Star Wars books

[Kasimir he/him]

So, there was this moment in one of the threads where Ketek and I basically derailed for a bit over Vergere. Of all the Star Wars novels available, I enjoy books written by: Matthew Stover, Timothy Zahn, Jude Watson (surprising but I grew up reading Jedi Apprentice, so) and James Luceno.

 

Especially Matthew Stover--if I say I liked RotS, it's not so much because of the movie (although I always enjoy lots of lightsaber combat) but because Stover did a great job in the novelisation. I enjoyed Shatterpoint (my copy is dogeared), I do love Traitor (despite my quibbles with the way it's sometimes regarded and how LotF made a hash out of Vergere) and Shadows of Mindor was honestly more than decent as well.

 

Any other Stover fans around? Barring that, any other Star Wars fans who follow the novels? I've mostly stopped by now, first because I discovered Brandon Sanderson (not so, I lie) and more importantly, because things just seemed to keep going downhill since LotF and Traviss.

[Left he/him]

I've read most of the Zhan books and one Kotor book, but aside from that nothing.

[Kasimir he/him]

CalebTheGeek, on 11 May 2014 - 02:20 AM, said:

I've read most of the Zhan books and one Kotor book, but aside from that nothing.

Which KOTOR? Darth Bane?

[Left he/him]

Revan, and I only read it because I wanted some kind of ending to the video game series.

[Briar King]

I could go on all day about the EU since I've been buying and reading them since 1993. Now they re all scrap with Ep 7 coming out. That bums me out so much.

[Kobold King he/him]

I could go on all day about the EU since I've been buying and reading them since 1993. Now they re all scrap with Ep 7 coming out. That bums me out so much.

 

Canon discrepancies never bother me, especially not within a science fiction franchise. I merely assume the gaps in continuity to be evidence of alternate universes!

 

The geekier you are, the more fun you'll have in life. Because hypothetical physics supplies answers to all dilemmas.

[Kasimir he/him]

Briar King, on 12 May 2014 - 09:00 AM, said:

I could go on all day about the EU since I've been buying and reading them since 1993. Now they re all scrap with Ep 7 coming out. That bums me out so much.

I'm with you on this. One reason I could never get into Marvel was too many alternate universes and timelines. I do like continuity, and although most Star Wars fans are familiar with the different levels of canon, I guess I am a bit saddened that those of us who liked to draw on and discuss on that rich corpus mightn't really have that in common with new fans any longer, especially once the movie comes out.

[Ketek]

Matthew Stover is the best SWEU writer around, no question about that. His novels make you think; on top of that his books are sprinkled with a liberal dose of violence. Well-written violence - he actually practices martial arts and you can see that knowledge being used in his fight scenes.

 

And Vergere is a very well-written character. I would go so far as to say that it is likely one of the best characters I have ever seen in a novel, to the extent that other writers that had novels featuring her as a character failed to capture the essence of the Stover Vergere (he was the creator). The worst part was when they retconned her as being Sith; that just showed how badly they failed to understand what could have been.

 

Even putting Traitor aside, RotS' novelization is beautiful; the prose is lovely and the prologue is absolutely epic - it ends with a quote that just made my hair stand on end:

 

“A pair of starfighters. Jedi starfighters. Only two.

Two is enough.

Two is enough because the adults are wrong, and their younglings are right.

Though this is the end of the age of heroes, it has saved its best for last.” 

 

And then there's the interlude sections about how the dark always wins:

 

“The dark is generous.

Its first gift is concealment: our true faces lie in the dark beneath our skins, our true hearts remain shadowed deeper still. But the greatest concealment lies not in protecting our secret truths, but in hiding from the truths of others.

The dark protects us from what we dare not know.

Its second gift is comforting illusion: the ease of gentle dreams in night’s embrace, the beauty that imagination brings to what would repel in the day’s harsh light. But the greatest of its comforts is the illusion that dark is temporary: that every night brings a new day. Because it’s the day that is temporary.

Day is the illusion.

Its third gift is the light itself: as days are defined by the nights that divide them, as stars are defined by the infinite black through which they wheel, the dark embraces the light, and brings it forth from the center of its own self.

With each victory of the light, it is the dark that wins.”

 

And then we have Shatterpoint, which is essentially Apocalypse Now with Jedi. And storming Mace Windu.

 

And he's not exclusively a Star Wars author, he's written a little-known series called the Acts of Caine. Very good series, and if you're one for violence, give it a read. If grimdark fantasy doesn't hit you though... you're probably not a Stover fan.

Edited May 12, 2014 by Ketek

[Shardmancer he/him]

What? there is a Kotor- knights of the old republic book.. that follows some of the story line from the video game??? kewl stuff

[Ketek]

No, it resolves the storyline from the first two games.

 

The Jedi Exile's name is Meetra Surik.

 

And regarding the OP, James Luceno is awesome. Darth Plagueis is a worthy EU novel. The Rise of Darth Vader is another. Also, I read Jedi Apprentice (which is partially why I like Kenobi so much).

 

Zahn is pretty good too, but I think he'll never surpass his Thrawn trilogy, although Allegiance and Choices of One are pretty good reads. The last EU novel that I really enjoyed was John Jackson Miller's Kenobi - definitely a read for those Kenobi fans out there.

Edited May 12, 2014 by Ketek

[GreyPilgrim he/him]

I have always loved the EU. I am really sad to see it go.

