Deep Space Nine, the Ultimate Unauthorized Trivia Challenge by James Hatfield
and George "Doc" Burt |
Untitled Gene Roddenberry Book (circa 1977) In the About the Authors section in The Price of the Phoenix, a Star Trek novel by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath, the authors say that they "have been working on forthcoming books with Gene Roddenberry, William Shatner, and Nichelle Nichols." The Shatner book, Shatner: Where No Man...: The Authorized Biography of William Shatner, was published in 1979. The Roddenberry and Nichols books (see below for more on the latter) never materialized. In the anthology Star Trek: The New Voyages 2, editors Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath announced plans to work with Nichelle Nichols on a novel called Uhura. The book was never published. I don't know whether it was actually written, but New Voyages 2 did include "Surprise!," a short story by Marshak, Culbreath, and Nichols. From the Editor's Preface to Star Trek: The New Voyages 2:
Ian McLean adds that, in a footnote in one of the Marshak and Culbreath books, the book is called The Uhura Connection. Ian's recollection is that the book would have been a mix of fact and fiction about Nichols and Uhura, with Uhura exploring the life of her ancestor, Nichols, who had worked with NASA, among other things. (In the 1970s, Nichols worked with NASA to recruit astronauts from minority groups.) Mr. Spock's Guide to the Planet Vulcan (circa 1979) The third lost book from Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath, this was announced as a forthcoming book in the About the Authors page of their second Bantam Trek novel, The Fate of the Phoenix. According to a Psi Phi post by Ian McLean, the book was later listed as an upcoming book from Pocket, who took over the Star Trek books license and published two more novels by Marshak and Culbreath. Gates, Harlequin, Moonchild (circa 1980) Steven E. MacDonald, whose original science fiction novel The Janus Syndrome was published by Bantam, was asked to write two Star Trek novels for Bantam. In an email, he recalls:
Years later, MacDonald made some pitches for stories conceived as either comic miniseries or novels. MacDonald has not yet made any Star Trek sales, but, among other things, he's written the Andromeda novel Waystation, published in 2004, and he has has been involved in some fan-produced Star Trek audio adventures. Thanks to Steven E. MacDonald for the information.
Jeff Rovin has written dozens of books, including joke books, video game books, show biz biographies, and novels in Tom Clancy's Op-Center series. I asked him on the Scarlet Street forum about the book:
The Wristwatch Plantation (circa 1982)
Science fiction novelist Larry Niven, whose short story "The Soft Weapon" was adapted as the animated Star Trek episode "The Slaver Weapon," co-wrote a storyline for the early 1980s daily Star Trek newspaper comic strip with Sharman Di Vono. In his book Playgrounds of the Mind, a collection of short stories, novel excerpts, and commentary, Niven discusses the experience. He mentions that he and Di Vono were interested in getting the story published, either in novel form or as a collection of the newspaper strips. Neither happened. Niven also says the story as presented in the strip featured a rush ending because the artist wanted to quit. The book includes a summary of the originally planned ending. See pages 507-510 of Niven's book for more information. The strip, which features Niven's alien species the Kzinti, is currently available as part of a comic strip CD ROM collection from Rich Handley. The image above is smaller and lower quality than the version on the CD ROM. Ian McLean and Allyn Gibson have both mentioned Niven's book in the past, and I thank them for bringing it to my attention. To Steal a Starship (1983 or 1984) A.C. Crispin, author of Yesterday's Son and several other Trek novels, proposed a novel that was turned down. She described it in a post on the Pocket Books Star Trek bulletin board:
If the movie was the reason the proposal was rejected, the timeframe is right. The Search for Spock was released during the summer of 1984. In 2002, the Canadian web-based SF magazine Voyageur published sample chapters from a manuscript by award-winning science fiction novelist Robert Sawyer. A few years before the publication of his first SF novel (Golden Fleece, 1990), Sawyer unsuccessfully tried to sell a Trek novel to Pocket.
Robert Sawyer has made the sample chapters and outline available through his website at http://www.sfwriter.com/armada.htm. One of the regulars at the TrekBBS, who goes by the user name The God Thing, emailed Sawyer about Armada and posted Sawyer's reply. According to Sawyer, it would be difficult to finish and publish the novel now because the book was started in the early 1980s, before most of the movies and the newer series. "Subsequent revelations in the later Star Trek movies and series are at odds with what I wrote (although I suppose it would be possible to modify my storyline to work within those constraints)." Sawyer was also concerned about Pocket's constraints. Dave Stern had wanted all novels published during his editorial reign to be as consistent with each other as possible, which Sawyer found problematic. However...
In a post over on Psi Phi's bulletin board, Ian McLean mentioned a lost book by Star Trek writer and SF novelist David Gerrold, author of the original series episode "The Trouble With Tribbles" and a nonfiction book about the making of said episode coincidentally titled "The Trouble With Tribbles", the nonfiction book The World of Star Trek (two editions), the Bantam novel The Galactic Whirlpool, the novelization of Encounter at Farpoint, the Next Generation series bible, a couple of animated Trek episodes, the lost Next Generation episode "Blood and Fire," and much more. Ian posted on Psi Phi:
Ian's post suggests that the novel may have had some thematic similarities with "Blood and Fire." Ian McLean also mentioned a lost book by Trek novelist Howard Weinstein on Psi Phi:
There are at least fifty changes from the first version to the revised version, some as short as a single word, others as long as a paragraph or two. Most of the excisions involve scenes in which there is physical contact between Kirk and Spock (for example, describing the warmth of Spock's hand on Kirk's face during a mindmeld). But there was also a sentence that described Spock's realization that Kirk was the person Spock was meant to spend his life with. Copies of the original can still be found in used bookstores and at conventions, so this book isn't completely lost yet. If the cover has raised letters for the title, it's likely to be the original; if not, check anyway, because at least some copies without raised lettering have the unexpurgated text. Better yet, just check page 41 for a passage that begins, "I understand that you were probably playing with dolls and wearing lipstick until you were twenty!" That appears only in the original. Charles Washburn's Star Trek Memoir (1986) Charlie Washburn was profiled in the November, 1986 issue of Starlog (#112) in the article "From the Notes of 'Charlie Star Trek.'" He worked behind the scenes on the show for a year or two. In the interview, he stated his desire to write a book about working on the original series and about being a black man in the television industry. I haven't heard anything about this proposed book since then, and I don't know whether it was ever actually written. From the article:
J.M. Dillard, author of several Trek novels, adaptations, and nonfiction books, was profiled in the December, 1987 issue of Starlog (#125). The article, "J.M. Dillard: Blood on the Enterprise," by Daniel Dickholtz, included the following news:
When The Next Generation went into production, the Star Trek office at Paramount, through Gene Roddenberry or his personal assistant Richard Arnold, imposed a new set of constraints on Pocket's Trek novel program. It's possible that this proposal was one of the many that were turned down due to those constraints. In a live chat on Compuserve in January, 1990, Carmen Carter described a novel she had proposed to then-editor Dave Stern.
