History Creator / JohnMFord

[[ https://slate.com/culture/2019/11/john-ford-science-fiction-fantasy-books.html Mike Ford vanished into obscurity]] after his tragic and untimely death in 2006. (He had had serious health problems his entire life.) After hassles with his family and legal affairs, his works are finally about to be reprinted in their entirety, along with many that have never seen the light of day.

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: A fight with the new editor of the Star Trek line torpedoed Ford's plans for a sequel to ''Literature/TheFinalReflection''. He did go on to write ''Literature/HowMuchForJustThePlanet'' (which contains some bitter swipes at Paramount), but afterwards he never wrote another Star Trek novel.

* KeepCirculatingTheTapes: Unfortunately Ford's surviving family were in opposition to his writing career, and because he failed to set up a legal foundation for his works before he died, they now hold veto power over any attempt to republish his works (except the two Star Trek books, which Paramount has control of). The only means to find them now is in used bookstores.

John M. Ford (1957 - 2006) was an SF writer, game designer, and poet, noted for his intelligence, wit, and originality. This last was in a sense also his greatest weakness, since a writer who never repeats himself can be very hard to market effectively, and he never achieved the fame many feel he deserved.

Ford's other work in the realm of RPG design includes several sourcebooks for ''{{GURPS}}'', and the classic ''TabletopGame/{{Paranoia}}'' supplement, ''The Yellow Clearance Black Box Blues''.

And we haven't even scratched the surface of his original novels, which include ''Web of Angels'', which did {{cyberpunk}} before cyberpunk was cool; ''Literature/ThePrincesOfTheAir'', a SpaceOpera featuring a trio of con men; ''The Dragon Waiting'', an AlternateHistory political thriller that won a World Fantasy award; ''The Scholars of Night'', a UsefulNotes/ColdWar thriller; ''Growing Up Weightless'', a Philip K. Dick Award winner that's been described as one of the best Heinlein juveniles Creator/RobertAHeinlein never wrote; and ''The Last Hot Time'', a UsefulNotes/{{Chicago}} gangster story set TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture in which half the characters are elves.

* AlternateHistory: ''The Dragon Waiting''

* EyepatchOfPower: The sorcerer Peredur in ''The Dragon Waiting''
* EyeScream: In ''The Dragon Waiting''

* HistoricalDomainCharacter: Richard III and many others in ''The Dragon Waiting''
* InSpiteOfANail: In ''The Dragon Waiting'' Christianity never took hold in the Roman Empire, Constantinople didn't fall to the Turks, and France was partitioned between England and Byzantium sometime in the 12th century. The Wars of the Roses still seemingly happen exactly as they do in reality up through the crowning of Edward IV, with the exception of one relatively insignificant death.

* MysteryCult: One of the allohistorical details in ''The Dragon Waiting'' is the survival of the historical cult of Mithras. One of the protagonists is a member.

* OffIntoTheDistanceEnding: ''The Dragon Waiting'' ends with two of the protagonists departing on horseback: "Without any noise, they rode away, and soon were lost to sight." Notably, although the book is in tight-third, and the viewpoint character in the final scene is one of the characters who rides away, on the final sentence the viewpoint changes; there are no other characters there, so there is no sight for the characters to be lost from except that of the audience.
* OurVampiresAreDifferent: In ''The Dragon Waiting'', vampirism is treated as a disease, "haematophagic anemia", with obtrusive parallels to AIDS.

* TreacherousAdvisor: In ''The Dragon Waiting'':
-->"Your Grace." He reached into his bag, produced the translation of Mancini's letter. "We have a great deal of trouble. I hope that these are men you can trust."\\
"Yes, Professor, they are absolutely loyal to me," [[spoiler:Buckingham]] said, and signaled for his men to close the door.

And we haven't even scratched the surface of his original novels, which include ''Web of Angels'', which did {{cyberpunk}} before cyberpunk was cool; ''The Princes of the Air'', a SpaceOpera featuring a trio of con men; ''The Dragon Waiting'', an AlternateHistory political thriller that won a World Fantasy award; ''The Scholars of Night'', a UsefulNotes/ColdWar thriller; ''Growing Up Weightless'', a Philip K. Dick Award winner that's been described as one of the best Heinlein juveniles Creator/RobertAHeinlein never wrote; and ''The Last Hot Time'', a UsefulNotes/{{Chicago}} gangster story set TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture in which half the characters are elves.

* BodyDouble: Queen Rachel in ''The Princes of the Air'' has several, of which at least one is an android and one is a male relative who has the same build and shares the distinctive family eye colour.

