I am not sure this is the right thread, but why do people like Zahn so much? I felt that he and KJ Anderson locked EU into a fairly uninteresting narrative.
For me the restart of the SW novels Zahn did was a big deal. In this product saturated era it's hard to imagine the desert that SWlit was pre 'Heir'. I liked it so much I picked up his Conquerors novels too, which are O.K. There was HUGE excitement at the time.