The title is a reference to Clotho, one of the three Fates of Greek mythology. The Klingon Trilogy and Timetwist (1988?) The Signature Edition reprint omnibus Worlds in Collision, by Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens, features an interview with the authors conducted by Kevin Dilmore. Asked about their first dealings with Pocket, they say that Memory Prime, their first published Star Trek novel, was one of three proposals.
The Star Trek That Never Was (1988)
Judging by the cover copy ("adventures written for the original series and its planned sequel"), this was a book about unproduced episodes of Star Trek, covering the same subject as the thin, overpriced books The Star Trek That Never Was and The Star Trek That Almost Was published by the Star Trek Files Magazine group (also known as Schuster and Schuster, Couch Potato Press, Pioneer Books, etc.). Those little ripoffs had plot summaries of episodes written for the original Star Trek and the aborted Phase II series. Interestingly, the cover copy for Pocket's book says that it was "compiled by Allan Asherman, featuring material by Norman Spinrad" et al. Perhaps this book actually reproduced scripts and story treatments, rather than just summarizing them. As if by coincidence, the Asherman book was due for publication during a writers' strike in Hollywood, and "The Child", the premiere episode of The Next Generation's second season, was based on an unused Phase II script. Did Paramount order Pocket to drop the book so they could have some unused scripts to work with? Maybe. Another script was retooled ("Devil's Due"), and only now has a book on Phase II been published (Star Trek Phase II: The Lost Series by Garfield and Judith Reeves-Stevens). As for the original series material, Theodore Sturgeon's proposed episode, which would have been in this book, has since been adapted into novel form (The Joy Machine by James Gunn), but we may have lost some other intriguing stories. By Logic Alone and The Federation Mutiny (1990) Star Trek novelist Diane Carey was interviewed in the October, 1990 issue of Starlog (#159). In the article, "Beyond the Final Frontier," by Wanda J. Hall, Carey discussed three books that were to have followed her two Piper novels, Dreadnought! and Battlestations!
It seems likely that these novels fell victim to Paramount constraints in effect at the time. Untitled Time Travel Novel (1990?) Susan Sackett, in her memoir Inside Trek: My Secret Life With Star Trek Creator Gene Roddenberry, mentions that she and her writing partner tried to rework an unproduced Next Generation episode, sold in 1989 but not used after a change in producers, as a novel.
The War Virus and A Flag Full of Stars (1990-91) In 1990, Pocket Books announced the creation of a series within a series: The Lost Years, three books that would cover the period between the end of the Enterprise's first five year mission and the reunion of the crew during the V'Ger incident. (In other words, the time between the original TV series and the first movie.) The first book published was J.M. Dillard's The Lost Years; it was to be followed by Brad Ferguson's A Flag Full of Stars and Irene Kress's The War Virus. Unfortunately, something went wrong. A Flag Full of Stars was delayed by several months and the planned third book, The War Virus, never appeared. Current Pocket Books ST editor John Ordover has said the latter book "didn't work out for reasons I can't really get into." (He once said on CompuServe that it had nothing to do with Paramount.) A then-employee of Pocket, Paul Shannon, posted on usenet that The War Virus "was cancelled because it was submitted in unpublishable condition." Ferguson's book isn't completely lost, though; an electronic version was available from his website (http://www.fred.net/thirteen/affos/affos.html; thanks to Alex Rosenzweig for posting the URL on the Pocket Star Trek books bulletin board). The current URL given on his website is ftp://ftp.fred.net/pub/users-www/thirteen/books/pdfs/affos.pdf, though that doesn't seem to be working now. Brad Ferguson posted his view of the Lost Years situation online in 1991:
For what it's worth, Ferguson later wrote a Next Generation novel, The Last Stand (1995), so his relations with Pocket have obviously improved over the last six years. As for The Lost Years trilogy, it was eventually finished, but it became a tetralogy, with the eventual appearance of L.A. Graf's Traitor Winds (1994) and J.M. Dillard's Recovery (1995). Ian McLean (who would deserve royalties if this were a for-profit site instead of a personal money sink) mentioned, in a Psi Phi thread about The Lost Years, "'Orion's Belt', the proposed Captain Will Decker novel by Robert Greenberger." Although I read about The War Virus in various places back when The Lost Years trilogy was announced, I had never heard of this book until Ian mentioned it. Robert Greenberger has written several Star Trek novels, some in collaboration with other writers. Recently asked about Orion's Belt over at the TrekBBS, Greenberger set the record straight.