* ChekhovsSkill: In ''The Princes of the Air'', the protagonist signs up for a language course as a student to score some easy marks; much later, his proficiency in the language is one of the deciding factors in the climactic confrontation.
* ConMan: The heroes of ''The Princes of the Air''

* FamilyEyeResemblance: In ''The Princes of the Air'', one of the things marking a character as a minor member of the royal family is that he has the distinctive family eye color.
* FeudalFuture: In ''The Princes of the Air''; it turns out to be important to the plot, and not just set-dressing.

* HumanSubspecies: One of the planets in ''The Princes of the Air'' is an ocean world with no dry landmasses, so the people who live there have been modified to be able to live underwater.

* StarbucksSkinScale: In ''The Princes of the Air'' there's a scene where the protagonist and a woman he's interested in are having coffee together, and it's noted in passing that her skin tone matches the coffee-with-cream they're drinking.
* SubspaceOrHyperspace: ''The Princes of the Air'' has a unique version

* TheWomanWearingTheQueenlyMask: Queen Rachel in ''The Princes of the Air'' turns out to be this.

And we haven't even scratched the surface of his original novels, which include ''Web of Angels'', which did {{cyberpunk}} before cyberpunk was cool; ''The Princes of the Air'', a SpaceOpera featuring a trio of con men; ''The Dragon Waiting'', an AlternateHistory political thriller that won a World Fantasy award; ''The Scholars of Night'', a UsefulNotes/ColdWar thriller; ''Growing Up Weightless'', a Philip K. Dick Award winner that's been described as one of the best Heinlein juveniles Creator/RobertAHeinlein never wrote; and ''The Last Hot Time'', a UsefulNotes/{{Chicago}} gangster story set TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture in which half the characters are elves.

And we haven't even scratched the surface of his original novels, which include ''Web of Angels'', which did {{cyberpunk}} before cyberpunk was cool; ''The Princes of the Air'', a SpaceOpera featuring a trio of con men; ''The Dragon Waiting'', an AlternateHistory political thriller that won a World Fantasy award; ''The Scholars of Night'', a ColdWar thriller; ''Growing Up Weightless'', a Philip K. Dick Award winner that's been described as one of the best Heinlein juveniles Creator/RobertAHeinlein never wrote; and ''The Last Hot Time'', a UsefulNotes/{{Chicago}} gangster story set TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture in which half the characters are elves.

Probably his widely-known work is in a sense his least original -- two novels in the Franchise/StarTrekExpandedUniverse, but even here he broke new ground: ''Literature/TheFinalReflection'' is a historical novel of the early years of Federation-Klingon interaction, with a Klingon as its hero, and ''Literature/HowMuchForJustThePlanet'' is a musical comedy. He also co-wrote the Klingons sourcebook for FASA's ''Star Trek'' TabletopRoleplayingGame, which was for a time the most complete and in-depth source on Klingon language and culture available. Much of it has been {{Jossed}} since the screen canon got serious about exploring Klingon culture, but there are still fans who think Ford's version was better, and not just in the sense that there will always be fans who think the old version was better. Even so, many feel that Ford's explorations directly influenced the evolution of the canon Klingons into their modern, honor-driven pseudo-Samurai form.

* OurVampiresAreDifferent: In TheDragonWaiting, vampirism is treated as a disease, "haematophagic anemia", with obtrusive parallels to AIDS.

Absolutely no relation to the acclaimed film director JohnFord.

And we haven't even scratched the surface of his original novels, which include ''Web of Angels'', which did {{cyberpunk}} before cyberpunk was cool; ''The Princes of the Air'', a SpaceOpera featuring a trio of con men; ''The Dragon Waiting'', an AlternateHistory political thriller that won a World Fantasy award; ''The Scholars of Night'', a ColdWar thriller; ''Growing Up Weightless'', a Philip K. Dick Award winner that's been described as one of the best Heinlein juveniles Creator/RobertAHeinlein never wrote; and ''The Last Hot Time'', a [[TheWindyCity Chicago]] gangster story set TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture in which half the characters are elves.

Probably his widely-known work is in a sense his least original -- two novels in the Franchise/StarTrekExpandedUniverse, but even here he broke new ground: ''Literature/TheFinalReflection'' is a historical novel of the early years of Federation-Klingon interaction, with a Klingon as its hero, and ''How Much For Just The Planet?'' is a musical comedy. He also co-wrote the Klingons sourcebook for FASA's ''Star Trek'' TabletopRoleplayingGame, which was for a time the most complete and in-depth source on Klingon language and culture available. Much of it has been {{Jossed}} since the screen canon got serious about exploring Klingon culture, but there are still fans who think Ford's version was better, and not just in the sense that there will always be fans who think the old version was better. Even so, many feel that Ford's explorations directly influenced the evolution of the canon Klingons into their modern, honor-driven pseudo-Samurai form.

