I don't remember Shadows of the Empire being so bad. It's been at least 10 years since I read it, and I was 14 at the time, so there you go. But then, I was more interested in the characters and what they were up to between V and VI to really care about the quality of writing.
Your son might enjoy Shadows for the very same reason. It's certainly no match for Zahn's books, but it's entertaining.
People will probably curse my name for this, but by the end of the New Jedi Order, I was very angry. Very angry. All the deaths and destruction for what? What?
They killed one of the Solo kids for goodness sake.
As everyone else has, I whole heartedly recommend all of Zahn's novels (eight at the moment), even the non-Star Wars ones.
Only SW book I really dislike, when I read it, was The Truce at Bakura, possibly one of the Clone Wars ear novels (I still have a number of them to read however).
One last thing, all of this is based on when I originally read the books, which I did as they came out. That's a span of fifteen or so years, I've never re-read any of them, so there's no teling what I would think of them now.
BrooklynKnight said:
I know R.A. Salvatore did the opening hardcover for New Jedi Order but i'm not sure if he did anything else.
By the way, he also wrote the novelization of Episode 2. Speaking of which, I'd recommend all of the prequel novelizations, since they're lacking most of the weaknesses of the movies (as I see them of course).
horacethegrey said:
Examples being Grand Admiral Thrawn (quite possibly the best Star Wars antagonist ever)
I've got most of the Star Wars novels but have only read a fraction of them and definitely not in order (unless it's a trilogy or such of books). And have skipped quite a few in the timeline. I've enjoyed Tim Zahn's books as well as those by Aaron Allston and Mike Stackpole (great guys if ya ever get to meet them!!!) The only book I put down was Matthew Stover's book, Traitor. What I read of it, all they were doing was torturing Jacen Solo. Nothing else. Just. Torturing. Him. Got tedious real quick. IMO, even Courtship Of Princess Leia was better.
The only book I put down was Matthew Stover's book, Traitor. What I read of it, all they were doing was torturing Jacen Solo. Nothing else. Just. Torturing. Him. Got tedious real quick. IMO, even Courtship Of Princess Leia was better.
Heretic. Seriously, how far did you get? At the thirty page mark or so, the dynamic changes dramatically. [sblock]Jacen overcomes the physical torture, so Vergeie starts forcing him to question his values and views towards the force[/sblock] It has some brilliant character development (by franchise sci-fi standards) and has by far the most interesting perspective on the force of any of the Star Wars novels.
Heretic. Seriously, how far did you get? At the thirty page mark or so, the dynamic changes dramatically. [sblock]Jacen overcomes the physical torture, so Vergeie starts forcing him to question his values and views towards the force[/sblock] It has some brilliant character development (by franchise sci-fi standards) and has by far the most interesting perspective on the force of any of the Star Wars novels.
I'm going to go a little against the grain here. I disliked the Thrawn stories. If you've ever been annoyed by a DM's pet NPC, Thrawn will push the same buttons. Hard.
Of course, chances are your kid is too young and inexperienced to have the same baggage I have in that respect.
Seriously, how far did you get? At the thirty page mark or so, the dynamic changes dramatically. [sblock]Jacen overcomes the physical torture, so Vergeie starts forcing him to question his values and views towards the force[/sblock] It has some brilliant character development (by franchise sci-fi standards) and has by far the most interesting perspective on the force of any of the Star Wars novels.
