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Out this week is The Assassination Game, the fourth book in Simon Spotlight’s new timeline Starfleet Academy series. A year since the last book in the series, fans of the new timeline must be itching to read the new book from first time Star Trek writer Alan Gratz, who has kindly agreed to tell me a bit about the book and how he came to write it:

The Assassination Game is the fourth book in the new Starfleet Academy series. Where does it fit into the timeline of our heroes education at the academy, and what is the book about?

The Assassination Game is about a series of terrorist events on the Starfleet Headquarters/Starfleet Academy campuses, either caused by, or in reaction to, the arrival of the Varkolak, an antagonistic alien species I invented for the book. Meanwhile, Kirk and Bones are participating in an underground student event called The Assassination Game, which sees cadets trying to “kill” each other by catching each other alone and tapping each other with a cafeteria spork. The two storylines cross, naturally, culminating in a rousing climax with a spork. :-) As to when this occurs, I was less specific about that. Let’s just say it’s not the characters’ first year at the academy, nor their last—assuming they were there for a year or two before the events of Star Trek XI. That was one of the tricky things about writing this book, of course: trying to fit it in with what we know—and don’t know—about the new alternate timeline continuity.

You can read the rest of the interview, in which Alan talks about sporks, TOS references, Section 31 and more, on my main blog.

I think it’s safe to say that the time when it could be said Star Trek non-fiction doesn’t sell enough to justify new books must be well and truly over. In the next year we have Star Trek: The Next Generation 365, Federation: The First 150 Years, the Klingon Bird of Prey Haynes Manual, Star Trek: The Next Generation Classic Quotes, and Stuck on Star Trek (whatever that is). And now Amazon have added listings for two more books in the near future!

Coming in October this year is Star Trek On Board the USS Enterprise, by Michael Okuda. It will be a hardcover book, and at the moment that’s the only detail I can find. One might assume form the name it’s a new technical manual, even though the Haynes USS Enterprise Manual hasn’t been out that long. However the name is pretty open, it could a guide to ships, crews, or even something behind the scenes. The most exciting potential for me comes form the release date, which is pretty much right on top of TNG’s 25th anniversary; would it be too much to dream this is the book form of the cancelled Build the USS Enterprise-D part work magazine?

The other book is much more obvious, and rather exciting: Star Trek the Visual Dictionary, coming in February next year will be the first Star Trek book in Dorling Kindersley’s always richly illustrated and well presented Visual Dictionary series. Also in hardcover, the question here is what exactly will the book cover? New timeline or prime, and if the latter, could it include stuff from the new movie; it might seem a slightly to early release ahead of the film for that though. Whatever it covers I’m sure it will be a pleasing addition to our Star Trek libraries.