I, Jedi

Are we ready for more MAStackpole?

4/21/13:
Ro here, and we're moving right along from the fun disaster that is the Jedi Academy trilogy to I, Jedi by Michael A. Stackpole. This is not one that I read as a child. Mostly because it didn't actually feature any of the main characters from the movies. I did pick this book up fairly early on, right after it came out in paperback I think. But I bought it without reading the description. It had a picture of Luke and Artoo on the cover for goshdarnsakes!! After I figured out it wasn't actually about either of them (or any of the other main characters I knew and loved) I put it back among my other, very well loved Star Wars novels and didn't give it another thought. After the frustration with the Rogue Squadron series, I can't say I'm stupendously excited to read more of Michael A. Stackpole. But I'm giving it a go. Because it's Star Wars. And Es and I promised to do this together. And maybe it'll be good. Even without the main characters I know and love...

Esme's Two Cents: I remember my friend Kate loving Stackpole as a kid. She was a huge fan of Mirax Horn (nee Terrik) for a lot of the same reasons I'm a huge fan of Mara Jade: sassy, independent business woman. My hope with I, Jedi was that I would be won over by the Mirax/Corran romance. I don't remember making it that far into this one as a kid but I do remember that Mara's in it, and that's always a huge selling point with me.

The kind of iJedi I much prefer...

Ro's Predictions for I, Jedi

1.) Someone major dies, but the main character moves on quickly.
2.) There's lots of action.
3.) Lots of women squabble over Corran Horn.
4.) That's all I got, so let's do this thing!

Esme's Predictions for I, Jedi

1) Mara will turn up and be awesome! Possibly alongside Mirax as a kind of spy/businesswomen badass duet.
2) The writing will be hard to read but the interesting plotline will make it bearable.
3) A lot of women squabble over The Horn (total copycat move - sorry, Ro ^_^).
4) The mystery will not, as such, baffle me til the very end. I kind of expect to have it solved by then

UPDATE 4/28/13: Well, this book was short lived for both Es and I. We've decided to put it down and replace it with the Dark Empire trilogy instead. This will be an interesting experience I think, the Dark Empire books being the first Star Wars graphic novels we've read for our blog project. In it, a clone of the Emperor threatens the galaxy with terrible weapons called World Devastators, and Luke finally gives into hate and anger and goes to the Dark Side.

Luke Skywalker giving in to the Dark Side.

We'll be putting up a post dedicated specifically to Dark Empire very soon, so let's get back to why I, Jedi just didn't work out. As I wrote above a week ago, I already had reservations about Stackpole's ability to write anything resembling a good book after our experience with the Rogue Squadron series. Of which, granted, we did only read the first book. But one was enough, and clearly that goes for all Stackpole books. I was only able to get through 65 pages of I, Jedi. I'm not sure how far Es got, but I'm pretty sure it was farther than that, for which I applaud her. This was not an easy book to stay with, even for just 65 pages. After that amount of time, all I knew was that Corran Horn's wife was missing, she couldn't be located using the Force (Luke Skywalker makes a cameo to inform us of this, and of Corran's impressive, latent Jedi power), and Corran is worried. After 65 pages. Oh, and that Corran has startling green eyes. This part really irked me. So far, I, Jedi is the only Star Wars book we've read that's in the first person. A bit unusual, but it could be done if the book was written really well. However, this was not. And that point was proven in the first 20 pages when Corran describes his own "startling green eyes" in the narrative twice. As silly and ridiculous as it sounds getting angry over something as insignificant as eye color, this really bothered me. A good writer would figure out how to show or describe eye color in the first person some other way. And other than his "startling green eyes," we don't actually know what the rest of Corran looks like, except at one point he's encouraged to grow a beard and change his hair color. From what to what, I don't know.

The above rant over a character's description is only one part of the frustration of Stackpole's writing, but I think it's pretty descriptive of this writer's inability to focus on the bigger picture of what's going on outside of Corran Horn and his green eyes. Stackpole seems so focused on Corran, he can't give us any more plot than the very basic "Corran decides he wants to have kids (a major stresser between Corran and Mirax before the book starts), finds out his wife is missing, and agonizes about it" plot line. In 65 pages (out of a more than 500 page book), I was sort of hoping for more. But as usual, Stackpole did not deliver, and Es and I have decided to move on to much more interesting EU stories. Sorry Mr. Stackpole, we didn't mean to slam you so hard. But really, after two very frustrating tries, I think I'm personally done with you.

Esme's Two Cents: My issues with Stackpole kind of dovetail with my issues with KJA. I need a narration that isn't overshadowed by the author's voice. I need characters who talk like actual people, not like flowery, over-dramatic caricatures.