* AgainstMyReligion: In ''How Much for Just the Planet?'' we have [=McCoy=] explaining why he, Sulu, and two Klingons won't Kneel Before Zod (the evil queen Janeka):
-->'''[=McCoy=]:''' Well, it's against Mr. Sulu's religion, these two gentlemen already have a dictator, and I'm a Democrat.

* BizarreAndImprobableGolfGame: ''How Much For Just The Planet?'' features one that involves land mines and artillery.

* CrowdSong: In ''How Much For Just The Planet?'', the Direidians break out into crowd songs around the visiting Federation and Klingon diplomatic delegations on several occasions. It turns out that [[spoiler:it ''was'' all carefully rehearsed and planned out ahead of time, as part of the Direidian "plan C" to prevent either of the two sides from taking over their planet and disrupting their way of life]].

* FilkSong: Most (all?) of the songs in ''How Much For Just The Planet?''
* FoodFight: ''How Much For Just The Planet?'' culminates in one.
* GenreSavvy: The Klingon communications officer in ''How Much For Just The Planet?''

* MustHaveCaffeine: In ''How Much for Just the Planet?'' it's quickly established over breakfast that "Bones [=McCoy=] was not a morning person":
-->'''[=McCoy=]:''' Plergb hfarizz ungemby, ''and coffee''.

* NoWaterProofingInTheFuture: Played for laughs in ''How Much For Just The Planet?''
** Technically it's "no peppermint shake-proofing", but yeah.
* PieInTheFace: Pretty much everybody during the FoodFight in ''How Much For Just The Planet?''.
-->Blueberry, Kirk thought instead of ducking.\\
''Splat.''\\
Blueberry it was.

* TimeForPlanB: In ''How Much for Just the Planet?'' the Diredei plan to stop the Federation and/or Klingons from exploiting their dilithium is called "Plan C". [[spoiler:There was no Plan A or B; C stands for the keystone of the plan: "Comedy".]]

* {{Tuckerization}}: Much of the supporting cast of ''How Much For Just The Planet?'' is based on Ford's friends and fellow authors, including DianeDuane, Creator/PeterMorwood, Creator/NeilGaiman, PamelaDean, and JanetKagan.

Probably his widely-known work is in a sense his least original -- two novels in the StarTrekExpandedUniverse, but even here he broke new ground: ''The Final Reflection'' is a historical novel of the early years of Federation-Klingon interaction, with a Klingon as its hero, and ''How Much For Just The Planet?'' is a musical comedy. He also co-wrote the Klingons sourcebook for FASA's ''Star Trek'' TabletopRoleplayingGame, which was for a time the most complete and in-depth source on Klingon language and culture available. Much of it has been {{Jossed}} since the screen canon got serious about exploring Klingon culture, but there are still fans who think Ford's version was better, and not just in the sense that there will always be fans who think the old version was better. Even so, many feel that Ford's explorations directly influenced the evolution of the canon Klingons into their modern, honor-driven pseudo-Samurai form.

!!John M. Ford's works provide examples of:

* ActualPacifist: The diplomat Emanuel Tagore in ''The Final Reflection''. This causes some confusion when Klingon security attempts to search his luggage for hidden weapons, and takes their inability to find any as a sign that he's hidden them really well.

* DeceasedFallGuyGambit: ''The Final Reflection'' opens with a competition between teams representing the Klingon Navy and Marines, with their InterserviceRivalry meaning a signficant amount of prestige rides on the outcome. When the team representing the Marines is found to be cheating, the Marine officer in charge of the team is blamed for the whole thing and executed on the spot by a superior officer who, it is implied, is at least a co-conspirator and probably the real mastermind.

* HistoricalDomainCharacter:
** Richard III and many others in ''The Dragon Waiting''
** The novel-within-the-novel of ''The Final Reflection'' has several future historical figures in it, including a cameo appearance by a young Spock. In the frame story, the real Spock is visibly unhappy about the novel, and refuses to talk about whether the scene has any basis in truth.
* HistoricalFiction: ''The Final Reflection'' presents itself as a historical novel published in Kirk's time and set decades earlier.
* HumanChess: In ''The Final Reflection'' (although technically the participants are all Klingons and the game is ''klin zha'', specifically ''klin zha kinta'', 'the game with live pieces'.)