(Perhaps there's another lost novel out there somewhere, if Ian was right about someone proposing a Will Decker novel.) Star Trek: The First 25 Years (1991)
(Image provided by Curt McAloney. Click on the image to see the back cover.) In 1991, Pocket Books promoted an anniversary book by Gene Roddenberry and his longtime assistant, Susan Sackett, called Star Trek: The First 25 Years. It was to have been a heavily-illustrated hardcover book. In addition to listing the book in their schedule, Pocket advertised it in some of its other 1991 books. However, the book was never published, and no definite reason was ever given. Rumor had it that Leonard Nimoy had some kind of problem with some photographs in the book, but that was never confirmed. Until 2002, anyway. Susan Sackett's book, Inside Trek: My Secret Life With Star Trek Creator Gene Roddenberry, has some information on the anniversary book. She had originally intended it for the 20th anniversary, but Pocket couldn't reach a deal with Paramount. Eventually, however, everything was cleared up for a 25th anniversary book, written by Sackett with a few quotes from Roddenberry. According to Sackett, the rumor that Leonard Nimoy was responsible for the book's cancellation is true. First he was late in signing off on photos of him in the book, and then he wanted editorial changes made to the text of the book. After a closed-doors meeting with Roddenberry, his lawyer Leonard Maizlish, Leonard Nimoy, and his attorney (but not Sackett), Maizlish told Sackett "that the book was on hold because Leonard Nimoy didn't think the prose 'lofty enough,' as Maizlish put it, and wanted it more in the style of someone like Bill Moyers." [p.189] Adding insult to injury was the later publication of the coffee table book Star Trek: Where No One Has Gone Before, with text credited to Trek novelist J.M. Dillard. According to Sackett, "an extensive amount of the copy was taken from my manuscript (which Paramount owned outright, since I was paid as a writer for hire). When I learned of the proposed book, I contacted Pocket Books, and they hastily cut me a small check and added my name on the front page in the first space under 'Additional Material by.'" [p.190] Inside Trek has a bit more information on this and other books by Sackett, published and otherwise, as well as some new information on Roddenberry's The God Thing. Curt McAloney typed out the front and back cover text:
Return to Tomorrow: The Filming of Star Trek - The Motion Picture (1991) In 1991, Image Publishing was one of a few companies churning out unauthorized behind-the-scenes Star Trek books. Advertised in some of their books was Return to Tomorrow by Preston Jones, which was scheduled for December, 1991, though it was apparently never printed. From the ad:
Recently, through one of the regulars at the TrekBBS, I heard from Preston Jones. Here's his description of the book, for which he's now seeking a new publisher:
Edward Gross's Star Trek Fiction Book (1992, 1995) In 1992, Edward Gross, author of a few unauthorized Trek nonfiction books published by Hal Schuster, posted a message on CompuServe. He asked published pro and fanzine Trek fiction writers to contact him about a book he was writing on Trek fiction. To the best of my knowledge the book never appeared, though keeping track of books from publishers like Image and Pioneer can be difficult. Interestingly enough, fellow unauthorized Trek nonfiction writer James Van Hise published Trek: The Printed Adventures in 1993 through Schuster's Pioneer imprint. In 1995, Gross appeared online again. This time he solicited readers of Star Trek novels on rec.arts.startrek.current for summaries and reviews of Star Trek novels, to be included in a book he was preparing on Star Trek books. I emailed him and asked about the book (and whether it would be a Pioneer book). He responded that this would be an Image book, because he no longer had anything to do with Pioneer. That was encouraging news, so I wrote up a review of Mission to Horatius and sent it to him. He acknowledged receipt of it, and encouraged me to do a few more. I didn't get around to it, and I didn't hear from him again. The book was never published, but I put the Mission to Horatius review on my home page. Some time later I added a God Thing page, and then it all evolved into this site. Probe (Music of the Spheres) (1992) In 1985, Pocket published Margaret Wander Bonanno's first Trek novel, Dwellers in the Crucible. A great deal of the book centered on new characters created by Bonanno. By the time she wrote the sequel, though, Pocket was operating under a new set of restrictions, imposed by the Star Trek office at Paramount.. Authors were not supposed to write much about new characters, but were expected instead to focus on the series regulars. Characters created for one book were not supposed to be brought back in others. Bonanno's novel apparently violated those new rules, and Paramount (in the form of Richard Arnold, representing Gene Roddenberry) insisted on drastic changes and rewrites. Ultimately, as happened with Brad Ferguson's A Flag Full of Stars, the book was substantially rewritten by another writer. And then another. J.M. Dillard did the initial rewrites; Gene DeWeese did the final rewrite. (This is one of the incidents discussed in Tim Lynch's 1991 interview with Richard Arnold.) According to Bonanno, only 7% of her book remained in the finished version. Though Bonanno reportedly wanted her name removed from the book, that wasn't done. Later, she found another way to express her dissatisfaction: by distributing copies of her original manuscript for Probe, under her original title Music of the Spheres. Many fans who have seen it report that Bonanno's original version is superior. Thanks to the Internet, it's easier to make that determination. You can find out more by going to Bonanno's website, or read a pdf version of her original version. Harve Bennett's Star Trek: The Academy Years (1992?) Harve Bennett, producer of the first several Star Trek motion pictures, proposed a Starfleet Academy story concept for the sixth motion picture. Called The Academy Years, it would have featured a cast of young actors playing younger versions of Kirk, Spock, and McCoy. It was rejected in favor of The Undiscovered Country. According to a source who apparently worked for Pocket at the time, there was some discussion of doing a novel based on the unfilmed story. Responding to an earlier post about the possibility of a novelization, someone posted the following:
Paul Shannon posted a few times on usenet as a Pocket employee with some inside information (I've quoted him above on The War Virus). I don't know why this message is signed Scott, though. Jim Rugg's Special Effects Book (1993) In February, 1993, Tom Rugg posted a message on Compuserve asking if there was much interest in a book on the special effects of the original Star Trek. His father was Trek special effects whiz Jim Rugg. The younger Rugg hoped to talk his father into doing the book; the two would work on it together. November 1997 update. Tom Rugg emailed me, saying, "The book was never written. However, I gathered raw material for the book. I taped several hours of interviews with my father, getting details about the effects on each show. I also taped an interview with Al Jones, one of the other effects guys on the show. And I've transcribed most tapes, and my father has edited the transcriptions. Then I got busy with other things, and that's where the book sits. Will the book ever be written? I don't know. I hope so, but I'll need to find some time to do some more interviews (with other participants), or else decide to put together the book using what I have now." A Boxtree UK edition of one of Image's unauthorized Star Trek nonfiction books included a list of forthcoming books. One was The Law of Trek, described as "A fascinating study of the Trek universe's legal system by Paul Joseph, a professor of Law at Nova University." The book's release was scheduled