Star Trek Vulcan’s Glory by D.C. Fontana
The night after the first episode of Star Trek aired the woman who opened the production office and started answering the phone was a secretary named Dorothy Fontana, She had worked with Gene Roddenberry in this role typing up memos, answering calls getting coffee on the previous show The Lieutenant. In her mid-20s the young woman would go home and in her off hours would pull the typewriter and bang-out story treatments and scripts. By the time Star Trek aired D.C. Fontana had solid scripts for half a dozen shows around town. Gene Roddenberry had shown her enough respect to show her the Star Trek series bible in 1964 and hired her to work on both pilots.
The first and most important woman in the world of Star Trek was given the chance to choose a story out of the bible to write a script. In the second aired episode, Charlie X had her special touch giving ST’s first god-like being depth to the story treatments that date back to the spaceship Yorktown under Captain Robert April didn’t have.
She got that job the same way she got the others, she walked up to producers and said “Let me tell you a story.” She was a great storyteller and always found emotional hooks for exciting stories.
I re-read this novel for a longer piece I am working on about Dorothy Fontana. So I will save some of my thoughts for that article but we have to talk about this book. I dropped a line to Dave Stern who was the editor at Pocketbooks at the time and he told me he considered this a career highlight but he didn’t have many memories of the process.
It is obvious why you would ask this writer to do a novel about Spock’s first mission on board the Enterprise. While later novels like Vulcan’s Forge by Josepha Sherman and Susan Shwartz or Spock’s World by Diane Duane might come off as more elaborate Science Fiction takes built off deeper canon I think this novel is special.
At the time it was written ST book editors probably believed it was safe to tell a Captain Pike story and not step on canon because there is no way we would ever get a show about the early days of the enterprise. With the introduction of Strange New Worlds, this novel now has a different place. Now we have to read looking for the ways it can or cannot line up with the new TV canon.
I love Strange New Worlds, I don’t want to second guess the producers and for the most part, they did respect this novel making some things canon, like the Number One’s species, and her name from another later novel. That said there are a few times the two have trouble co-existing. I don’t know if I was running that writing room, this book would have been required reading.
Dorothy Fontana is not just the mother of Star Trek but she did more to form Spock than Amanda Greyson (who DF named). In two of the most important episodes of Vulcan lore, Fontana created Spock’s parents, his pets, and his childhood, and named the Vulcan Forge. In a re-write of the episode This Side of Paradise, she wrote out Sulu she explores Spock’s interior hidden feelings in a way no one else on the show thought possible. Her relationship with Nimoy went back to an episode of The Tall Man that Fontana wrote called “a Bounty of Billy” and she knew he could handle it.
That script got her the gig as story editor of Star Trek, and in a sense the job running the Animated series, and this novel. Just like that episode Vulcan’ Glory is an adventure story with A, B and C plots that all tie into the theme of Spock’s conflicted emotions. The C storyline of Scotty joining the crew and making the ultimate engine room hooch is hilarious and probably the one that doesn’t line up with SNW as Scotty has still yet to join the crew on the enterprise. (maybe he was assigned elsewhere and it is Kirk who brings him back)
There is a lot going on in Vulcan’s Glory that might be pushed deeper into the alphabet with storylines but let me recap it a bit without giving deep spoilers. Spock is about to report to duty on the Enterprise when he called back to Vulcan for a meeting with his mother, who speaks for Sarek who refuses to speak with him. Spock is neglects his estate ie his arranged marriage to T’Pring. This is the first major difference although it could be explained to match TV canon.
Before he leaves for the enterprise Spock meets with T’Pring. SNW viewers know in that show they have a steamy relationship and are trying to make the marriage work. In this novel, there meeting is cold and loveless. Fontana draws a direct line between this meeting and the events of Amok Time., this is many years before the events of SNW, so it is possible that those kooky Vulcan kids could give it another go before T’Pring decides I was right the first to write off Spock. Because that is what she does in the novel. Pay me the estate I am due and go run off to Starfleet.
*HUGE STRANGE NEW WORLDS SPOILER IN THE NEXT PARAGRAPH*
The first time the novel just can’t co-exist with SNW is Number One who DCF never gave a name something later Trek novels decided couldn’t work. The name is not the problem. “On her planet, ILyria, excellence is the only criterion that is accepted. She is technically designated as being the best of her breed for the year she was born.” DCF worked on The Cage so I have no doubt this was the back story on the Cage and the reasons she is Number one as much as being the first officer. Which is problematic with the canon established later by the Khan storyline. In a very smart move, SNW respected this backstory while respecting the canon and making it a secret of Number One’s past, as genetic engineering is illegal in the post-Eugenics war Federation. The cliffhanger at the end of SNW season one is built on this reveal. SNW modified this and I think it was the right decision.
Spock makes it to the Enterprise and their first mission track down the crashed Vulcan ship that disappeared hundreds of years ago with A rare Vulcan gem on it, it is the title Maguffin. The first mystery finding the ship, the artifact, and then once they have it there is a murder on board, and the only suspect is a Vulcan.
One thing DCF does in this novel that made me uncomfortable was the number of Vulcans in Starfleet and 11 on the enterprise! I was always under the impression Spock was the first Vulcan in Starfleet, T’paul doesn’t count because she wasn’t Starfleet technically. I realized that the show had a hard time portraying the hundreds of people on the enterprise as written and with hundreds 11 Vulcans we rarely see is possible.
One of those 11 Vulcans is T’Pris. That is your steamy Spock love story. T’Pris is a widowed Vulcan that Spock quickly falls in love. DCF writes Spock and romance very as always.
“If there are so few of us, then we must view each one as precious. Is that not so Mr. Spock?”
Spock paused, thinking it over, mulling the consequences of what he would reply. Finally, he nodded. “Yes, Lieutenant. I would say so.”
Later once their romance flourishes we see similar sexuality that Spock has in SNW, I know some fans were comfortable with but DCF was not shy about it.
“Spock held up his right hand, fingers spread, and T’Pris matched it with her left. The tactile contact sent a flow of warmth through him. Their eyes locked, and the look went deeper, mentally chaining them together. He sent the first gentle probe along the bond, reaching out to her.
T’Pris opened herself to him, welcoming him, the merging of their feelings racing after the intimate mind touch.”
You get the idea. It is pretty hot steamy Vulcan stuff. DCF as thought a lot about this, as many nerdy fans has. She has actual angry memos about her script for Enterprise Incident while she tells other producers just how the Vulcans get it on two decades earlier. I think in 1989 she loosened up about it, maybe not as much as SNW folks did, but bottom line DCF knew what everyone else does Spock is the real heartthrob of Star Trek.
Random details I liked. How she wrote the transporter effect feelings, the size of the crew, and the general operation of the ship. DCF was thinking about how the shifts would work. She was clearly thinking this through and I liked that. Spock is crucial to the solution of the mystery onboard the ship and also has to help Help with a mystery on the away mission. The Scotty storyline is very funny. You might guess where the Spock romance goes and the feelings are spot on as DCF portrays them.
Vulcan’s Glory is a top-notch ST tie-in for me. Modern Tie-in novels have the benefit of building off decades of canon building and fans who have thought about ST for decades. This novel can tell us what Dorothy Fontana the woman who sat in a room in 1964 with Gene Roddenberry talking about Star Trek thinks about how Spock came on the enterprise. That means more to me than a Short Treks played for laughs.
Dorothy Fontana is and will always be one of the most important voices in Star Trek and this novel should be respected as such. I feel that way 200%.
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