My personal favorite has always been Karen Traviss. The Republic Commando novels are exceptional. She managed to put so much into those books. The clones were always a concept that I felt was a little underappreciated. They had to go through so much. Being raised from birth (?) to be soldiers, ageing at double the normal human pace. Think of how hard that could be on a mind! There was also often a tendency to lump them together. "They're all just copies of the same person, right? No need to give them individual characterization. Let's just blow them up." Traviss managed to escape those traps and create beautiful, individual, and complex characters.

I have never been in combat, but her betrayal of it, the brotherhood created by it, the entire mindset, must be nearly perfect.

Unfortunately, Traviss was never able to finish her stories, as her portrayal of Mandalore, its history, and its culture contradicted with that of the Clone Wars TV show. However, if you haven't read them, I highly suggest you do. Don't let the first book, Hard Contact, fool you. It is good, but not excellent, as the series was only a videogame tie-in at that point. The there other Republic Commando novels (Triple Zero, True Colors, and Order 66) as well as the single follow-up Imperial Commando novel (501st), are beautiful and heartbreaking.

James Luceno is also one of my favorites, and of course Timothy Zahn.

I never read Stover's RotS novelization, but based on what I've read about it, this is a major failure on my part.

Mostly, I get annoyed when people consider spinoffs like the Star Wars novels to be "lesser literature". Yes, some Star Wars books are utter drivel. But many of them can stand up to supposed "true" literature.

For anyone who's interested, I would suggest checking out Tor.com's ongoing Expanded Universe Reread. They focus on the classic ones (ones from the nineties), which I consider some of the best. They do a pretty good job of covering the books.

[Ketek]

I would say the EU made the mistake of introducing far too many mediocre writers instead of picking only the absolute best, plus the countless retcons.

 

Karen Traviss was alright. She wasn't someone whose writing I enjoyed a lot, but it was alright. Paul S. Kemp's Crosscurrent and Riptide are also solid reads, I really enjoyed them.

[GreyPilgrim he/him]

Ditto on their introducing mediocre writers. In general, the post-Episode VI novels declined in quality the more they made of them, though that was in part due to the situations becoming overly contrived and boring characters.

I also enjoy Kemp. Crosscurrent was quite good, though I never read Riptide.

I noticed that they have chosen some of the better authors to start the new EU books; Miller, Luceno, and Kemp are already well-established Star Wars novelists.

I stopped following the EU for the most part a couple years ago. It just got to be too much and the quality was generally decreasing. I will have to read the new novels they make, both because I can't live with not being in-the-know about official Star Wars expanded canon and because I am genuinely interested in where Disney chooses to take the characters.

[Briar King]

It's gonna be pretty damnation hard to convince myself to get the new ones. I'm so sore building up a bookcase for 20 yrs now of an "alternate universe" ugh. I'm going to avoid giving Star Wars people anymore of my $ for a long time.

[Ketek]

Ditto on their introducing mediocre writers. In general, the post-Episode VI novels declined in quality the more they made of them, though that was in part due to the situations becoming overly contrived and boring characters.

I also enjoy Kemp. Crosscurrent was quite good, though I never read Riptide.

I noticed that they have chosen some of the better authors to start the new EU books; Miller, Luceno, and Kemp are already well-established Star Wars novelists.

I stopped following the EU for the most part a couple years ago. It just got to be too much and the quality was generally decreasing. I will have to read the new novels they make, both because I can't live with not being in-the-know about official Star Wars expanded canon and because I am genuinely interested in where Disney chooses to take the characters.

 

Riptide's prologue is pretty well-written. Miller's Kenobi is probably his best work up to date. Luceno is one of those writers who consistently churns up solid work.

 

I read EU novels for the gems they occasionally bring out, but all-in-all I've not been following them much too, not when there are better universes to explore out there.

[Kasimir he/him]

Ketek, on 13 May 2014 - 3:02 PM, said:

Riptide's prologue is pretty well-written. Miller's Kenobi is probably his best work up to date. Luceno is one of those writers who consistently churns up solid work.

I read EU novels for the gems they occasionally bring out, but all-in-all I've not been following them much too, not when there are better universes to explore out there.

I enjoyed Miller's Kenobi, I'd have to say I don't like Kemp's work so much. (Didn't enjoy Crosscurrent or Riptide.) I was first introduced to Luceno through Cloak of Deception, and I've found him to be consistently good.

[Ketek]

I just loved how ripped up Kenobi was by his guilt over Anakin. It still resonates with me to this day.

 

You were there,” Annileen whispered. “Weren’t you? When this bad thing happened,” she mouthed. “You were there.”

 

Ben closed his eyes and nodded. “It didn’t just happen,” he said, hardly breathing. “I caused it.”

 

Annileen’s mind raced. Raced and veered into dark imaginings that she wanted to dismiss. But Ben was serious about whatever it was, and she had to be, too. “You … you hurt someone?”

 

“They hurt themselves,” Ben said. “I came along at the end—the very end. But I was also there at the beginning. I should have stopped it.”

 

She shook her head. “You’re just one man.”

 

“I should have stopped it!” The railing shook. “I failed! It was on me to stop it, and I didn’t. And I will have that on my conscience forever.”

 

Annileen’s eyes looked left and right. The fence quaked so hard under his hands that she thought the very posts might fly out of the ground. “Ben, you can’t blame—”

 

“You can’t know.” He turned and clutched at her shoulders, surprising her. “I failed everyone. Do you have any idea how many people have paid for that? Do you know how many people are paying, right now?”

Edited May 13, 2014 by Ketek