* InterserviceRivalry: Is strong between the Klingon Navy and Marines in ''The Final Reflection''.
* LightbulbJoke: ''The Final Reflection'' has these in the form of "Rom Jokes", which Federation and Klingon crewmembers swap at a peace conference. The only one related to the reader is "How many Romulans does it take to change a transtator coil? Answer: 1 to change the coil, 150 to blow the ship up out of shame."

* MeaningfulRename:
** The protagonist of ''The Final Reflection'' goes through several. One is the rename all Klingons do when they determine their life career path. Klingons entering the Klingon Navy, as the protagonist does, have a name beginning with K; Marines have names beginning with M; civilian scientists and technicians have names beginning with A; and so on.
** All the human characters in ''The Last Hot Time'' have one in their backstory, except the protagonist, who being the NaiveNewcomer gets his during the course of the story. (Interestingly, the narration continues to refer to him by his old name for a couple more chapters, until he's settled in to his new identity.)
* MustHaveCaffeine:
** In ''How Much for Just the Planet?'' it's quickly established over breakfast that "Bones [=McCoy=] was not a morning person":
--->'''[=McCoy=]:''' Plergb hfarizz ungemby, ''and coffee''.
** In ''The Final Reflection'', a sympathetic Klingon character is depicted as a morning coffee drinker, praising its mind-clearing effect; it's explained that he picked up a taste for it during a space voyage where the supplies ran low and all they had to drink was a case of coffee they'd plundered along the way.

* PardonMyKlingon: Done with actual Klingon swear-words in ''The Final Reflection''.

* SealedBadassInACan: In ''The Final Reflection'' the [[spoiler:Klingons]] have a super-soldier with an enhanced metabolism that makes him practically unbeatable, at the cost of a dramatically reduced lifespan. To get the most possible use out of him, his handlers keep him in cryogenic suspension between missions.
* SmartPeoplePlayChess: ''The Final Reflection'' reveals that Klingon military strategy is the province of military "thought admirals", who hone their skills in ''klin zha'' (Klingon chess). The (Klingon) protagonist's father, who is a thought admiral, also studies other races' equivalents of ''klin zha'', including the Human game "chess", to gain insight into the races that play them.

* {{Tuckerization}}:
** The fictional author's note at the beginning of ''The Final Reflection'' includes a message of gratitude to "Mimi Panitch, my editor, who first decided the Federation was ready for this story"; in real life, Mimi Panitch was the editor at Pocket Books who brought ''The Final Reflection'' to print, along the way defending it from Paramount higher-ups who doubted its suitability.
** ''The Final Reflection'' includes brief cameos by Klingons based on the co-authors of the Klingons sourcebook.
** Much of the supporting cast of ''How Much For Just The Planet?'' is based on Ford's friends and fellow authors, including DianeDuane, Creator/PeterMorwood, Creator/NeilGaiman, PamelaDean, and JanetKagan.

* UnreliableNarrator: ''The Final Reflection'' begins with an author's note from the in-story author, admitting up-front that some of what follows is no more than informed speculation, and some of it just plain made up to paper over the gaps in what his research was able to uncover. He declines to say which bits are which.
* VariantChess: In ''The Final Reflection'' the protagonist's father studies other races through their chess-equivalents. Of the several mentioned in the novel, ''klin zha'', the Klingon game, is of particular and recurring significance.
* WarriorHeaven: The Klingon afterlife, as described in ''The Final Reflection''.

* {{Tuckerization}}: ''The Final Reflection'' includes brief cameos by Klingons based on the co-authors of the Klingons sourcebook. Much of the supporting cast of ''How Much For Just The Planet?'' is based on Ford's friends and fellow authors, including DianeDuane, Creator/PeterMorwood, Creator/NeilGaiman, PamelaDean, and JanetKagan.

* PardonMyKlingon: Done with actualy Klingon swear-words in ''The Final Reflection''.

* MeaningfulRename: All the human characters in ''The Last Hot Time'' have one in their backstory, except the protagonist, who being the NaiveNewcomer gets his during the course of the story. (Interestingly, the narration continues to refer to him by his old name for a couple more chapters, until he's settled in to his new identity.)

* HistoricalDomainCharacter: Richard III and many others in ''The Dragon Waiting''

* MustHaveCaffeine: In ''How Much for Just the Planet?'' it's quickly established over breakfast that "Bones [=McCoy=] was not a morning person":
-->'''[=McCoy=]:''' Plergb hfarizz ungemby, ''and coffee''.