Berkley's BATTLESTAR GALACTICA Paperback Novels

More books from my collection - the first four Battlestar Galactica novelizations by Robert Thurston ("and Glen Larson" - sure....) from Berkley Books. The first Galactica novel adapted the pilot, and sported the familiar Robert Tannenbaum poster artwork on its cover. I must have read this book a couple dozen times in Junior High....

I read book 2, Cylon Death Machine, (based on the two-part epic, "Gun On Ice Planet Zero") even more times. Thurston's adaptation is a terrific space adventure story that improves on the teleplay somewhat, and employs a truly neat narrative device that switches around between the viewpoints of various characters - including the hardboiled convicts that the Galactica crew conscripted from the Prison Ship for this "Dirty Dozen Against the Guns of Navarone at Ice Station Zebra" mission. Berkley chose to use Frazetta's TV advertising art for this cover - which I'm sure was a very wise commercial decision.

I remember that I received books 3 & 4 for Christmas, 1980. The Tombs Of Kobol adapted the two-part "Lost Planet of the Gods," while The Young Warriors adapted and slightly expanded upon the episode of the same name. Both of these books sported rather nice (and TV-accurate) wrap-around cover paintings by sci-fi artist David Shleinkofer.

Amazingly, this series outlived the television show by almost a decade - running all the way to 1988, and totaling 14 titles, the last few of which were original stories, and not adaptations of TV episodes. Somehow, I missed all of the later volumes (written by Thurston, Mike Resnick, Ron Goulart, and others), except for #13 - a Thurston original called Apollo's War. (Cover art by James Warhola.)

Oddly, I don't recall actually reading that one - I think I'll pull it out and add it to my "To Be Read" pile....

In the meantime, I think I'll start scouring online used booksellers for the volumes I'm missing. I'm especially interested in reading the later "originals" by Thurston.

ADDENDUM 2/5/12: I found a few of the ones I'm missing at some reasonable prices, and ordered four books from various online dealers: #7 War Of The Gods, #9 Experiment In Terra, #11 The Nightmare Machine, #12 Die, Chameleon!

Die, Chameleon arrived on Saturday in good shape. Hopefully, the others will also show up in decent condition. Turns out that I also already have a beat up copy of #5, Galactica Discovers Earth, though it's in such bad shape I may want to try and find a replacement copy. Then I think I'll only need the following books: #6 The Living Legend, #8 Greetings From Earth, #10 The Long Patrol, and the final volume, #14 Surrender The Galactica.