I mentioned this in the Amy Berg question thread, but thought that maybe the possibility of "The 4400" returning in book form warranted its own discussion thread. If I'm wrong, by all means feel free to lock or delete this thread.

Anyways, I was perusing Amazon.com and found a listing for a paperback book called "The 4400: The Vesuvius Prophecy" that's supposed to be coming out on June 24th, 2008. This is the information given at the site:

The 4400: The Vesuvius Prophecy (The 4400) (Mass Market Paperback)
by Greg Cox (Author)

List Price: $7.99

288 pages, published by Pocket Star.

• ISBN-10: 1416543171
• ISBN-13: 978-1416543176

That's all the info that's there. Also according to Amazon, this Greg Cox guy has written a bunch of other tie-in novels for "Star Trek", "Alias", "Buffy", "Roswell", the movie "Underworld", and some comic book novels for Marvel's "Fantastic Four" and "X-Men" and DC's "Infinite Crisis" and "52".

I hadn't heard anything about this so I thought I'd post it to see what everybody else thought. This makes me slightly less upset about the prospect of the show not coming back!

I hadn't heard anything of it either.

Hopefully this doesn't dwindle things for a season 5 but considering it comes out during the summer, who knows.

Thanks for that though.

Vesuvius Prophecy- wonder what that could be ???

I was actually thinking that, if nothing else, a "4400" book coming out next summer could actually bode well for the prospect of the show coming back for a 5th season. It seems kind of weird to me that they'd cancel the show, and then come out with a tie-in novel a whole year later. If anything, I'm hoping that a possible decision to cancel the show won't mean that the book being released gets cancelled to!

At the very least it means that we should be getting at least one more original "4400" story before all is said and done.

And I have no idea what "The Vesuvius Prophecy" might be referring too. To my knowledge there has never been anything called "Vesuvius" mentioned on the actual show.

You know, the release of this book might actually be a good thing afterall. If I remember correctly, the 4400 soundtrack came out around the summer of this past year and we were greeted with season 4.

Who knows, this might just carry a positive ripple effect after all.

Me too!

The author Greg Cox has his own website, so I emailed him asking if he could give me any info at all about the book (Does the story take place after the events of the season 4 finale? Are there plans to write anymore "4400" fiction after this one? Does this mean anything whatsoever in regards to the actual show being renewed or cancelled? etc...), so we'll see if I get a response from him.

Wow, this Greg Cox guy works fast! I already got a response back from him about the book. Here's what he had to say:

Joe,

Thanks for your interest! I'm afraid I don't have any inside scoop on the Fifth Season. I'm hoping the show returns next summer, the same time my book comes out, but who knows? Especially with the Writers' Strike going on. As it happens, my book takes place about midway through Season Three, shortly before Jordan Collier returns from the dead. That seemed like the best place to stick a standalone novel before the whole promicin storyline kicked into gear. The plot basically involves Tom and Diana trying to stop a rogue 4400 from destroying Seattle. I also tried to fill in some of the blanks regarding the Shaun-Isabel relationship. I'm still waiting for CBS's final comments on the manuscript so all of this is subject to change, but I know there's at least one other 4400 novel in the works. I'm betting it takes place during the Third Season, too. Sorry I don't have more information about the show. Here's hoping we get a fifth season!

Best,

Greg

So it doesn't really tell us anything about a renewal or not, but as I said at the very least it will be nice to get some new "4400" stories. And it's good to know that the author is actually a fan of the show! Although I wonder why CBS has to approve the manuscript.

If the show [God-forbid] does get cancelled, but the books do well enough, then maybe this can be a means for the story to continue, and we can start to see some novels taking place post-season four.

That's cool that he replied. I look forward to the novel. There are so many other novels out there such as for Smallville, Lost, Roswell, Buffy, Charmed, etc. So it's cool that there are some that will be of the 4400.

