Worst EU NOVEL

[Coiler]

I've just read Darth Maul: Shadow Hunter. That POS book is now my least favorite EU novel. An outcome that is never in doubt due to it preceding TPM, idiotic and contradictory characterization, and general bad writing makes it easily the worst EU novel I've read.

[Guardsman Bass]

I also blame KJA, not for poor writing I did not mind reading his books, but for starting the whole “Bigger, Bader and Better” scenario. The whole super-weapon of the week, made me sick. And the concept of the “Suncrusher” using a Torp too take out a sun, was plainly painful.

What's even more irritating about it is that it's not like KJA was lacking for subject material - he had the whole issue of setting up and running a Jedi Academy to work with, plus that idiot Daala running around (hell, you could probably combine the events of the Jedi Academy Series and Darksaber into the same series, or even one book). Instead, he decided to do this whole stupid thing with the Suncrusher.

I know a lot of people hate I,Jedi, but Stackpole, in my opinion, did a much better job of showing the development of the Jedi Academy in half a book than KJA did in three.

. After all, Stackpole was the guy who actually had to beg his readers to buy more of his books to be able to pay his rent, a telling (if pathetic) episode.

What? Tell me more of this. Feed my Stackpole hate.

Mwahaha. Oh man, you'll love this then. After all, 'tis better to show than tell.

That's unusually blunt for a well-published author. There are a lot of better fantasy and sci-fi authors who would love to sell 250,000- 750,000 copies of a franchise's book, or even 30,000 copies of their own books. Did Stackpole just not manage his money or contracts that well?

That said, from what I've read, I wouldn't be surprised if his original novels didn't sell that great, aside from the name recognition favoritism for his franchised novels. The DragonCrown Series (of which the Dark Glory War is only the first installment) was nothing to write home about aside from the first book as mentioned as above (and even that went to shit in the last 40-50 pages). The other books in the series just got progressively worse, in my opinion, until the last book (The Grand Crusade) was just appallingly bad.

I'll second Darksaber for a worthless SW book. Aside from bad characters, generally bad plot, and so forth, the book was just utterly unnecessary; KJA could have easily combined it into the Jedi Academy Trilogy. The only bright side (which I enjoyed the most) were the Bevel Lemelisk sections, where you got to see him bitch at the incompetence of his employers.

I would nominate Karen Traviss's Bloodlines, but I didn't finish. The thing that really bugged me, though, is that she is terrible at giving characters their own unique "voices" within the story and the dialogue; they all sounded like Karen Traviss talking with unfunny sarcasm.

[Ashka Boda]

Either Tatooine Ghost or The Force Unleashed... I can't make up my mind. Probably TFU, if I absolutely had to pick one.

I have to say, though, I haven't finished Wild Space yet, but so far it blows like a hurricane. It's drawn out, boring, overly dramatic and absolutely pointless, not to mention all the mind-blowing continuity fuck-ups.

Did I miss a meeting? Since when does Anakin Skywalker become a Jedi Knight a few weeks into the war? Isn't Jedi Trial set six months before ROTS? I could understand if they wanted to move it a little, but to change something this major by a margin of two and a half years is just insane. And does this mean that the entire The Clone Wars series is supposed to happen in the first months of the Clone Wars? That Anakin was training a padawan almost from the outset of the war? God, I hope they kill Tano in some incredibly excruciating way. I mean, killing her is the only way to fix all this.

How could someone write a SW novel and not be informed of the Eeth Koth debate? And didn't they eventually decide to kill the guy at Geonosis, like the DK book said? It pisses me off, the incredibly small amount of fact-checking required to get stuff like this wrong. Who is this Miller woman, anyway? The back page photo makes her look like a sassy suburban Illinois hausfrau, and the text says that she's written SG1 novels. Are they picking these people off the streets now? The book is dedicated to Ewan McGregor, of all people... although it could have been worse. It could have been dedicated to Hayden Christensen... or Jake Lloyd.

[Kurgan]

Dark Saber. I didn't so much hate it, as was just really disappointed by it. I didn't actively HATE any of the SW novels I read back in those days, but then I guess my standards were pretty low, and I deliberately avoided any of the books that got really bad reviews from fans around me.

Back in the day (pre-1997) I felt I OWED it to myself to read each Star Wars novel I came across. Now I don't even care.

[Crazedwraith]

Either Tatooine Ghost or The Force Unleashed... I can't make up my mind. Probably TFU, if I absolutely had to pick one.

Interesting. Prior to this I'd heard nothing but good things about this one. Whats so bad about it? Or Did Dark Nest turn everyone against all Dennings work?

[Guardsman Bass]

Dark Saber. I didn't so much hate it, as was just really disappointed by it. I didn't actively HATE any of the SW novels I read back in those days, but then I guess my standards were pretty low, and I deliberately avoided any of the books that got really bad reviews from fans around me.

Back in the day (pre-1997) I felt I OWED it to myself to read each Star Wars novel I came across. Now I don't even care.