In short, I need Zahn!

In other news, cannot wait for this book!!!!

No, but seriously, after having the same experience with two authors in a row, I'm wondering how many more of these books we'll have to wade through before we find the quality of writing that will bring our beloved characters back to life. Will Barbara Hambly, Vonda McIntire, or Kristine Katherine Rusch (huh, lots of WOMEN coming up all of a sudden) be the answer to our desperate pleas? We did both enjoy
Kathy Tyers ...

Well, here's hopin'! Now on to Dark Empire!

Oh ... come on, really?

I'm pretty sure Ro and I are on the same page at this point when it comes to the Jedi Academy Trilogy so

"I've Sithed my pants. My diaper's gone over to the
Dark Side. I've got pages of these, I could go on..."

I'm gonna go ahead and explore the "oh, dear" that is Kevin J. Anderson's series.

As Ro put it when she texted me last week, this series is compulsively readable. It's terrible but you just have to know how it ends. For me, it's like really bad chocolate. I know it's bad, I know I'll get a tummy ache, but I can't stop eating it!

To begin with, there's the totally ambiguous narrator. Throughout the series, Anderson's own voice is all over the narration, divulging information that the character whose POV it's supposed to be has no way of knowing. The fluidity of POV makes the author's voice that much more jarring. The easiest place to see this bleed is any time we're supposedly getting Jacen and Jaina's POV. The kids are two - they're not going to know that an evil Sith spirit has hurt their uncle; they're not going to know that they're in the city's lower levels; and they'r certainly not going to know that a ragged bunch of lower-city dwellers are actually Old Republic political exiles. But during the narration, all these facts are shared with the reader. I find this completely shakes me out of the story because I'm so busy thinking, "There's a mysterious god-like voice telling me things. It doesn't fit into the story anywhere. Why can't I get some POV from an actual character?" I never got to be deeply involved with a character because there was so much authorial voice interfering with my immersion in the story.

Ha!

Another problem I had with the series was that I never really bought into the scenarios so they lacked impact. I mean, Admiral Daala goes nuts and destroys things. I get that she's emotionally scarred but she was also clever enough to get the attention of Grand Moff Tarkin. Someone that clever should have a much better idea of the importance of strategy. And she's been sitting around the Maw tirelessly maintaining her forces for eleven years - someone that patient should, logically, be more cautious with her forces. She's just ... kind of pointless.

Also ... Ro, did you notice how Admiral Daala bears a striking resemblance to Mara Jade? Red hair, green eyes, fiery traumatized-by-the-Empire spirit ... could we have been a bit more creative with physical features? This time around, I also noticed that Tionne, with her "silver-white hair," "willowy form," and memory for historical events seems an awful like like, oh, I don't know, Winter? Now I realize that TZahn is a tough act to follow but it's not that hard to come up with dramatic physical features that don't mimic his characters. Couldn't Daala have had - oh, to pick some features at random - raven-black hair and violet eyes? Tionne could have been non-human.

I want to say something - anything! - positive about this series. To be honest, though, I ended up skim-reading a lot of it. Given that I was still able to follow the plot without a problem, I clearly didn't miss much in doing so.

Very ready to move on. Give me hope, "I, Jedi" ....

Jedi Academy Trilogy: Do I still love KJA??

In Japanese! Admiral Daala is a cheerleader?

I belonged to the Kevin J. Anderson fan club when I was a kid. No, I mean literally. There was a fan club. I got special postcards sent to "Tessa Elizabeth Williams" (these were the days before I loved my first name as-is and had no proper middle name so I made up my own).

To be honest, I was a fan because of the Young Jedi Knights. Having reread them as an adult, I can say with certainty that they feel very, very different. On the one hand, I'm like, "Yikes!" On the other, I gave them to a very challenging student of mine last year who gobbled them up (up to the point where there was romance - then he got upset and demanded to know why I would give him a kissing book).

From "Darth Vader and Son" - everyone should own this book!

My hope is that I won't have the same adult reaction the the Jedi Academy Trilogy that I did last year to Young Jedi Knights. I hope that Luke doesn't seem like a moralizing and pedantic moron (my favorite Luke is the Farmboy, not the Jedi Master). I hope that I love Kyp Durron as much as I did then (mmm, there's trouble!). I hope that Mara's spontaneous arrivals and departures are as exciting to me now as they were when I was younger ("Look, look, it's Mara! Look, there she is!").

Fingers crossed! Let's get this party started, Yavin IV!

Tatooine's Ghost: or What Episode 1 Should Have Been

Who doesn't want a bantha plushie?!