As for why CBS has to approve the manuscript, I'm not entirely sure but I think it has to do with the rights and what not since CBS is official label that the 4400 dvds were produced under.

I look forward to this book badly and hopefully there will be more! Guess that means I have to start saving up since I collect all things 4400!

Don't worry SWJaggy, you shouldn't have to save up too much. All the websites that I saw list the book as costing anywhere between $6-$8, since it's just a paperback.

I too checked to see what is out there about the Vesuvius Prophecy and found the following information. Maybe this ties into the backstory of such a book about the 4400's?

Vesuvius
n : a volcano in southwestern Italy on the Mediterranean coast;
erupted in 79 AD and buried Pompeii; last erupted in 1944
And more about an eruption from this volcano:

Vesuvius blast could kill 300,000*
March 04, 2007
John Follain
The Times

THE next eruption of Vesuvius could kill at least 300,000 people, nearly
20 times as many as the AD79 disaster that buried the ancient city of
Pompeii, according to Italian government research.

More than half a million people live in the so-called “red zone” of 18
towns in a four-mile radius of the volcano and most would die if an
evacuation could not be completed in time, the research says.

The findings are from a study by some of Europe’s leading vulcanologists
and public health experts, including Dr Peter Baxter of Cambridge
University’s Department of Public Health.

Baxter — known in the field as “Dr Doom” for his studies of the victims
of eruptions — and a team of Italian scientists calculated the possible
death toll based on the impact of the final phase of an eruption, when a
mushroom-shaped cloud of superheated gas, rock and ash would come
crashing to earth.

“The main cause of death would be the high temperatures — the flows
would penetrate windows, burn people to death and asphyxiate them,”
Baxter said.

Vesuvius, which was known as “hell’s chimney-pot” in the Middle Ages,
has been quiet for more than 60 years. Over the past 2,000 years, it has
erupted on average once a century.

“The rule is that the longer the period of inactivity, the bigger the
eruption,” said Augusto Neri, of the National Geophysical and
Vulcanology Institute, who led the study. The most famous eruption of
Vesuvius, in the first century, still grips the imagination 2,000 years
later. Some 16,000 people died in Pompeii, Herculaneum and the
surrounding area when they were covered in a 30ft layer of volcanic ash
or engulfed by billions of tons of pumice and other rock.

Pliny the Younger, who witnessed it from across the bay, wrote of the
eruption: “Darkness fell — not the dark of a moonless or cloudy night
but as if the lamp had been put out in a closed room.” The destruction
of Pompeii, the worst affected city, has inspired many books and films,
including Robert Harris’s 2003 bestseller, which features Pliny the
Elder and which is to be adapted by the director Roman Polanski in a
£100m movie.

Some 2.5m tourists visited Pompeii last year, where the finest ruined
villas boast their original frescoes and where the paved roads are still
marked by ruts left by ancient wheels.

The plaster casts of victims burnt to death during the eruption and the
traces of their bodies found in the ash in the foetal position, are
among the main attractions.

According to the new study, Pompeii would also be among the sites hit by
any future eruption, with tourists among the victims if they were not
moved out of the area in time.

The report, published last week in the American journal Geophysical
Research Letters, is the first computer study with a three-dimensional
simulation of an eruption’s impact on densely populated areas, taking
into account the volcano’s topography and details of previous discharges.

The first rumbling of Vesuvius would be followed by the spewing of vast
amounts of ash that would blot out the sun and rain down to earth, the
scientists say. The ash would make it difficult to breathe, crush roofs
and make roads impassable.

The Italian authorities say that since Vesuvius is among the most
closely monitored volcanoes, there would be sufficient warning to
organise an emergency evacuation before any danger materialised. The
civil protection ministry estimates this would take three to five days.

But officials have long warned that news of an imminent eruption would
cause panic with thousands fleeing, mostly by car, paralysing roads. One
ministry report stated: “In this phase many deaths are to be expected,
caused by road accidents, people being crushed, fires, heart attacks and
shootings.”

