Star Wars Books Thread

[kirk55555]

They've revealed a ton of new book covers and descriptions at Comic-Con today.
I always like backstory stuff so Cobalt Squadron could be interesting, and The Visual Dictionaries are usually pretty cool.

The Mace Windu comic and Thrawn adaptation look interesting. Of course this being Disney we get no adult books announced, except for another showing of Phasma and the (I'm starting to assume legally mandated) Episode VIII novelization. Disney hates getting money from adult books, apparently. Anyway, staying positive, I expect the comics to stay generally solid, and Phasma might be ok. I wish we were getting more normal books, but as long as Marvel keeps putting out good comics at least I'll still be getting some Star Wars to read (although that recent Star Wars/Aphra crossover was hot garbage, hopefully a rare misstep for the Marvel SW comics).

Unrelated to ComicCon, I just finished Rebel Rising. It was pretty good. I really wish they'd focused on her post-teenage years more (they ended up skipping from basically her 18th year until she was arrested, which was about 3 years) but what we got was interesting. The book definitely makes her relationship with Saw more clear, although it makes her desire to see her Dad in the movie make less sense. The book could have used a bit of streamlining, a few things were a bit repetitive, but overall it was a good book. Not as good as Ahsoka when it comes to non-general audience books, but pretty good (although I had to laugh when Jyn got the most YA of YA romances which then ended exactly as I expected, but I found it funny more then annoying).

If only Disney cared enough to give the other Rogue One cast members something like this. They were all older then Jyn and seemed to have interesting lives, epsecially Donnie Yen and his friend

 

[Tuskin38]

I'm curious to see how The Legends of Luke Skywalker will be presented. My guess is that they'll be a collection of tall tales and highly fictionalized accounts ("Luke Skywalker? I thought he was a myth!") but presented from an in-universe perspective.

I believe that was confirmed when the book was announced.

I'm interested in that 'Stromtroopers Beyond the Armour' book.

And most of the DK books. I love Cross-sections and Visual Guides

 

[JD]

The Mace Windu comic and Thrawn adaptation look interesting. Of course this being Disney we get no adult books announced, except for another showing of Phasma and the (I'm starting to assume legally mandated) Episode VIII novelization. Disney hates getting money from adult books, apparently. Anyway, staying positive, I expect the comics to stay generally solid, and Phasma might be ok. I wish we were getting more normal books, but as long as Marvel keeps putting out good comics at least I'll still be getting some Star Wars to read (although that recent Star Wars/Aphra crossover was hot garbage, hopefully a rare misstep for the Marvel SW comics).

Unrelated to ComicCon, I just finished Rebel Rising. It was pretty good. I really wish they'd focused on her post-teenage years more (they ended up skipping from basically her 18th year until she was arrested, which was about 3 years) but what we got was interesting. The book definitely makes her relationship with Saw more clear, although it makes her desire to see her Dad in the movie make less sense. The book could have used a bit of streamlining, a few things were a bit repetitive, but overall it was a good book. Not as good as Ahsoka when it comes to non-general audience books, but pretty good (although I had to laugh when Jyn got the most YA of YA romances which then ended exactly as I expected, but I found it funny more then annoying).

If only Disney cared enough to give the other Rogue One cast members something like this. They were all older then Jyn and seemed to have interesting lives, epsecially Donnie Yen and his friend

Well, if you're willing to suck it up and read a middle grade book, they did get Guardians of the Whills. I think the one reaction I saw to it was kind of meh, but it is better than nothing if you really want more Baze and Chirrut.
Yeah, it is a bit disappointing the only adult novel we're getting for Journey to TLJ, but I don't have a problem with YA or middle grade books, so I'm not to upset.

 

[kirk55555]

Well, if you're willing to suck it up and read a middle grade book, they did get Guardians of the Whills. I think the one reaction I saw to it was kind of meh, but it is better than nothing if you really want more Baze and Chirrut.
Yeah, it is a bit disappointing the only adult novel we're getting for Journey to TLJ, but I don't have a problem with YA or middle grade books, so I'm not to upset.

