Star Trek: Discovery: Somewhere to Belong to Put Discovery Crew Through "Traditional" Star Trek Adventure
Star Trek: Discovery: Somewhere to Belong has been announced for release in May 2023. Somewhere to Belong is a new Star Trek: Discovery novel written by Dayton Ward and set between the Paramount+ series' third and fourth seasons. Similar to IDW Publishing's Star Trek: Discovery comic book miniseries Adventures in the 32nd Century, Somewhere to Belong looks to examine how the USS Discovery crew adjusted to life 930 years into their future. However, where Adventures in the 32nd Century spotlighted individual characters in each issue, Somewhere to Belong will look at the crew more holistically and reveal a dangerous connection to Discovery's past.
Star Trek: Discovery: Somewhere to Belong is now officially listed on the Simon and Schuster website. Here's the book's official synopsis:
Captain Michael Burnham and the crew of the USS Discovery are finding that each day is a critical adjustment to their new lives and new missions in an Alpha Quadrant more than nine hundred years in the future. It's here that Discovery is reconnecting with various worlds where the cataclysmic event known as "the Burn" has decimated Starfleet and, with it, the United Federation of Planets. There's been precious little time for the crew to truly come to terms with their present reality, as their devotion to duty hides the emotional stress that could impact their effectiveness, and even threaten themselves or others.
After a successful journey to yet another planet cut off from the Federation, Discovery picks up a distress signal located in a nearby star system—a plea that harbors roots from their past lives in the 23rd century, and which may now lead to an entirely new crisis, plunging them all into mortal danger….
Ward previously wrote the Star Trek: Discovery novel Drastic Measures, bringing the Prime Timeline's Gabriel Lorca and Philippa Georgiou together at a key moment in James T. Kirk's life, as well as many other Star Trek books. He wrote about the official reveal in a post to his personal blog on Monday, saying that, in addition to examining the crew's adjustment to a new time period, he hoped to put the Star Trek: Discovery cast of characters through a classically structured Star Trek adventure.
"Along with this, I also just wanted to put these characters through something closer to a 'traditional' Star Trek adventure," Ward writes. "No crazy galactic crises or threats of war, but instead maybe a first contact situation and chance to see how Burnham and her people can adapt to how things like this are handled in the here and now of 3189 vs. 2258. Unlike Drastic Measures, which I wrote as a prequel set ten years before the events of Discovery's first season, here I was writing within a more strict set of parameters. As this one is set in that narrow gap between seasons, I had to work within the constraints that implies, but hey! Welcome to writing tie-in fiction for a show that is currently in active production."
Star Trek: Discovery: Somewhere to Belong goes on sale on May 23, 2023.