 Having finished "Tatooine's Ghost" about two weeks ago, I've had time to process it. I have to say, I really enjoyed it. It was fun, fast paced, quirky, and romantic, all the things that make up a good Star Wars novel for me. But the part I loved most was that we see more of Anakin Skywalker's mother, Shmi. Through an audio diary, we hear her story after Anakin leaves, that of a mother torn between relief that her son is no longer a slave and worry that he's all right in the big, wide universe. I LOVE details like this! I wanted these journal entries to be Episode 1, instead of the horrific disaster that Lucas put forth. These parts of the story were my favorite, and I drank them up as slowly as I could to savor them.

Shmi Skywalker, definitely a devoted mother.

I also loved how Troy Denning helps Leia come to terms, at least a little, with the fact that Darth Vader, or actually Anakin Skywalker, was her father. And was once an innocent child who loved his mother, his friends, and working with machines. Not to mention the fastest human podracer ever! (I love Han's reaction to this information - total disbelief. Clearly keeping with Han's if-I-didn't-see-it-it-must-not-have-existed/happened personality.) It's hard to think of evil people as innocent children once. To learn that they had parents who loved them and cared for them (not always, sometimes it's the lack of parents that leads the child down the path to evil...). But in this case I really enjoyed reading about Leia's confused feelings as she discovers more about her grandmother and her father. Who wouldn't be confused, trying to tally Darth Vader with the beloved Anakin Skywalker? More than anything, this is what I wanted out of Episode 1. Which of course we fans didn't get. But Denning does an incredible job of writing his own version.


Kitster - so cute! He figures prominantly in "Tatooine's Ghost."

Es's Two-Cents
This novel didn't really get a fair read from me, I'll be honest and fair to it. About halfway through reading it, I had some serious stuff happen and it completely put me off reading of any sort for several weeks. By the time I got back to the book, I'd forgotten parts of it so I'm sure I don't have as clear an idea as I should about what happened (for example, did Leia and Han discover Leia was pregnant during the novels? The twins' conception during the Tatooine trip is implied - and hey, Han almost died, no judgment!- but I missed it completely if there was a big discover buried in there). Ro here: there was no implication. But lots of romance... Ooooo lala!

Having said that, I did enjoy it and look forward to more of Denning's good writing in the future. I liked that he put a bit of an adult spin on the characters that Zahn sometimes shies from (yes, Han and Leia are married, sexy business is happening) but I like how he doesn't turn their relationship into a soap opera-esque dramas-ville scenario either. It's incidental and helps the plot progress so it works.

I agree with you, Ro, the plot was quirky, fun, and fast-paced. My only real complaint was that this novel also didn't get as fair a reading from me because, having just finished "Scoundrels," which really is a heist novel, I couldn't help but compare the two.

Still, the mystery was well-derived and I liked that added weight that Shadowcast's network of spies added to the importance of the painting. In that vein, Denning also did a masterful job of implying the existence of Grand Admiral Thrawn without ever saying his name or, I believe, his rank. That was really clever.

Overall, good job, Mr. Denning!

An Ode to Wookiepedia

Smug Bothans...

Throughout this whole rereading/blogging experience, I've found myself logging on and looking Star Wars stuff up on Wookiepedia. Something I obviously didn't do as a kid (oh the joys and powers of imagination *cue Willy Wonka's Pure Imagination*). It's actually been extremely helpful as far as visualizing non-movie characters, places and objects. The wiki is helping to fill in gaps that my still limber, but not pure, imagination (go away Willy Wonka!) is struggling to concoct. I looked up the Bothans to see what they look like because, while mentioned in Return of the Jedi, we never actually see any Bothans. And they feature prominently in the Thrawn trilogy.

Sexy Squibs?

Not only does the wiki for Star Wars have drawings, pictures, and other visual aids for both movie and non-movie people, places, and things, they have details and histories that are super fascinating and add so much more depth to the books Es and I are currently reading. For example, in Tatooine's Ghost (which we're currently reading) there are aliens called Squibs (yeah, the Harry Potter Star Wars crossover is not lost on us...). They're described as small, furry, hyperactive, and very sketchy as far as loyalties lie. But what do they look like? The sketch here shows them as sort of ElfQuest (bonus points to people who know what I'm talking about!) catlike aliens. Funny story, I totally pictured them looking like one of our cats. Anyway, I was able to go to Wookiepedia and do a search to find out what they look like. And so, this is my non-rhyming, not-even-written-like-a-poem Ode to Wookiepedia. I look forward to looking up many more interesting creatures, aliens, tech, and planets on the nerdiest of wikis!

Tatooine Ghost

This cover makes me want to visit Tatooine - that's a first!