for October, 1994. To the best of my knowledge the book was never published by Boxtree or Image. The book was likely a reprint or an extended version of a paper by Paul Joseph and Sharon Carton. Published in the University of Toledo Law Review in 1992, "The Law of the Federation: Images of Law, Lawyers, and the Legal System in Star Trek: The Next Generation" is a long analysis of how the Federation's legal system is seen to operate in episodes like "Measure of a Man," "The Drumhead," and a number of others. The full text of the paper is available on the web at http://tarlton.law.utexas.edu/lpop/etext/joseph-carton.htm. That paper, with several others, also appears in the 2003 book Star Trek: Visions of Law and Justice, edited by Robert Chairs and Bradley Chilton and published by Adios Press. Pamela Dean's Star Trek Novel (1994) In a series of posts on usenet in 1996, Pamela Dean Dyer-Bennet, who has published several fantasy novels as Pamela Dean, discussed working on an unpublished Star Trek novel for Pocket. It was clearly not a good experience. The book started as a spec submission to editor Mimi Panitch, who left Pocket before the completed manuscript arrived. Dave Stern passed on it after some discussions and rewrites. Dyer-Bennet tried again later with John Ordover, but again ran into difficulties. She writes of the constraints of the time:
In a followup, she added: What I had was the captain of a Federation ship that was actually more powerful than the Enterprise (*gasp*) solve the problem while Kirk was distracted. This did not go over well. I really enjoyed writing it. I've only read some of Dyer-Bennet's short fiction in the Liavek fantasy anthologies, so I have no idea how this novel might have turned out. However, it's unfortunate that she tried submitting the book during a couple of the less inspired eras of the Star Trek publishing program. It's possible that her comments were tinged with a hint of frustration or bitterness, but there have indeed been times when way too many Star Trek novels were about the Enterprise crew saving the universe or the galaxy from destruction (Invasion, Double Helix, Genesis Wave, Maximum Warp....) Star Trek and Christianity (1994) In late 1993, Christian writer and academic Frank Beckwith posted on usenet about a new book coming out in 1994. The book, Star Trek and Christianity by Rob Bowman (no relation to the former Trek director), was apparently supposed to be published by the Christian Research Institute. The CRI's Christian Research Journal had published an article of Bowman's on the subject back in 1991. According to Beckwith, Bowman was a fan of Trek, but as a Presbyterian theologian he was also somewhat critical of the show. As far as I know, the book was never published; it's not in Books in Print, not on amazon.com, and nowhere to be found on the CRI website. The Wisdom of Gene Roddenberry (1995) In 1995, HarperCollins listed a book called Wit & Wisdom of Gene Roddenberry in Books in Print. I also came across an ad for it in a comics distributor catalogue under the shorter title above, along with a reproduction of the book's cover. According to these sources, the book was to have been edited by Majel Barrett Roddenberry, due for publication in September of 1995. BiP listed it as a mass market paperback, 96 pages, $6.99, ISBN 0-06-105316-3. But the book never appeared in bookstores. I checked the web site www.roddenberry.com, which Majel apparently set up as an online version of the Lincoln Enterprises catalogue, and the book wasn't listed, so I emailed the address given for information requests and got the following reply: From stinfo@roddenberry.com Thu May 15 14:00:07 1997 To: Steve Roby From: stinfo@roddenberry.com (Star Trek Orders) Subject: Re: "Wisdom of Gene Roddenberry" book? Date: Thu, 15 May 1997 14:00:07 -0800 >Hi. I've seen a listing in Books in Print for a book called The >Wisdom of Gene Roddenberry, written by Majel Barrett, published >by HarperCollins, but it's not listed in the books section of >the Lincoln catalog online. Do you have any information about this >book? > >Thank you. > >Steve Roby Dear Steve: That book does not exist and never will until I can get all of his letters and his speeches in order. Thank you for your interest peace and Love, majel (If that's actually from Majel herself, that's pretty neat.) This book may not be lost indefinitely, but it evidently won't be available any time soon. Before briefly capturing the attention of a larger publisher (Little, Brown), Ed Gross and Mark A. Altman produced several unauthorized Star Trek nonfiction books for Gross's own company, Image, some of which were reprinted in the UK by Boxtree. I have not come across any sign of an Image edition, but for some time both amazon.co.uk and Waterstone's had a listing for a Boxtree edition. (Waterstone's website was eventually taken over by amazon, and the book is no longer listed.) According to the Waterstone's record, this is "A guide, based on information presented in various episodes over the years, to some of the alien civilizations featured in the Star Trek universe, including Klingons, Cardassians, Romulans, Vulcans, Bajorans, the Borg and the Dominion. The aspects covered include customs and political ideologies." According to Gross, this book, which was co-written by Gross and Altman with John L. Flynn, was never actually published. In a September, 1996 issue of his Dateline: Starfleet news bulletin, Bill Mason reported the following:
At some point in late 1996 or early 1997, this book was dropped in favor of Peter David's Triangle: Imzadi II, which was published in 1998. David's book covered the same subject area, but I can't help but wonder how Dillard's novel would have dealt with it. John Vornholt's "Way to Eden" Novel (mentioned in 1996) In 1996, on CompuServe, Pocket Books Trek novelist John Vornholt mentioned in a post in the Star Trek forum that he had once proposed a novel based on the not-so-classic Trek episode "The Way to Eden." He didn't say when he'd proposed that particular book. He also didn't seem particularly surprised that Pocket passed on the idea. Philip Jose Farmer's Star Trek Novel (1996) According to a Farmer fan's website, science fiction novelist Philip Jose Farmer (most famous for the Riverworld novels) was considering writing a Star Trek novel. Patrick Lozito wrote the following in 1995 on a GeoCities page:
I haven't seen anything else to substantiate this particular item, and the site on which it appeared is a bit frivolous in tone (the above was quoted from a page called "Barsoom Needs Bazooms"). However, the short story mentioned above does exist, and Farmer was offered a chance to write for the original series. His official website has for sale a copy of an early Star Trek bible with some notes handwritten by Farmer on the front page ("protein molecules given off by host are similar to pollen - Desire of the Moth") for US$1,000. Secret Fighting Arts of the Warrior Race (1996)
Update: as of late 1999, the publisher says that some copies are still available through one supplier, Wing Lam Enterprises, though I haven't confirmed that they actually have copies in stock. (WLE's price is US$29.95; the price printed on the book's back cover is US$16.00.) And as of 2004 copies are still occasionally popping up on ebay. It took a few years, but as of February, 2004, I finally have a copy of my own. I originally had this as a 1997 book, but thanks to an email from João Paulo Cursino, who has a copy, I now know it was published in December, 1996, so the main site entry for the book is now on the 1996 page. The March, 1996 issue of Locus listed ST Anthology as a November, 1996 Pocket Books release. It was dropped from later Locus publishers' listings, and never appeared on the Pocket Star Trek web site's upcoming books list. Pocket Books ST editor John Ordover confirmed that this book was considered, but was never actually written:
So this is more of a lost concept than a lost book, as the stories were never actually written.
