Alan Dean Foster Writing Star Trek Movie Adaptation

One of the last pieces of the multimedia rollout for the new Star Trek movie has finally been revealed. Today Pocket Books confirmed with TrekMovie that veteran sci-fi novelist Alan Dean Foster is writing the adaptation for the new Trek feature. See below for exclusive details on this exciting development, along with comments from Star Trek screenwriter Roberto Orci.

Star Trek – The book – via Alan Dean Foster
All ten previous Star Trek movies had novel adaptations, as do most ‘tentpole’ films, so it should come as no surprise that there is one for the new JJ Abrams Star Trek. However, with the heightened secrecy and lack of any announcement, some fans started to wonder what was going on with the book. The first word actually came this week on Alan Dean Foster’s website, in his monthly update for February. Foster wrote:

This month’s update is going to be very brief. I had to fly into Los Angeles a week ago to, among other things, see the new STAR TREK movie at Paramount. Which in my opinion is, by the way, really, really good. And as I’m writing the book version, and as said book version must be completed really, really soon, I am going to be really, really busy for the next month.

Really.

TrekMovie checked in with Pocket Books and a spokesperson confirmed that Foster is writing the book and that it should be released around the same date as the film…either the same date (May 8th) or within a few days after. The Star Trek adaptation will be in a large sized ‘trade paperback’ format and will retail for around $16.00 (the price has not yet been finalized). No word yet on if there will be a young adult or audio version.

Orci on the Foster collaboration
TrekMovie checked in with Star Trek co-writer Roberto Orci to see what he and his writing partner Alex Kurtzman thought of Foster adaptation their screenplay, and he said "we feel great about it since we recommended him." He went on to say of Foster:

If you are a fan of novelizations as we were as kids, then you have known his name for a long time and aside from that he has written some incredible sci-fi of his own. You are lucky to get him to do something  based on your work and it was an honor to have this chance. And of course we were huge fans of his Transformer novelization.

Orci said that he and Alex are working closely with Foster on the adaptation and that starting from their first meeting Foster came to them with "tons of questions and comments," including "some of the same great debates that fans have been coming up with on the site [TrekMovie.com]." Orci hopes that, like other past movie adaptations, the one for Star Trek will go into that extra detail and "explain things and answer some questions in a way that can’t be done in a script." Orci also noted that he is hoping the Star Trek book will include some scenes that did not make it in to the final cut of the Star Trek movie, which is common with film adaptations. 

Foster is the perfect choice
With Alan Dean Foster, Simon and Schuster and Paramount could not have picked a better person to adapt Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman’s script. The prolific best-selling author has written some of the finest and most popular licensed tie-in books in history, including ghost-writing the adaptation for the first Star Wars movie ("Star Wars: From the Adventures of Luke Skywalker") and writing the ‘sequel’ to Star Wars "Splinter of a Mind’s Eye," both in 1976. In 2002 Foster returned to Star Wars with "The Approaching Storm" a prequel book to Star Wars: Episode II. Foster also wrote adaptations for the first three Alien movies, The Thing, Alien Nation, The Chronicles of Riddick and many other films, including 2007’s Transformers, also based on a script from Orci & Kurtzman.

Foster – master of licensed tie-ins for decades

Alan Dean Foster also has some serious Star Trek cred. From 1974-1978 Foster wrote the series of ten "Star Trek Logs" adaptations of Star Trek The Animates Series. During the 70s he also wrote all but one of the Peter Pan Star Trek Record Story books. Foster’s greatest contribution to Trek is probably his draft of the Star Trek Phase II script "In Thy Image" which became the story basis for Harold Livingston’s script for Star Trek The Motion Picture in 1979.

Alan Dean Foster – first Trek works from the 70s

In addition to all of his licensed tie-in work, Foster also has written dozens of original science fiction and fantasy novels, and is probably best known for the popular ‘Commonwealth’ and ‘Flinx’ novels.

Foster has his own popular sci-fi with the ‘Commonwealth’ series

More on Alan Dean Foster at: Official Site  | Wikipedia  | Memory Alpha