Onward, upward! Or, as Han would say, "I have a bad feeling about this..."

Wait, what?

It's not that I don't think it will be interesting - everything I've read (all right, the flap copy, but still!) suggests that it's going to be an awesome new adventure. But I think part of what worries me is that it's new. This isn't a reread; it's a brand-new adventure by a brand-new author. Help!

When Ro and I started putting together our booklist, we negotiated and discussed which books we wanted to include. I had a couple of reasons for fighting for this one. First of all, it's a weird place in the series for a new book to be. A lot of the new stuff is post-Zahn trilogy, during the original trilogy, or pre-episode one. This one takes place right after the Thrawn trilogy and before ....

OMG. Ro!! I've screwed us up! This is what happens when I get cocky (right, Han? Right?).

So I've just had another look at the official Star Wars Novel Timeline (which apparently I didn't bother to read before). Turns out Tatooine Ghost comes right before the Thrawn trilogy.




The Official Star Wars novel chronological timeline - worth a read ^_^

Crap!

Ro, I'm so sorry! But since this is a problem that begs to be discussed, please post your thoughts about whether or not to continue with this novel or not below....

Ro's Input: Eh, no worries! I say let's read it! Mostly because I've already started it. And it's a new Star Wars book for me also. So we just have to remember to backtrack every time we wonder why there are no twins present, and why Mara Jade isn't swinging out of nowhere trying to slice Luke's head off. (As if that ever actually happened... heehee.) Plus I'm curious about Troy Denning and what he has to bring to the mix. So I say, let's go for it! I have almost no expectations for this book, and only expect to be entertained. Do we think Mr. Denning will be another Timothy Zahn. Of course not. But it'll still be a fun read! (I feel sort of bad for all of the other Star Wars authors, being held up to Timothy Zahn's brilliance. It's really not fair... But he set the bar so high!!).

Es's Input:

In that case, onward and upward!

The Thrawn Trilogy: how it rocked our early development

I love mash ups! Especially sci-fi ones.

Ro's Input

Here we are, months after starting the Thrawn trilogy. Exhausted from the space battles. Overwhelmed by the machinations. Thrilled with the triumphs. And most of all, remembering what made this trilogy so special when we were kids. At least, that's how I'm feeling. As I reread this trilogy, which I've done several times before, I focused on all the reasons I loved it the first time I read it. Like sitting in Es's basement, smelling the wood burning in the wood stove, eating chocolate chips, and talking about Mara, Luke, Leia, Han, and Chewie. What the twins would be like when they grew up. The treachery of the Bothans, and what the heck were they hiding in Mount Tantiss and why were they so scared of the New Republic finding it anyway? Hours and hours and hours outside in my back woods or Es's, playing Star Wars like we were a part of the universe. More than anything, this is what these books mean to me. They mean forming a friendship. They mean playing games in a vibrant imaginary universe. They mean childhood at its best. They also mean so much more than that because these are the books that Es and I formed our friendship with. Once we were done reading them, it was clear (to me anyway) we would be life long friends. We lost touch a few times, but always seemed to find each other in the end. Maybe it's the real version of the Force. Maybe it's just Fate. Or coincidence. It doesn't matter, actually. All that matters is that Es and I are friends. And this trilogy was the catalyst that got us to this point.

Es's Note: Ahhhhh!!!!!! Also, truuuuue!!!!!!!

Ahem, let the cheese flow. It must be the Valentine's vibes in the air... Right, let's get down to the hard core evaluation. I'm a dyed-in-the-wool Timothy Zahn fan and practically worship everything he's ever written. It's hard to find fault with his work. As an author, he's able to draw his readers into the story with tendrils and promises and mystery. His well-formed characters (and of course, the most amazing non-movie character ever, Mara Jade!) guide us through the story, and all of the twists and turns that Zahn sets up for them to trip over. I'm not going to analyze the books too much because to me, they are a reminder of so much more (though being well-written does not hurt at all). I'll leave the analyzing up to Es, who is so much better at it than I am anyway. I leave you, dear reader, with all the warm-fuzzy feels of childhood and turn it over to Es...

Es's Input

What can I possibly add to that? I've spent the last two years burried up to my nose in literary criticism so that's been foremost on my mind during the reading process (as is, I think, evidenced by my need to actually cite my work - who does that in a blog????). But Ro has really brought up the most important thing: our friendship began with this particular series. We read, we talked, and after what was frankly the rockiest start to a friendship that any two friends could possibly have, we found common ground and, what's more, that we both needed the friendship. Like Ro said, maybe that's the real nature of the Force. We were always going to be life-long friends - it's our destiny ^_^