According to the new study, the final phase of the eruption would see a
column of gas, rock and ash, similar to a nuclear weapon’s mushroom
cloud, come crashing down onto the lower slopes of the volcano.

The result would be pyroclastic blasts of red-hot gas and rock, followed
by thousands of tons more ash. The temperature of magma leaving the
crater would be 950C, falling to about 200C at the outer limit of the
red zone.

Travelling at 60mph, these flows would sweep over thousands of homes
built illegally on the slopes of Vesuvius since the second world war to
reach towns including Ottaviano, which contains a Medici palace. The
flows would arrive in Pompeii and Herculaneum within 20 minutes.

“At least 300,000 are at risk, according to our model,” Neri said. “Our
hope is that these people won’t be around when the eruption starts.”

The study found that up to 200,000 people living north of Vesuvius would
have more time to flee thanks to the volcano’s Mount Somma rim, which
would act as a natural barrier and divert more volcanic flows towards
the south.

The civil protection ministry, one of the bodies which commissioned the
study, is examining its findings.

Experts are divided on how much notice they will have of an eruption and
on whether it will be possible to avert a death toll on the scale of
Asia’s Boxing Day tsunami in 2004.

“Whether the evacuation will work in time depends on how long a warning
Vesuvius gives us. If it starts to signal that an eruption is coming, we
could have a few days’ warning or we could have a few weeks’,” Baxter
said. “But there is a lot of uncertainty.”

To date, only small-scale rehearsals have been carried out for an
evacuation. In the most recent, last October, it took 10 hours to
evacuate groups of 100 people by bus from each of the 18 towns.

Professor Giuseppe Luongo of the University of Naples, a former director
of the Vesuvius Observatory which monitors the volcano, believes plans
are inadequate and local people are ill-informed about them.

"Today, people aren't prepared for an evacuation. It’s wrong to bet on
carrying out the entire evacuation in just three to five days. If there
was an eruption tomorrow it’s quite possible we’d see huge traffic jams,
car crashes and people using guns to make their escape," he said. We
need to plan to start the evacuation of vulnerable people, like
pensioners, first. People need to know what to do and they have to
understand they won’t be able to get out by car. You can walk 10 miles
in three hours, that’s quite a good safety margin.”

Some Neapolitans are hoping Vesuvius will stir soon. Guides who work
near its summit believe a volcano that splutters, growls and
occasionally spits fire and lava is a better crowd-puller than a dull,
impotent mountain. But anyone who doubts the apocalyptic vision of the
scientists has only to refer back to Pliny’s description to be reminded
of the reality: “You could hear the shrieks of women, the wailing of
infants, the shouts of men.”

Now that's an interesting thought. When you talked of it being a volcano, it brought back a memory of my dad and my sister talking about Mt. Vesuvius when they had gone to Italy.

If it does turn out to be something of those lines, it sure would be interesting considering not all the 4400's are in Seattle and it definately would put a global spin on things.

LOL this hilarious, I live right in front of the Vesuvius, I can see it from my window (but dont worry, my city is outside the danger area). I'll definetly buy that book.

It would be cool to go a little more global, but since the author said that the story is basically about Tom & Diana trying to stop a rogue 4400 from destroying Seattle, I was thinking that maybe it was about a 4400 with the ability to manipulate the Earth who perhaps tries to sprout a volcano right in the middle of the city or something.

Seriously, I can't believe that there haven't been "4400" novels before now. Given what the basic premise of the show is, there are so many story possibilities out there, especially if they decided to not always focus on the main characters. I have all the "V" novels from back in the '80's, and not all of those books dealt with the characters we knew from "V: The Series" on tv. Some of them were about all new characters in different parts of the country and we got to see what it was like dealing with the alien invasion from a different perspective. The "4400" books could introduce some new characters and we could see what was going on in New York City or something.

1.) Yeah it's the same way with the Star Wars novels. There are some that deal with known characters but they take you through all kinds of new adventures. And then there are those that turn out to be about new charactesr entirely.

