All About False Colors (April 5, 2017)

Bandit LOAF

Bandit LOAF

Long Live the Confederation!




Yesterday, Wing Commander: False Colors was released as an ebook. Today, we'd like to tell you a little about the book's background! Eagle-eyed readers may notice there's slight difference with the ebook edition of False Colors' title: the name of the co-author. Printed copies read "William Keith" whereas the new version says "Andrew Keith." What's going on? The answer is that the original printing was actually an embarassing error: William Keith is a real writer... just not the one who wrote False Colors. His brother Andrew, who also wrote the Heart of the Tiger novelization, was the man behind False Colors. Andrew Keith was active in the Wing Commander community at the time and he took the error in good spirits. Unfortunately, Andrew passed away not long after False Colors was published.

SPOILER WARNING: One thing new readers will notice is that False Colors leaves the characters' stories somewhat unfinished. The immediate threat from the dreadnaught is gone, but our familiar novel characters are no longer flying for the Confederation and are facing an uncertain future in the Landreich. At the time, Mr. Keith spoke of his desire to continue the story with two additional novels. THese were never contracted, and to the best of our knowledge no outlines were ever written. We did include the theoretical events of both in the Wing Commander Arena timeline update as a tribute to Mr. Keith. In his words:






LOAF: Any future plans for working with WC?
Keith: I hope to pitch two new novels down the line. But it depends on Baen Books, Origin, and others.

LOAF: Two new novels? Can you give away any information on those?
Keith: The book ideas are still vague. One I'd like to do would involve a Kilrathi prince -- a friendly one -- from False Colors. Sort of Bonnie Prince Charle in Scotland, with Cats and carrier support by the Karga. The other would put the Landreich at war with the Confederation. I'm thinking of following something like the Alamo/Goliad/San Jacinto model.
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You can find our full interview here. If you would like to learn more about Andrew Keith and his work, he was kind enough to provide some reference material which we have maintained since the book's release:


The preview chapter is an earlier draft, saved before the editing process was complete. As such, it's an interesting look at how the smallest details of a book can change!

Here's an odd fact: False Colors is the only Baen Wing Commander novel NOT translated into German. It's unclear exactly why the book wasn't translated, given the success of the other novels in the range. It was, however, available in the Czech Republic where it sported a beautiful new cover (pictured.) The Czech translations only adapt novels involving Dr. Forstchen, so it is book 6 instead of book 7 there. Released in 2005, this translation was the last official Wing Commander novel printed.









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Original update published on April 5, 2017
 
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I understand that a German translation of "False Colors" called "Unter falscher Flagge" was announced by Bastei Lübbe back then. However, it was obviously never released and I think the state of said translation is unknown.

However, if Baen and Bastei Lübbe come to an agreement regarding German Wing Commander Ebooks one day, perhabs we will see "Unter falscher Flagge" afterall.
(You can have dreams, can't you?) :)
 
Sure would be nice if we could get all parties involved... and make it possible to commission new authors to write new stories in the universe! Maybe some old time fans with writing experience?! Even its for a kind of short story anthology through Baen... Maybe stories to 'fill in gaps' and fix those last nudging tidbits of lost or dead end stories... and everyone involved' stories would be considered 'canon'! Edited by something like Loaf and other continuity hawks with experience in the series (writing for the games)!

Tell that hidden stories about Bossman and Knights survival and return to the Claw.

The post-Pilgrim's Truth story about what happened to the Emperor, after he the Pilgrim's left... how he regained his empire after being so dishonored...

A story covering Paladin's court martial on the Concordia after Olympus events (post .163), and being transferred to the Tiger's Claw (some time later).

Some Privateer related stories, maybe even a cross over with Tri-System...

A story about Blair's survival and where he ended up...

Short stories inspired by the lost Keith plot ideas... etc.
 
Hells ya! Maybe some stories set during Arena too! Since the game didn't really have much of a story!
 
I understand that a German translation of "False Colors" called "Unter falscher Flagge" was announced by Bastei Lübbe back then. However, it was obviously never released and I think the state of said translation is unknown.

However, if Baen and Bastei Lübbe come to an agreement regarding German Wing Commander Ebooks one day, perhabs we will see "Unter falscher Flagge" afterall.
(You can have dreams, can't you?) :)
Click to expand...

This is very interesting! I had not heard that before. I have always secretly hoped that a foreign publisher would continue the series. They are starting to do original German-language Star Trek stories, and I've seen it happen for several other IPs... well, as you say, dreams. :)

Sure would be nice if we could get all parties involved... and make it possible to commission new authors to write new stories in the universe! Maybe some old time fans with writing experience?! Even its for a kind of short story anthology through Baen... Maybe stories to 'fill in gaps' and fix those last nudging tidbits of lost or dead end stories... and everyone involved' stories would be considered 'canon'! Edited by something like Loaf and other continuity hawks with experience in the series (writing for the games)!
Click to expand...

This is not outside the realm of possibility! It's something I'd like to talk to Chris about once Star Citizen winds down; I suspect we could come to an agreement where we use the 'movie novel' license to tell some interesting, canon stories. (There'd be some limitations without EA; the movie stories have to take place during the war, for instance.)

Dream of dreams would be to somehow convince Electronic Arts to let us run a publishing program similar to what a group of superfans do with Jerry Pournelle's War World series. Andrew Keith was a friend and I'd like very much to write the two False Colors followups based on his thoughts... and I've been outlining and picking away at a 'political biography' that follows Tolwyn and Paladin through their lives in the style of Robert Caro's LBJ volumes... and then of course we could do data books like the Confed Handbook... it would be the next frontier.

I've been working on some of this quietly over the past few years and I think it's time to pick up the pace. If you're able and interested to help, hit me up! :)
 
I wouldn't mind help with 'editing' if you need extra eyes! I'm not quite sure I'm up to the task of writing an original story just yet though... unless its a collaborative effort, and I was helping come up with ideas while someone else with the prose skills works on the actual writing! Most of my experience is with dry text book writing, which is fine for technical manual stuff, but not so much story stuff... I have been published a couple of times in journals/magazines, but that's about it...

Appendices/glossary sections (maybe indexing? timelines?) I could have fun with that if I was put on task of writing something up!
 
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