Unfortunately, Robberson picked the wrong time to do an unauthorized cookbook, and the wrong publisher. The publisher in question was Carol Publishing Group. Through their Citadel Press imprint, they had just published Sam Ramer's The Joy of Trek. Paramount/Viacom sued on grounds of copyright violation, and that book is now essentially a lost book itself. According to Entertainment Law Digest, Paramount also filed a legal action against Carol Publishing and Theresa Robberson in December of 1997. Making matters worse, Pocket decided to publish its own official Star Trek Cookbook by Ethan Phillips and William J. Birnes. Robberson's book wasn't cancelled officially, but its publishing date was repeatedly pushed back, from November 1997, to March 1998, to 2000. The final blow was the collapse of Carol Publishing Group in August 1999. The company claimed not to be bankrupt or out of business, but all staff working on new, as-yet-unpublished books were laid off. The Noe Valley Voice interviewed Robberson in 1997, when the book's publication seemed to be imminent. The article discusses why Robberson decided to write a Trek cookbook, how she came up with the recipes, why she took the unauthorized route, and more. Star Trek Reader's Reference (1997) In a first for this page, which has been online for several years, this book is no longer lost. It was published in 2001. Click here for more information. Deep Space Nine, the Ultimate Unauthorized Trivia Challenge (1997 or 1998?) In 1996, Kensington published The Ultimate Trek Trivia Challenge for The Next Generation, by James Hatfield and George "Doc" Burt. (The two also wrote Patrick Stewart: The Unauthorized Biography.) Amazon.com lists this followup book as out of print, but no other source, including Books in Print and the Kensington website, lists it, and I've never seen it. Star Trek Collector: Artifacts From the Future (1998) Originally titled Artifacts of the Future: A History of Star Trek Memorabilia, this book by Kevin Stevens was supposed to be published by Pocket Books but after a long series of delays was removed from Pocket's schedule. Margaret Clark, editor of Pocket's nonfiction Trek books, announced in her Q&A page that Stevens hadn't delivered the book and it was no longer on the schedule. However, it's still listed as active in Books in Print, complete with ISBN (0-671-00463-8) and publication date (November 1998). Amazon.com and other online sources listed the book Star Trek Interviews by Lyndsey Cockwell for several months. The original listing was for an 82-page paperback from Cimino Publishing Group, priced at $12.95, due April 1, 1998. Later there was a listing for Star Trek Interviews With CDROM, 84 pages, $24.95, due August 1998, with a new ISBN. More recently, it disappeared from Amazon.com. An email from Edward Cimino confirmed that the book was cancelled. Secret of Vulcan's Fury: Official Strategies & Secrets (1998) According to Books in Print, Sybex planned to publish a book by Bart Farkas on the Secret of Vulcan's Fury computer game in April, 1998. However, Interplay halted work on the game before it was completed. The game has been cancelled, and, obviously, so has this book, though it was listed in some sources and had been assigned an ISBN (0782123015). Star Trek TV writer D.C. Fontana was involved in writing the game's storyline, and rumor says she would like to rewrite the story as a Star Trek novel. At present, however, Pocket's editorial staff is apparently not interested. David McIntee's Star Trek: Voyager Novel (1999) David McIntee, author of several Doctor Who novels and the unauthorized Voyager episode guide Delta Quadrant, almost managed to sell Pocket's John Ordover a Voyager novel after a number of pitches. Then Ordover saw an ad for Delta Quadrant, putting an end to the novel. McIntee was told that Pocket was not allowed to buy books from writers of unauthorized Star Trek books. That may be true, but if it is, it must have imposed recently. John Peel wrote a number of publications for the notorious Hal Schuster and went on to write a few Pocket Star Trek novels. (Peel also wrote both unauthorized Doctor Who nonfiction and officially licenced Doctor Who novels.) McIntee has discussed the experience in a couple of usenet posts in 2000 and 2002. In 1999, a "Citizen G'Kar", who appeared to be McIntee posting pseudonymously, posted a detailed and lengthy synopsis of the novel on usenet. It's too long to reproduce here, but it shows that the book would have been interesting. Janeway and her crew encounter a world on which families are only supposed to have one child, and extra children end up in the hands of a mysterious corporation. One of the characters, Koschei, previously appeared in the Doctor Who novel The Dark Path as a young version of the Master, the Doctor's nemesis, if I understand correctly. (I have The Dark Path but haven't read it yet.) Star Trek: Insurrection (1999) In an interview archived at http://www.trekgalaxy.com/newsextra150.htm, Michael Piller talks about a book he wrote about the making of Star Trek: Insurrection.