2.) I will admit that I do like for things to pertain to characters that we all ready know but at the same time it always does get fun when new characters are introduced because it expands our horizons. Considering there were 4400 returnees brought back and we haven't yet witnessed all 4400, it would be cool to see some others (whether through season 5 or the novels).

Hopefully these two novels won't be the last.

When does season 3 book come out in barnesnoble? I wonder what book be about.

That one comes out on Tuesday (Nov. 20th). I really hope the Barnes & Noble I go to has it otherwise I'll be angry.

I look on the barnesnoble website last night to look for it. It didn't popup when it cames out?

I don't know why it's not coming up on the Barnes & Noble website.

I went to the store 2 weekends ago and they specifically told me it's coming out on the 20th.

It is coming out on the 20th.

Here's the link for the book on Amazon: S3 Guide

Hey, just thought you'd all like to know I e-mailed Greg yesterday and I got a response.

The first note is the one I sent (figured you all can read it) and the second one is the reply.



Here is his response.



(By now, we all know who sent the first e-mail to Greg. Smart idea of e-mailing him, Joe. I figured it wouldn't hurt to send him a line to show him the interest in the books is there.)

I dropped Greg a line to let him know about this forum and how much excitement his book is generating:

Dear Greg:

Just thought you would be interested to know that the fans that post on the official 4400 message boards are absoultely buzzing about your upcoming book! Personally, I'm super excited to get a copy. I just can't wait until it's released. I hope it fares well, which I'm sure it will, and that we can expect more in the future. Not to mention a renewal for Season 5 {sends up a prayer to TPTB! )

Good luck and continued success!

Sincerely,
[my name] (a.k.a. amerirish)

Here's a link to the thread about your book: http://forums.usanetwork.com/index.php?showtopic=395107


And here's his (immediate!) reply:

[amerirish]

Thanks for alerting me to the discussion. I'm encouraged by how much interest there is in the book this far ahead of publication. I'll have to log onto that forum sometime soon.

Crossing my fingers that we get a Fifth Season . . . .

Greg


What a nice guy!

That's cool, amerirish.

Greg seems like a really great guy. You can tell that he loves his work and when writers love their work it always makes enjoying them much more.

L—Lemmings

OMG, he should totally hire PJ, EM, OR & IR (among others) to form a writing team!

Yo, Greg: if you pop by here, you HAVE to read "The Real Love Triangle" and "Once Upon a Time on The 4400"!!!!

I don't know if you're lost or rude, but what's the problem with showing some support for someone's accomplishment?

Hi. Greg Cox here. Glad to hear that you're all looking forward to the novel. I'm amazed and encouraged that there's so much interest in the book already.

To answer a couple of your questions,

1) Like all tie-in novels, the outline and manuscript had to be approved by the owner of the property. In this case, that would be CBS. They approved the outline months ago and I'm now waiting on their final comments on the manuscript. This is pretty much standard procedure when you're writing books based on movies and tv shows. With any luck, I'll only have to make a few minor revisions.

2) As for "Vesuvius" . . . well, I don't want to give too much away, but you might want to consider that there's a dormant volcano only about three hours away from Seattle: Mount Rainier.

3) As it happens, I actually grew up outside Seattle, so I had a lot of fun working lots of local color into the book. A more international approach is not a bad idea actually, but I wasn't going to pass up a chance to take full advantage of the Seattle connection.

Thanks again for everyone's interest. Hope you like the book when it comes out.

Wow, Greg, thanks for posting!

Considering that Seattle is where it all started, it always is fun to keep things in that general area.

Just some ideas (for fun), it would be cool to have a book done on the Starzl Mutation. A 4400 getting together with a non-4400 and creating a P+ kid would be sweet!

Thanks Greg, and welcome aboard the board!

