For fans of Pocket's Enterprise Relaunch/Rom War books...

[Enerdhil]

As for the books, I was expecting the new launch to the end of this year (based on the interval between the past titles)... need to wait one more year

Interesting... according to Memory Alpha, D.C. Fontana apparently intended Shariel to be the name of the Vulcan God of Death. This was apparently revealed in the text commentary track by the Okudas for the episode Amok Time on one of the DVD sets. Martin certainly does his research.

It is not illogical for Vulcans to have gods?

[michelle]

i think vulcan gods are as much their gods as greek gods are to us.

[honeybee]

There's plenty of reference to the pre-Surak "gods" of the Vulcans. It's canon that they were once pagan - and some vestiges of the time before the Awakening still exist in Vulcan folklore, ritual and other cultural elements.

[Aikiweezie]

That's good news. I really enjoyed "TGTMD" & "Raptor's Wings."

[Zane Gray]

There's plenty of reference to the pre-Surak "gods" of the Vulcans. It's canon that they were once pagan - and some vestiges of the time before the Awakening still exist in Vulcan folklore, ritual and other cultural elements.

Right, this would have been pre-Awakening, back when they were warlike.

[Reanok]

In the animated show yesteryear it talks about Vulcan honoring their Gods. it makes sense the pre awaking era before the Surak era will be dealt with in this book.Also in a season 7 Tng 2 part episode their is an ancient Vulcan weapon that portrays the ancient Vulcans Gods of War and death one side of the device and on the other side of the weapon shows logic and peace. the weapon was used to kill a person with just a single thought.

[aadarshinah]

...and it will be followed by Michael A. Martin's next installment, Star Trek Enterprise: Romulan War: In Shariel’s Jaws in trade paperback format in October 2011.

Oh, thank God someone found it. I was searching the (poorly concieved, if I may say so) publisher's website for ages last month looking for when the next book would be out....

But, you're right; I can't recall the episode, but I'm pretty sure one of the Treks mentioned something about the Vulcan gods being pre-awakening.

[honeybee]

Brought over from the clothing discussion thread. . .

The Enterprise relaunch books are not written for non trekkies - I can't imagine a non trekkie even understanding Under the Raptor's WIng - BUT, I do think there was plenty in the books designed to appeal to Trekkies who had given up on ENT or who had never watched - there were so many references to other series and characters - and a real attempt to explain various contradictions (and some non contradictions that the fans still groused about).

As for the cover, it would have been nice to see Trip on the cover - but I don't trust a publishing grunt to photoshop him into a Romulan - so it's probably all well and good that he wasn't there.

[Rigil Kent]

Having not read the book, I'm only operating on what I've seen in reviews, but isn't he pretending to be a Vulcan, not a Romulan at this point? So bumpy foreheads aren't necessary, right?

[honeybee]

In the beginning, he's still pretending to be Romulan - but by the end - he's been altered to look Vulcan and taken on a Vulcan persona - and being Trip - it's made a plot point that he's not doing a very good job at pretending to be Vulcan.

It the books Trip does have a bumpy head as a Romulan - but since SOME Romulans - like the TOS ones - don't have bumpy foreheads - I just explain that away as a racial-type difference between them - maybe some Romulans look similar to Vulcans and others don't. But in the books, Trip gets the bumpy forehead and then has surgery when he is recruited to continue his work as a Vulcan.

[Kevin Thomas Riley]

God, I hate the bumpy Romulan foreheads... They make no sense.

[aadarshinah]

its the issue of a small gene pool. It's like... oh, kinda like the finches on galapagos islands. they all started the same species, but limited gene pools allowed mutations in the genes to overtake the population fairly quickly, drastically changing the appearance of the birds from their fellows on another island, even when the rate of mutation is the same. There's probably a better example, but that's the best I have at the moment. All it would take would be for a small portion of the Vulcans who would become Romulans to have the gene for a small bump, or develop the mutation, and very quickly it would spread throughout their gene pool and years of genetic reinforcement would cause it to become a larger, more pronounced difference between species.

[Alelou]

But that suggests the bumpy-headed ones had better luck mating than the plain-headed ones in early generations -- and I find that hard to believe.

Maybe if it's a marker for some other mutation that DID come in handy for that...

[Aikiweezie]

But that suggests the bumpy-headed ones had better luck mating than the plain-headed ones in early generations -- and I find that hard to believe.

Maybe if it's a marker for some other mutation that DID come in handy for that...

Maybe bumpy heads were considered sexy for a time...........

[aadarshinah]

Maybe bumpy heads were considered sexy for a time...........

It could've had nothing to do with the bumpy heads, the sex appeal. The bumpy-headed could have just happened to be the leaders, of higher rank than the average Romulan/Vulcan - whatever you want to call them right after they diverged. Or those with bumpy-heads by side effect could have been better warriors, or smarter, or more potent, or whatever. The bumpy heads could be a secondary side-effect of the primary reason for the sex appeal.

Or, in the days whe the bumpy heads were just starting, the proto-Romulans could have still been following the Vulcan tradition of arranged marriages, and sex appeal had nothing to do with it. The one or two who had the gene could have passed it on regardless and, in a limited population, those things can spread quickly. I recall something vaughly having to do with Rh-factors in a subset of German immigrants (or maybe it was Dutch?) that is a good corrollary for it, but I don't remember enough of the details to be helpful. Something from high school biology, at least.

Or, to be even more out there, it's possible that the bumpy headed subset existed on Vulcan before the scisim and banded together - perhaps they were a clan, or perhaps they were outcasts for being imperfect Vulcans, or however Vulcan society may have worked before Surak - and went on to become the Romulans, and so there was no choice in the matter. Perhaps, if this was the case, the bumpy headed were chosen for the very reason they looked different than your average Vulcan.

Though, to tie back to the T'Pol's father thread, I'd like to hear that explination. You can cosmetic surgury a Romulan into a Vulcan all you want, whatever other differences there may be, but if T'Pol's father really was a Romulan, genes don't lie. If she was half-Romulan, she'd have half of the Romulan genes, including the bumpy-headed gene. Now, it might be a dominant/resessive thing, the bumpy head, but that would have to bank on the fact that her supposedly Romulan father was carrying that gene and was lucky enough to have it passed on to her - 1in4, if he was a de-bumped Romulan, 1in1 if he just so happened to be a bumpless Romulan....

Sorry for the bio lesson. Genetics and organic chem were always my fav in school....