Ian McLean, on Psi Phi, quoted another Piller comment on this book from Joe Nazzaro's recent book, Writing SF TV:
This is one book I'd really like to see. I can only hope it will appear in some form eventually. Star Trek: New Worlds: Official Strategies & Secrets (2000)
According to various sources, the book was written by Bart Farkas with David Chong. It was to be 240 pages long, and the price was US$19.99. Like the Vulcan's Fury book, it had been assigned an ISBN (0782126731), and was listed on the Sybex website, from which the cover art at right was taken. (Given the absence of authors' names, this was most likely an early version of the cover.) Sybex has since removed most information about the book from their site, and an employee confirmed by email that the book was cancelled. (For gamers who might have appreciated this book, there was an official website for the game at http://www.interplay.com/stnewworlds/, which seems to be gone now, and an unofficial game guide is available in pdf format from Stratos at http://www.stratosgroup.com/download/guides/200010stnw/stnw.pdf.) Despite the cancellation of the Vulcan's Fury and New Worlds books, Bart Farkas has managed to get a few Star Trek game books into print, including one from Sybex (Star Trek: Klingon Academy Official Strategies & Secrets). Last Unicorn Games Books (2000)
Some material from the sourcebooks is likely to be available in electronic form from authors of the material, but that depends on a number of legal matters. One Last Unicorn author, Steve Long, announced that Spacedock, the Starship Recognition Manual, and the Dominion War book would be available for free in .pdf format, without illustrations. As of April, 2003, the supplements The Dominion War Sourcebook, Spacedock: The Advanced Starship and Construction Manual, Ship Recognition Manual Volume One: The Ships of Starfleet, Ship Recognition Manual Volume Two: The Cardassian Union, Ship Recognition Manual Volume Three: The Klingon Empire, and Ship Recognition Manual Volume Four: Starships of the Original Series Era are available from TrekRPG.net. At least two Last Unicorn writers have set up websites with some of their unpublished material. S. John Ross has an Untaken Treks page with material he wrote for a number of unpublished books, including information on Deltans, Orions, and more. Steve Kenson has a site called Star Trek: The Lost Episodes with his unpublished work, including information on Cardassians, Klingons, merchants, and Starfleet Security. Unpublished Last Unicorn books:
Information on the above titles comes from the Last Unicorn Games website. Other books that were reported to be in the works, according to Steve Long and other TrekRPG forum participants as well as other sources:
Starship Enterprise was due to be a hardcover coffee table book, originally scheduled for 2000. From Margaret Clark's Pocket website Q&A in September, 1999:
Later, in March, 2000:
(No, that Steve is not the Steve writing this.) Apparently, for whatever reason, no deal could be reached, and the book was dropped from the schedule. Some of what was intended for the book was apparently carried over into the Unseen Frontier book, but that book also failed to materialize. See below for more on Unseen Frontier (and, for that matter, the Voyager Technical Manual). Starting in 1999, Pocket ran a serial novel in the backs of its mass market paperbacks. Called Starfleet: Year One, it was collected and published as a book in 2002. According to its author, Michael Jan Friedman, there were originally plans for the story of the beginning of Starfleet to continue. In Kevin Dilmore's interview with Friedman in the Signature Edition reprint omnibus Pantheon, Friedman says:
Star Trek Comic Strips (2001?)
Shortly before the premiere of Star Trek - The Motion Picture, the Los Angeles Times Syndicate presented a daily Star Trek comic strip. The strip was never very widely syndicated but lasted until 1983. Rich Handley, who wrote an article for Star Trek Communicator about the strip, pulled together copies of all the strips from a number of collectors, and managed to get a number of the earlier UK comic stories from different publications. Unfortunately, for contractual reasons, Pocket has apparently reversed course on the book. According to John Ordover, in a Psi Phi post on April 27, 2001:
And that's where things stood until Handley made all the strips available to fans on CD ROM, in 2005. Mark Martinez's Star Trek comics site has a page describing the storylines, writers, and artists for the strip's four-year run. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Anthology (2001?) In 1999, Robin Anne Reid and Judy Ann Ford at Texas A&M University issued a call for papers on Deep Space Nine for an anthology of papers:
According to Reid, papers were written and submitted, some publishers were interested, but for a variety of reasons (no room in publishing schedules, fading interest in Star Trek, and so on), the book was never published. As late as 2004 there was still a slight chance the project would go ahead, but it's definitely not happening now. Papers were returned to contributors some time ago for submission elsewhere. This book is no longer lost. Though it had apparently been cancelled, the author, Gene DeWeese, and editors Marco Palmieri and Keith R.A. DeCandido got things moving again, and the novel was published in February, 2005. See the book entry for more information. According to a number of bookstore websites, Pocket published Diane Carey's novelization of the Voyager episode "Unimatrix Zero" in March, 2001, with the ISBN 0671551930. It's possible that such a book was planned, but it was probably never written and definitely never published. (Thanks to Kozara at the TrekBBS for mentioning this.) The Unseen Frontier: Declassified Images From the History of the Federation (2001, 2002, 2003...) This book has gone from repeatedly delayed to cancelled. According to a quote from Mojo (Adam Lebowitz) cited in psiphi's books database (temporarily down), this would have been a book of mostly new computer generated images of starship images from major events from Federation history. The book would have looked something like a future issue of National Geographic or a Time/Life book and was expected to be about 150 pages long. The book came into being because of the success of Mojo's Ship of the Line Star Trek calendars for Pocket, which feature new computer graphics shots of Trek spaceships. The psiphi page has many more quotes from Mojo on the book. In a post on the TrekBBS on March 6, 2003, editor Margaret Clark discussed the issue in some detail. Here's an excerpt:
Pocket made an attempt to relaunch the original Star Trek books line, rebranding the books as Star Trek: The Original Series. Some early discussion suggested that these books would go back to the early days of Kirk's first five-year mission and tell stories that incorporated more "lower decks" viewpoints. At the time, Pocket was doing a lot of trilogies, and the Original Series relaunch was to begin with two trilogies: The Janus Gate by L.A. Graf and Harm's Way by Jerry and Kathy Oltion, as mentioned in a now lost item on Psi Phi, reported by TrekToday. The first trilogy appeared but was followed instead by Kevin Ryan's Errand of Vengeance trilogy. Since then, the "Original Series" branding and the emphasis on trilogies have been dropped. I've found nothing to suggest what the Harm's Way trilogy might have been about. Star Trek: Voyager Technical Manual (2002?) According to a post by Rick Sternbach on the Psi Phi bulletin board, he and Tim Earls, a set designer and illustrator on Voyager, were planning a Voyager technical manual. However, Sternbach and Pocket "didn't see eye-to-eye on certain text issues concerning the DS9 Manual, and I did not believe the advance offered for the Voyager manual was adequate. In fact, it was less than that offered for the DS9 manual.... I chose to walk away from the Voyager book rather than put in too many hours creating brand new material for too little return." Sternbach became a contributor to the monthly Star Trek Magazine, which ended in March, 2003. Answering a question on the Psi Phi bulletin board in June, 2000, about the dropping of numbers from Pocket's Star Trek novels, John Ordover said, "97 will, I think, be a stand-alone by Dayton Ward, then a trilogy by Diane Carey to bring the numbering to an end. Working title is The Last Round-Up. This is all tentative, of course." The plan then was to end the numbered original series novels at 100 and then reboot the series with "Lower Decks"-style novels, looking at major events in original series continuity from the perspective of junior officers and crew. Dayton Ward's novel, In the Name of Honor, was indeed original series novel 97. However, the Carey trilogy has disappeared from the schedule and apparently been replaced by a single novel, The Last Roundup, by Christie Golden. The current schedule shows no more numbered books, so the buildup to 100 has presumably been dropped. In a post on the TrekBBS, Pocket editor Marco Palmieri wrote that he had considered doing a book of fan-produced technical material, particularly "speculative ship designs." Unfortunately, he found it wouldn't be economically viable. A few Star Trek websites list a planned September 2002 release of an Enterprise novel, Where No Man Has Gone, to be written by mystery writer Max Allan Collins. Psi Phi listed it for some time then dropped it, leading some fans to wonder what had happened. According to a Psi Phi post from Pocket editor Jessica McGivney, this is probably due to a simple mixup. Collins is not writing any Enterprise novels, but he is writing novels based on the cop show C.S.I. for Pocket. Somehow some information was evidently misinterpreted somewhere between Pocket and fan websites, and it spread for a month or two before being corrected. So it's not really a lost book, but for a short time it appeared to be. Decipher Roleplaying Game Books (2003-2004)
Unlike Last Unicorn, which announced plans for a considerable number of books in a very ambitious publishing schedule, Decipher announced a relatively small number of books. In 2002 and 2003, they published six hardcover books and a Narrator's Screen supplement. More books were scheduled for release in 2003 but never appeared. In January 2004 the majority of Decipher's role playing game staff was laid off. According to former employees, at least a few of the books were ready to be published. To keep interest in the game alive, without actually sending any books to press, Decipher offered four adventures as free pdf downloads from its website in early 2004. There were occasional announcements that the books were only temporarily delayed. In the summer of 2005, without any official announcement, Decipher shut down the Star Trek fan club and Star Trek Communicator, and was reportedly facing serious financial difficulties. In fall 2005 Decipher announced that the remaining supplements would not be published in book form. Instead, two so far (Worlds and Through a Glass Darkly: The Mirror Universe) have been made available as a pdf ebook through DriveThruRPG, for not much less than the cost of a print edition. Others may follow.
A.C. Crispin's first Star Trek novel, 1983's Yesterday's Son, was something of a phenomenon. A sequel to the original series episode "All Our Yesterdays," the book introduced Spock's son, Zar, who was born and lived in the distant past of the planet Sarpeidon. A sequel, Time for Yesterday, was published in 1988. Crispin's later Star Trek novels did not tie in to the Zar storyline. Then, back in December, 1999, on the old Pocket Books Star Trek discussion board, she announced:
On September 13, 2000, Crispin announced on Psi Phi that Paramount had approved the outline for the trilogy. On December 12, 2003, Bob Manojlovich posted (with her permission) an email from Crispin about the trilogy on Psi Phi. A couple of highlights from that email:
An article by Star Trek novel reviewer Michelle Erica Green, circa 2001, adds the following:
According to a December 2003 interview on SciFi.com, the trilogy was virtually finished. But on July 2, 2004, editor Marco Palmieri announced in a post on the TrekBBS, "Unfortunately, that project won't be going forward." Star Trek: Beyond the U.S. Frontier (2004?) In 2003, the following Call for Papers was circulated through academic listservs and mailing lists:
I contacted one of the editors by email recently. She confirmed that the project died due to funded research and other real life factors taking priority. It's unfortunate, because the only book that addresses how Star Trek is perceived internationally is Jeff Greenwald's 1998 book Future Perfect: How Star Trek Conquered Planet Earth, which takes a popular, journalistic rather than academic approach to the subject. First mentioned back around 2001, Walking Wounded was announced as a planned post-finale Deep Space Nine novel by Bradley Thompson, a writer on the TV series. David Henderson's Psi Phi website quoted Marco Palmieri as saying, "It deals in part with a group of Dominion War vets who are having difficulty getting past their experiences during the war." Marco announced on July 5, 2005, "Unfortunately, we decided not to go forward with Walking Wounded." It's possible that Thompson is too busy writing for television (currently for the new Battlestar Galactica) to devote time to writing a novel, but that is speculation. Untitled Lost Era Sisko Novel (2006?) In 2004, Marco Palmieri's presentation on upcoming Star Trek books from Pocket included a mention of two more Lost Era novels after the original six. As Jackie Bundy reported at TrekToday:
There were occasional references to the book over the next few years as a project that was still in the earliest stage of development (no author named or, possibly, chosen). Though this book has not officially been announced as cancelled, some authors have said that it's very likely dead following Palmieri's departure from Pocket. (The other book described above is Christopher Bennett's novel The Buried Age, published in 2007.) David R. George's Crucible trilogy (McCoy: Provenance of Shadows, Spock: The Fire and the Rose, and Kirk: The Star to Every Wandering), originally published as three mass market paperbacks in 2006 and 2007, was scheduled to be reprinted in May, 2009 in an omnibus hardcover edition with a significant amount of new material. In a post on TrekBBS on November 18, 2008, editor Marco Palmieri provided the planned table of contents for the omnibus:
A TrekMovie.com article on December 30, a book update by Anthony Pascale with information from Pocket editor Margaret Clark, announced that the omnibus had been cancelled. There are several possible reasons, including the Simon and Schuster layoffs in which Palmieri was let go and the news reports that Harlan Ellison was planning to sue over the trilogy's use of concepts and characters from his episode "City on the Edge of Forever." Star Trek Archives Volume 7: Best of Klingons (2009)