Thanks for posting Greg and answering some of our questions. I was confused when you mentioned that CBS was looking over the manuscript since I didn't realize that they owned the property. Even though the CBS logo is on the DVD's, I was under the impression that NBC owned the show itself.

OMG You're gonna blow up Mt. Rainier! It'll be like St. Helens all over again

Can't wait for this to come out!

This is spectacular news. I love reading, but only stories/genres I am familiar with or know I will enjoy. While I am still crossing my fingers and hoping everyday for a 5th season, it is nice to know that a novel will fill that possible void, perhaps a series of novels! Also, to Mr. Greg Cox, I appreciate your interest in the fans of your upcoming literature, nice to hear positive news on the series while waiting for the renewal. Thanks for taking the time to post here.

A book? Really?! How awesome! If they turned it into a book series I wouldn't complain. Even if one is all we get, that is far more than I expected bookwise! See you all at Barnes and Nobles!

This is just awesome isn't it?! The fact that the movie hasn't even been published yet and all ready we fans are generating noise. I know that because of the e-mails we've received back and the post as well, that Greg is impressed.

Heck if we don't get a season 5 (which I'm still hopeful for), it would be awesome if they could run a series on season 5. That's what happened with the show Roswell. After the show ended on tv, books were made that continued their journey. It would be cool if the same was done for the 4400.

I know that there's at least one more 4400 book after mine. I think it's being written by Kevin Dilmore and Dayton Ward, although I'm not a hundred percent positive about that.

Just giving this thread a bump since it seems like this and any subsequent books (HOPEFULLY!) is likely going to be the last new "4400" we have to look forward to.

Although I have to say I'm a little nervous about whether the fact that the show it's based on has been cancelled close to a year before the books release date will affect whether it's released at all!

I hope it come out next summer.

I love you AMERIRISH, I honestly love you!

Somone just posted this on the first page but I thought I would do so here:

http://www.amazon.com/4400-Vesuvius-Prophe...8696&sr=1-1

It seems we now have a cover and a release date: June 24th, 2008.

Sounds good.

This is so exciting about the book. I didn't know about it until I just read this thread. I am super excited!!!

Now that is a nice looking book cover.

I'm pretty excited about this. I hope everybody goes out and picks up a copy (c'mon now, paperbacks aren't that expensive). If worse-case-scenario and our campaign to get a proper ending to the show doesn't pay-off, then at least if sales on this are okay then we might get a continuation of the story in book form!

I'm definately gonna be getting a copy. There is no way I would miss out on a book about my favorite tv show! It gives us something to hold onto now that the show has sadly come to an end... for now.

It's already on my amazon wish list. I would order it but after they yanked the S3 companion guide I'm a bit wary. The day it's available I'll buy it.

The author, Greg Cox was here on this thread for a spell. Anyone who's interested should scroll back to the first few pages. What a nice guy

1.) I completely agree. Here's hoping this release date won't be pulled back. They had good reason with the season 3 one I suppose but still.

2.) That was fun when he dropped by wasn't it! It was cool because we as fans had all ready shown interest long before the release and he was kind enough to talk to us as well. It's a rare thing for authors to do that.

Is not on barnesnoble website yet? Is still coming out on june 24?

Whoo hoo! 4400 lives on!

I email the author last night and he email me back this morning. He say last he heard the book supposed come out sometime in july.

Since I'm more of a movie/TV-guy, I haven't read a book in about 10 years or so, but I am SO getting this book - and all future books that Greg may write about the 4400. I've signed petitions and sent a bag of sunflower seeds. Truly hoping that there will be a 5:th season.

By the way, I'm kind of surprised that no one reacted on the first mail reply (posted in this thread) that Greg sent, he said:
"I also tried to fill in some of the blanks regarding the Shaun-Isabel relationship."

Not sure if IMDB and my closed captions are correct, but according to them it's SHAWN. I'm sure this was just a type-o, and that there will be no such flaws in the upcoming book. Looking forward to it!

Keep up the good work Greg!