Most commonly-encountered Wing Commander book in the wild?

Bob McDob

Better Health Through Less Flavor
The other day, I was looking at the CIC April 1st updates again and looked enviously at Chris holding a copy of Freedom Flight at Powell's:



powells.jpg




It's been a long time since I've seen a Wing Commander novel in the wild, I thought nostalgically. Certainly not at a major retailer.... Some six years ago, I could still find copies of The Price of Freedom at Barnes and Noble or Borders, or even local second-hand bookstores (where I picked up another to replace my old, dog-eared copy pre-ordered in 1996). Nowadays, of course, it's possible to go online and pick up a book on the cheap (I snagged a copy of Action Stations for a single dollar at Abe Books!), but that doesn't compare to going up to a real bookstore and seeing them lined-up, side by side with heavy-hitters of days present and past.

... so I thought, as I strolled the aisles of my local communist comic-book store, my hand trailing along the spines of sci-fi paperbacks... and catching on a copy of William Forstchen's Fleet Action!

That was shockingly serendipitous, especially since it's the place where I first picked up Fleet Action, years and years ago, and then, if memory serves, went back and got another copy when that one went missing. Usually, when I went looking for Wing Commander books in the past, the one I'd usually find would be Freedom Flight, like Chris. But with three sightings of Fleet Action (plus another at a second-hand bookstore in Seattle's UW district), that probably ties it with Price of Freedom for the most-commonly seen book that I can recall.

I briefly thought of snatching up this last copy (after all, my own Fleet Action is in terrible shape; the paper cover folding and cracking) but thought no, that wouldn't be right. Let somebody else discover it.

What's other peoples experiences with Wing books recently? What's the last one you've seen at a bookstore? What's the most commonly found one that you can recall?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Never ever seen a WC novel in a traditional book store, sadly. Otherwise, I would have bought them myself, already.
 
Most of mine came from the same bookstore; last week I picked up Action Stations, incidentally, leaving me with only the movie novelization to find, I think. Pretty sure I saw a second copy of Heart of the Tiger when I went to pick up Action Stations... maybe Freedom Flight, as well.
 
Around my area we have something called the "Used Book Superstore." They have several branches all with large SciFi sections. Every month or so I do a sweep of all the stores (I've found some real gems on their shelves for military history...and everything is cheap! $1.99 paperback/$2.99 hardcover) ) and I'll keep an eye out for any WC books. I'll be sure to pick them up and turn them over to the CIC for prizes....
 
Dundradal said:
and I'll keep an eye out for any WC books. I'll be sure to pick them up and turn them over to the CIC for prizes....

We appreciate the gesture, but you can order most WC books for a couple bucks or less from amazon/eBay/half. They're fortunately not rare, and I'd say it's probably better to leave the ones you find in circulation.

And from a lifetime of sweeping used bookstores for WC novels, I can tell you there's no shortage here. :) We're standing in Mercedes Lackey's autograph line right this second with 8 copies of Freedom Flight. Some people were surprised we had so many, but we left a couple dozen at home.
 
QuailPilot said:
The Barn's and Noble's near my house has several Freedom Flights.

Now that's unusual! Are they brand new then? You don't see that much because there have been no new Baen WC book printings in more than ten years.
 
Now that's unusual! Are they brand new then? You don't see that much because there have been no new Baen WC book printings in more than ten years.

There's two Barnes and Nobels around here, one of them has a copy of the movie novel and Pilgrim Stars, and the other has two copies of Freedom Flight and one copy of Fleet Action, all new, within the last month.

What's more interesting to me is that I've actually seen the books change occasionally, which means people are either buying them or they are (more likely) rotating stock on the shelf). I haven't been by in a few weeks though.

I lost my copy of Action Stations and picked one up at the B&N just off the freeway, new, off the shelf. I was surprised - thought I would have to order it.
 
I'm less surprised about the newer WC Movie books, though if you ever see a junior novelization and to a lesser extent Pilgrim Stars, those just weren't printed in great numbers.

Maybe this is more common than I think, and CIC staff and other big Wingnuts have just long since cleaned out the local bookstores.
 
I'm less surprised about the newer WC Movie books, though if you ever see a junior novelization and to a lesser extent Pilgrim Stars, those just weren't printed in great numbers.

Maybe this is more common than I think, and CIC staff and other big Wingnuts have just long since cleaned out the local bookstores.

I have a friend who works at the new B&N that's stocking some new novels, I'm going to ask him if he can find out where they came from. I'm curious to know now.
 
The Borders at a local mall carried False Colors until last year. I'm not too sure if it was just a single copy that never got sold or what. Seems unlikely that in all that time they never sold this copy, so they must have been putting different copies up for sale. Now I really regret not asking anyone what was going on.
 
I run into the WC Movie novel pretty often. And the Book store in Juneau Alaska has a few copies of action stations also.
 
This is all very interesting--the chain bookstores in my area have for the past five years at least been very aggressive about rotating their Science Fiction MMPB stock... everything that doesn't stay in print gets returned, remaindered or pulped within months. It's a shame because you can't go and pick up earlier books in any but the most popular series' anymore.
 
Back
Top