I'm kind of willing to give a pass to some YA books depending on subject and author, but I do draw an unmoving line at middle school books. Still, at this point I expect Disney to go for the easy money, producing as much sutff as cheaply as possibly for kids while throwing out 2 or 3 decent books for older people a year. It sucks and its a big fall from the pre-Disney years, but I'm getting used to it. Doesn't mean I won't complain sometimes, but I'm not longer remotely surprised or expect it to change. Selling things to dumb kids is both cheap and can be done with almost no effort. So, it makes sense that Disney exploits that instead of spending money on authors who write for people older then 10. Paying a lesser known writer to write a story book or a small middle school book has got to be cheaper then paying for a general audience or even YA book, even though the audiences for those probably match the size of the audience for kids books if not surpass them (since the older someone is the more likely they can buy their own stuff).

 

[WebLurker]

They've revealed a ton of new book covers and descriptions at Comic-Con today.
I always like backstory stuff so Cobalt Squadron could be interesting, and The Visual Dictionaries are usually pretty cool.

My wallet is going to suffer this fall. On my list are all comics (save for the Thrawn adaptation), the movie's novelizations, the Canto Bight anthology, the the Cobalt Squadron book (I also understand that this one has a guide book attached to it), the Phasma novel and comic, and possibly the Luke and Leia biographies, Stormtrooper book, and Rebel Files (when it's not in the spendy gift pack). I'll probably have to make choices for sanity's sake (not to mention to afford other comics and stuff, much less life's bare necessities), but we're sure not in the dark times of no Star Wars anymore.

The Mace Windu comic and Thrawn adaptation look interesting.

I want to read the former, not the latter so much (I'm not sure how retelling the novel in comic form would add to the story.)

Of course this being Disney we get no adult books announced, except for another showing of Phasma and the (I'm starting to assume legally mandated) Episode VIII novelization...

If I read the announcement correctly, that novelization is being written by Jason Fry, so there a good bet that it'll be a good novelization, if you're like me and collect that sort of thing.

Wasn't the Stormtrooper book an adult thing, though.

...although that recent Star Wars/Aphra crossover was hot garbage, hopefully a rare misstep for the Marvel SW comics).

Sad to hear that, since I love Doctor Aphra. (I guess, considering that the main Star Wars series is hit and miss, that a crossover with it might be more likely to be a weaker story?)

Unrelated to ComicCon, I just finished Rebel Rising. It was pretty good. I really wish they'd focused on her post-teenage years more (they ended up skipping from basically her 18th year until she was arrested, which was about 3 years) but what we got was interesting.

I wonder if they want to have space for future storytelling (like how Jyn is appearing in mini stories set in that era in the current Forces of Destiny TV show)?

The book definitely makes her relationship with Saw more clear, although it makes her desire to see her Dad in the movie make less sense.

She didn't originally wanted to see him. When recruited, she was blackmailed into helping ("We're up against the clock here, girl, so if there's nothing to talk about, we'll just put you back where we found you"). When Saw asks what she wants from all this, it's not to see her dad ("They wanted an introduction, they've got it. I'm out now. The rest of you can do what you want").

Rebel Rising is building up to a subplot in the novelization where we learn that Jyn hated her father for abandoning her and was trying to distance herself from him (hence why she says in the movie: "I like to think he's dead, makes things easier"). All she literally wanted was to finish the job she was being forced to do, so that she could take the fresh start the Rebels were offering her, make a new identity, and disappear from the whole thing. Her change of heart regarding her father happens over the course of the story as she learns more details about what really happened.

The book could have used a bit of streamlining, a few things were a bit repetitive, but overall it was a good book. Not as good as Ahsoka when it comes to non-general audience books, but pretty good (although I had to laugh when Jyn got the most YA of YA romances which then ended exactly as I expected, but I found it funny more then annoying).

Yeah, while I liked the idea of the family adopting her, that relationship didn't work that well. I did like how it showed us in part what Jyn was thinking of when she commented that the Rebels cause has brought her nothing but pain.

If only Disney cared enough to give the other Rogue One cast members something like this. They were all older then Jyn and seemed to have interesting lives, epsecially Donnie Yen and his friend

There is the aforementioned Guardian of the Whills book (which I will admit that I'm not interested in). Cassian Andor and K-2SO are also getting a one-shot comic in the near-future (which I'm marginally interested in).

 

[Tuskin38]

Sad to hear that, since I love Doctor Aphra. (I guess, considering that the main Star Wars series is hit and miss, that a crossover with it might be more likely to be a weaker story?)

yeah, it just wasn't very good.I like the Alphra comics, but this was just, not very Star Wars IMO.

 

[JD]

Paying a lesser known writer to write a story book or a small middle school book has got to be cheaper then paying for a general audience or even YA book, even though the audiences for those probably match the size of the audience for kids books if not surpass them (since the older someone is the more likely they can buy their own stuff).

None of the people that have written Star Wars books are little know, pretty much all of them have been popular, bestselling, and in some cases award winning authors. Just because you don't read there stuff, doesn't mean that there aren't a whole lot of other people who do. I just noticed that Mira Grant is writing one of the Canto Bight stories, I've been wanting to check out her Urban Fantasy stuff she writes as Seanan Maguire for a while now.

 

[kirk55555]

None of the people that have written Star Wars books are little know, pretty much all of them have been popular, bestselling, and in some cases award winning authors. Just because you don't read there stuff, doesn't mean that there aren't a whole lot of other people who do. I just noticed that Mira Grant is writing one of the Canto Bight stories, I've been wanting to check out her Urban Fantasy stuff she writes as Seanan Maguire for a while now.

I'm not going to bother argue about books made for people barely old enough to stay home alone without an adult. At some point people have to draw the line with trying to justify how young a demographic for a book can be before making the book generally irrelevant. But, I both don't want to start that argument again and don't feel like wasting a second of my time arguing about books literally made for 10-12 year olds.

 

[JD]

I don't really see what age range someone writes for has to do with how well known they are, Dr. Seuss is probably one of the most popular and famous writers ever, and he wrote for young kids who are just barely starting to read. Then of course there's also Roald Dahl, and a certain woman who wrote an incredibly popular series of kids' books about a boy wizard.
Some of the most famous and popular writers ever, wrote kids books.
Your constant condescending attitude towards anything that isn't an adult targeted books is just really starting to annoy the hell out of me. There are plenty of great stories out that that aren't made for adults.

 

[fireproof78]

I don't really see what age range someone writes for has to do with how well known they are, Dr. Seuss is probably one of the most popular and famous writers ever, and he wrote for young kids who are just barely starting to read. Then of course there's also Roald Dahl, and a certain woman who wrote an incredibly popular series of kids' books about a boy wizard.
Some of the most famous and popular writers ever, wrote kids books.
Your constant condescending attitude towards anything that isn't an adult targeted books is just really starting to annoy the hell out of me. There are plenty of great stories out that that aren't made for adults.

Some of my favorite books are in that demographic.

 

[Reverend]

Some of my favorite books are in that demographic.

Indeed, some of the all time classic works of literature are in that demographic. Let's see, off the top of my head: -

Gulliver's Travels
Robinson Crusoe
The Swiss Family Robinson
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
Grimm's Fairy Tales
Oliver Twist
A Christmas Carol
The Three Musketeers
A Journey to the Center of the Earth
Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Through the Looking-Glass
Little Women
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
Black Beauty
Pinocchio
Treasure Island
The Jungle Book

...and all that's just the 19th century. Shall we also include the 20th?...

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
Five Children and It
The Tale of Peter Rabbit
The Railway Children
The Wind in the Willows
The Secret Garden
Peter Pan
The Lost World
Pollyanna
The Hobbit
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
Charlotte's Web
To Kill a Mockingbird
Plus pretty much everything by Dr. Seuss or Roald Dahl

And all that's just from memory. I'm sure it's less than 1/10th of what's out there. Anyone who might suggest fiction aimed at children or teenagers is inherently inferior is just plain ignorant, bordering on wilfully illiterate. And that's just really, really sad.

 

[JD]

So did anyone pick up Inferno Squadron yet?
EDIT: Just finished reading Shattered Empire, and I enjoyed it quite a bit. Seeing the events right after RotS, and seeing how the Empire reacted was pretty interesting. Shara Bey was a cool lead, and her connection to Poe was a nice connection to TFA. The use of the big three was pretty good to, we got some nice page time for them and pretty clear idea what they were up to, but they didn't distract from Shara and her story.

 

[WebLurker]

So did anyone pick up Inferno Squadron yet?

I have it, but haven't had a chance to read much beyond the first couple chapters.

EDIT: Just finished reading Shattered Empire, and I enjoyed it quite a bit. Seeing the events right after RotS, and seeing how the Empire reacted was pretty interesting. Shara Bey was a cool lead, and her connection to Poe was a nice connection to TFA. The use of the big three was pretty good to, we got some nice page time for them and pretty clear idea what they were up to, but they didn't distract from Shara and her story.

Glad to hear you liked it. I didn't very much; I think the pacing was off.

 

[Reverend]

So did anyone pick up Inferno Squadron yet?

Yup. Only a few chapters in but already liking what I'm seeing. It's interesting to see that rather than go the 'Lost Stars' route of the good person trapped in a bad system, the protagonist here appears to be a true believer, fully indoctrinated and having no misgivings about it's methods whatsoever. I'm curious to see how that pans out and develops in both the book and the game.

One assumes that given this starting point, the only logical trajectories for her character arc are either towards doubt and disillusionment (possibly by a very long road) or even further into zealotry. I suspect maybe the former, because it seems the latter leads only to madness and they probably want people to at least like their new protagonist.

 

[Ithekro]

If she's going to become part of the First Order, than she's on the path to zealotry like General Hux a generation later.

 

[fireproof78]

So did anyone pick up Inferno Squadron yet?
EDIT: Just finished reading Shattered Empire, and I enjoyed it quite a bit. Seeing the events right after RotS, and seeing how the Empire reacted was pretty interesting. Shara Bey was a cool lead, and her connection to Poe was a nice connection to TFA. The use of the big three was pretty good to, we got some nice page time for them and pretty clear idea what they were up to, but they didn't distract from Shara and her story.

Is it after RotS or RotJ?

 

[The Wormhole]

So did anyone pick up Inferno Squadron yet?

I've ordered it, it's in the mail, and I could have it by tomorrow. Unfortunately, with the way the next week or so is looking for me, I don't think I'll be getting to it anytime soon.

 

[WebLurker]

Is it after RotS or RotJ?

Inferno Squadron picks up right after A New Hope (the first chapter tells the Battle of Yavin from the perspective of a TIE pilot).

Shattered Empire picks up right after Return of the Jedi (in fact, the last moments of the battle from the film are shown as the series begins).

 

[JD]

Yeah, that was supposed to be RotJ.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

I suspect maybe the former, because it seems the latter leads only to madness and they probably want people to at least like their new protagonist.

Not necessarily. There's enough soldier worship in American culture to really sell that angle in a protagonist whose intentions and/or cause are not necessarily honorable. It's extremely hard to do and most game developers try to avoid putting themselves in that situation (let's count the number of first person shooters set in the Vietnam War ) but it's not impossible. As in films and novels of the same type, it really just requires the protagonist mostly owning the fact that they're probably fighting for the wrong side and may or may not be even be a good person, but then adopts a "fuck it, I wanna LIVE!" approach and fights on anyway. The story becomes less about morality or empires or some broader mission and a lot more about "Holy crap, there's a million people trying to kill me and how the hell am I gonna get out of this one?!"