This collection would have reprinted a number of stories by Mike W. Barr, Tony Isabella, and Len Wein: the first four issues of DC's original run of Star Trek comics, which began in 1984, followed by issues 31 and 32 from 1986. The first four were reprinted in 2005 by Titan in their To Boldly Go reprint collection. IDW's Chris Ryall announced the cancellation in his blog, with no reason provided. Several of IDW's previous books in the series reprinted material that was already widely available in book form from previous licensees, so it's possible that sales weren't high enough to justify releasing another book with material printed as recently as 2005 and released on DVD-ROM in 2008. Star Trek Archives Volume 8: Best of Spock
I haven't been able to find any indication of which stories would have been reprinted in this volume. The cancellation of the book was not publicly announced by IDW, but Allyn Gibson, who works for Diamond Comics, mentioned that the book had been cancelled in a post at TrekBBS. The February 2010 cancellations list at Diamond's website includes this book and the planned hardcover edition of Star Trek: Nero. Announced in 2008, Mike W. Barr's The Millennium Bloom was to be a novel about Robert April, who preceded Pike and Kirk as first captain of the Enterprise. It wasn't mentioned when the 2010 schedule was announced in 2009, and apparently the book was dropped after the outline was written. Star Trek: Starfleet Academy untitled paperback (2010) This is probably nothing more than a blooper, but because it appeared on the Simon & Schuster website rather than on Amazon, where bloopers are routine, it may be worth noting. For a short time in January 2010, following the news of the postponement of the four scheduled novels set in the new movie continuity (listed on the date unknown page for now, because they may yet appear), the site had a listing for something called Star Trek: Starfleet Academy Untitled Paperback #1, with the following data:
The children's book information led to some speculation that it might be the long rumoured omnibus of Peter David's three YA Starfleet Academy novels from the 1990s, which introduced some characters who later appeared as regulars in his New Frontier series. However, the "Part of Star Trek: Starfleet Academy" line linked to a page about the William Shatner novel Starfleet Academy: Collision Course. Still, given how quickly the page was removed, there may well be no lost book here. Delayed Books The lists of yet-to-be-published books in the pages of Locus and the inside covers of Pocket's Star Trek novels often include books that don't appear when scheduled, but probably aren't yet lost. For example, J.M. Dillard was supposed to have a novel called Discovery out in November 1991. It appeared a few years later, under the title Recovery. More recently, the novel Dyson Sphere was postponed a few times before appearing in 1999. J.G. Hertzler's two-volume Martok story, The Left Hand of Destiny, is the latest example of slipping publishing dates, but by April, 2003, both volumes were in stores. This may become more of a problem in light of Pocket's schedule cutback. With a large number of series to be represented and only one monthly mass market paperback slot (plus occasional hardcovers and trade paperbacks), some books may be announced three or four years before their actual publication. The loss of two editors has also led to some delays and cancellations. |
Note: Until recently, I tried, as much as possible, to link to the original sources of these tidbits of information. Unfortunately, David Henderson's Psi Phi site crashed and lost a lot of data. The TrekBBS seems to automatically delete old threads after a certain amount of time. As a result, I've updated this page to remove links that no longer work. Given how quickly the web changes, of course, there will always be a few links that don't work.
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The March, 1981 issue of Starlog profiled SF/fantasy artist Walter Velez. One of the works reproduced was cover art for a book called Star T*REK. According to the caption, this was "a Berkeley book by Jeff Rovin that was never published for fear of a Paramount lawsuit." Judging by the cover, this would have been a parody. The cover by Velez featured the Enterprise (movie-style, but with propellers on the nacelles) at the top, with a crazed McCoy in a bloody lab coat, Kirk with a ludicrous number of medals and ribbons on a TMP-style uniform, and Spock with a dog snout and floppy ears below. 
In 1985, Pocket Books published Della Van Hise's novel Killing Time, then withdrew it from publication. The wrong draft of the novel had been printed. Pocket had the correct version in the stores pretty quickly, but didn't publicize the change. Van Hise was apparently active in the "slash" fan fiction scene (i.e., fiction about Kirk and Spock as lovers), and she worked a slash subtext into this novel, more overtly in the accidentally printed early draft. The editor at the time had Van Hise rewrite the book to get rid of that subtext. The revised version was used for later printings. 
On a quarterly basis, Locus, the "newspaper of the science fiction field," lists books due to be published in the next several months. In June, 1988, Locus listed The Star Trek That Never Was by Allan Asherman as a planned October, 1988 release from Pocket Books. It was also listed, with a reproduction of the cover art, in the September, 1988 issue of Science Fiction Chronicle, again as an October release. According to novelist Margaret Wander Bonanno's 
Back in 1978, Bantam published Mary Ann Piccard's 
Unlike Secret of Vulcan's Fury, the computer game Star Trek: New Worlds was completed and released. However, for reasons unknown, Sybex cancelled its planned hint book. Originally scheduled for publication in September of 1999 (presumably the game's originally intended ship date), it was postponed until January and, later, August of 2000 before being cancelled. 
Last Unicorn Games published their first Star Trek role playing game book in 1998. Their plans were ambitious: core game books and various supplements related to each of the Star Trek TV series. They never came close to following the schedule printed in the back of the first book, but did publish eighteen books in two years. In 2000, Last Unicorn was bought by Wizards of the Coast. Whether due to WOTC's focus on its latest Dungeons and Dragons revisions, its desire to replace LUG's Icon role playing game system with its own D20 system, or other reasons unknown, Last Unicorn did not publish any Star Trek game books in the first month or two after its acquisition. Although several books were in the works, and at least three were reportedly ready for publication, the final blow came later in the year, when Paramount announced that Last Unicorn had lost the Star Trek role playing game license to Decipher, effective January 1, 2001. Although no official public announcement has been made, sources like 
After the abrupt premature ending of the Last Unicorn Games take on Star Trek role playing (
A couple of 2003 press releases described several unpublished books, two of which appear to have been revised versions of unpublished Last Unicorn books. 
Scheduled to appear in November 2009, this was cancelled by IDW. IDW's solicitation blurb read:
Scheduled to appear in January 2010, this was reportedly cancelled by IDW. Their solicitation blurb read: