Star Wars Shadow Games at BAM! (Sneak Peak)

[Base_Delta_Zero]

So, my local Borders went away, as they all did, but lo and behold! BAM moves in and takes up shop in the same building...using the same shelving...with the same layout...the same prices...the same deals...and the same books...WTF?

Maybe I'm missing something about their business plan here, but how is being identical to Borders going to succeed better than Borders? I don't get it. I mean, I'm happy. I love books and was afraid there wouldn't be a good bookstore in Southern Maine any more after Borders imploded, but I hope BAM doesn't go the same way.

Anyway, a few days ago, while perusing their shelves (which are set up purely by author within broad topics, so all of the Star Wars books are scattered throughout the Sci-fi section, which is stupid), I spot a Star Wars paperback I've never heard of called Shadow Games by Michael Reaves, so I pick it up. Turns out it wasn't supposed to be on the shelves until the 29th! Once I brought it to the register, the manager said he had to sell it to me, but pulled the rest of them. Sweet! Ten day jump on everyone else!

I'm about a third of the way through and can put a review up in coming days if anyone is interested and wants a heads up before they go out and buy it.

 

[sojourner]

BAM?

 

[Lieut. Arex]

BAM: "Books-a-Million", the nation's second largest bookstore chain, based in Birmingham, AL, now expanding into the northeastern and western U.S. after taking over the leases of several former Borders locations.

 

[JD]

I'm very curious to here some thoughts on this one. It's one I've been wanting to read since they first announced it a while back. They actually did a poll on the official Star Wars site that let the fans pick the title for this one.

 

[sojourner]

BAM: "Books-a-Million", the nation's second largest bookstore chain, based in Birmingham, AL, now expanding into the northeastern and western U.S. after taking over the leases of several former Borders locations.

Ah, of course, we have those here.

 

[Set Harth]

BAM!

 

[Base_Delta_Zero]

So, I've passed the half-way mark and will share some thoughts on the story thus far:

Michael Reaves (Coruscant Nights Trilogy) co-authored Shadow Games with Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff (never heard of her).

If you've read the CN trilogy, you'll feel like this book is a continuation, only with the characters' names being changed, as it reads almost exactly like the trying too hard sci-fi noir from that series.

It's not bad, really. At least I haven't hurled it across the room like the Fate of the Jedi books, and I didn't just give up, like I did after Jedi Twilight (CN Book 1), but it's definitely eye-roll-inducing at times with the super-low key plot and cheesy dialogue.

The story follows Dash Rendar from Shadows of the Empire prior to the events of that book/game. I was never really a fan of Rendar, as he always felt like a Han Solo wannabe, and what's amusing is that's how he is perceived by other characters in Shadow Games and an image he's trying to overcome.

Instead of the one-note smuggler character he was in SOTE, here he is portrayed as, essentially, a reluctant detective with a dour alien teras kasi (Star Wars kung-fu) master and sarcastic robot as sidekicks. His ship, Outrider, is in the shop after a mishap during the prologue and he gets dragged into a mystery plot in order to make enough money to pay for the repairs.

I won't go blow by blow and spoil every little thing that happens in the story, but I would like to point out that this is another of those EU books that seems hell-bent on making the Star Wars galaxy as small and incestuous as possible, what with the constant references to, cameos by and plots revolving around people, places and events from the OT.

Do I regret buying it? No, it's OK and the lack of Jedi or post-NJO insanity is a definite plus. The Dark Times/Rebellion/OT period of Star Wars is the most interesting to read about, from my perspective, but of all the cantinas in all the hives of scum and villainy in all the galaxy for Dash to walk into, why did he have to walk into Mos Eisley Cantina?

Seriously. Anyplace else would have been more interesting.

I'll check back in the next day or two, once I finish, to tell you whether it ends well or fizzles.

 

[ATimson]

Michael Reaves (Coruscant Nights Trilogy) co-authored Shadow Games with Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff (never heard of her).

She's written some books on her own, and also coauthored (according to the acknowledgements & interviews, not the cover) the third CN book and the forthcoming fourth CN book.

 

[Set Harth]

Re: thread title

The word you're looking for is spelled PEEK, not peak.

To say "sneak peak" doesn't make sense - unless one is talking about, for example, a new mountain which suddenly appeared in a mountain range while no one was looking. Or dosing somebody.

 

[Cicero]

So, my local Borders went away, as they all did, but lo and behold! BAM moves in and takes up shop in the same building...using the same shelving...with the same layout...the same prices...the same deals...and the same books...WTF?

Books-A-Million bought one to two dozen profitable Borders stories, inventory and all. Weirdly, Barnes & Noble ended up owning the actual Borders trademark (and the store website and customer database).

 

[Starbreaker]

Funny. There aren't any Borders around here, but the Books-A-Million tanked when Barnes & Noble moved across the street.

 

[Base_Delta_Zero]

Re: thread title

The word you're looking for is spelled PEEK, not peak.

To say "sneak peak" doesn't make sense - unless one is talking about, for example, a new mountain which suddenly appeared in a mountain range while no one was looking. Or dosing somebody.

Wow, really helpful. Thank you for posting this scintillating bit of info about a spelling mistake that was immediately obvious once posted but which I could not correct after the fact. I'm glad we have you around to police the interwebs for all teh spellsing errorz.

 

[Base_Delta_Zero]

Anyway, back to the topic at hand.

Finished the book this morning and I'd say the authors pulled it out in the end. The story switched from detective novel to spy novel/shoot 'em up in the last 100 pages or so, but it was fairly well done and exciting. Not to mention, I was getting pretty tired of the detective novel bits.

I'll reiterate that there was way too much OT and PT referencing going on for my tastes, though. For such a huge galaxy, we see and hear about people, places and things from Tatooine, Alderaan and Coruscant all too often, with only a handful of unique settings/characters.

If you've roleplayed at all, especially with Star Wars, the book felt a lot like a GM who didn't feel comfortable enough coming up with his own story using just the backdrop of Star Wars, so he took a few kool NPCs/plots he'd come up with for AD&D, changed their names, and sprinkled them in with plenty of the old standbys from the movies.

I'd recommend the book if you're obsessed with Star Wars or really like these authors, as it all feels very safe and familiar. There's not really much to it beyond that.

I would be interested in discussing the book further with anyone, especially if you get a chance to read it. I’m curious about others opinions on this book and others by the same authors. Spoiler code warnings, of course.

 

[JD]

Would you like this if you liked the MedStar duology? Because I really liked that when I read it during the lead up to ROTS.

 

[Base_Delta_Zero]

Oh, I think so, yes. I didn't particularly care for Medstar, myself, as the PT era is less interesting to me overall, but I still enjoyed Shadow Games well enough. If you liked Medstar, I'd say you'd probably like SG more than I did, actually.