I actually felt the same way a long time back. I made a list of all the Star Wars novels, and started down that list, including following the chronology (I read all the way from the Han Solo novels to Vector Prime without interruption).

[Darth Yan]

tattoine ghost is a god idea but i kind of skimmed through it. the parts i read weren't overly bad though

[Coyote]

Going through this, I'm glad I gave up on the EU long ago. It seems like almost everything has been mentioned...

[Jade Falcon]

I actually felt the same way a long time back. I made a list of all the Star Wars novels, and started down that list, including following the chronology (I read all the way from the Han Solo novels to Vector Prime without interruption).

Ditto here, I gave up at Vector Prime.

[Coiler]

I actually felt the same way a long time back. I made a list of all the Star Wars novels, and started down that list, including following the chronology (I read all the way from the Han Solo novels to Vector Prime without interruption).

I read everything up to Vision of the Future, skipped right to TUF, then swore not to read anything that occurred after that chronologically. If the reviews of LotF are any indication, I made a good choice.

[Darth Hoth]

I read through everything from Marvel Star Wars up to the Dark Nest trilogy. Nothing set after that, or during the Traviss-dominated Clone Wars, is of any concern to me, other than as objects of hatred. I admit to becoming mildly interested in LotF, briefly, but YodaKenobi's review at TFN thankfully changed my mind.

[Kurgan]

I will admit I haven't read everything in that period I mentioned either.

About the only EU novel series I have any interest in reading at this point is the "Han Solo Trilogy" (the original one), though one of my best friends (a hardcore Star Wars junkie at the time) told me even he couldn't get through them all, as they were rather boring.

But I do have a slight interest in seeing how "Star Wars was imagined" back in the early days, before all of the Lucas revisionism and the explosion of the EU materials, and since I've already read Splinter of the Mind's Eye and Zahn's early trilogy, and the movie novelizations... what's left? Maybe the Lando Calrissian books. But, despite all this, my backlog of reading lists includes a lot of stuff I'd rather read than some Star Wars EU. I think I've gotten my "fill" of that literature, perhaps to last a lifetime.

[Batman]

Your friend is a moron. Daley's Han Solo trilogy is one of the highlights of the EU and stands head and shoulders above most of the stuff written post TTT.

[Kurgan]

Well, to be fair, he told me this back in the summer of 1997, so he was judging it based on what was out at the time (he had just about everything).

If you're right, that's encouraging, if I ever get the time to read 'em.

[Jade Falcon]

Even the newer Han Solo trilogy isn't that bad.

[Pelranius]

Even the newer Han Solo trilogy isn't that bad.

Bria Tharen really got on my nerves though. Wasn't sorry to see her go in the last book, if you're referring to Crispin's work.

[Ashka Boda]

Either Tatooine Ghost or The Force Unleashed... I can't make up my mind. Probably TFU, if I absolutely had to pick one.

Interesting. Prior to this I'd heard nothing but good things about this one. Whats so bad about it? Or Did Dark Nest turn everyone against all Dennings work?

I actually didn't mind Dark Nest so much, but Denning has a kind of shallow, pulpy sensibility that I don't really care for. In Star By Star, it was okay to be really grandiose and epic like he always is, but Tatooine Ghost is about finding a painting, for God's sake, even though Denning tried to justify the whole thing by saying an encryption key or something was hidden in it.

That wasn't my main problem with it, though. The story was completely disjointed, almost like it was improvised as he was writing it. It had the feel of a badly edited work of fanfiction.

If someone shot Denning right now, it would probably be for killing off Anakin Solo, which I actually thought was pretty cool. What I feel he should be shot for was creating Jae Juun, Tarfang and those pesky Squibs, the five most pretentiously irritating and unfunny comic relief characters Star Wars has ever seen, and that's going up against some pretty stiff competition.

[Guardsman Bass]

Denning had no choice on the death of Anakin Solo - it was an order from the top, apparently, in the Lucas-related company.

[DrMckay]

Why kill him though? "For teh gritty?" As annoying as the Solo kids were, I liked Anakin's struggle with being named after his grandfather.

If anything, Philosopher-boy (Jacen) shoulda been the one to get it in the neck, showing that they were truly at war, and tempting the surviving siblings to the Dark Side. Jacen was an idiot.

Also, can someone please explain the killing Chewie in Vector Prime? Was that for "Teh Gritty as well?"

[Eleas]

Also, can someone please explain the killing Chewie in Vector Prime? Was that for "Teh Gritty as well?"

It was, basically. It was felt that they wanted Chewie to "go out fighting," if I recall correctly, so to end that character and introduce a whole new chapter for the Star Wars universe, they chose for an author... R.A. Salvatore.

Yeah.

[DrMckay]

he didn't go out fighting, he died by act of plot...

[Guardsman Bass]

Also, can someone please explain the killing Chewie in Vector Prime? Was that for "Teh Gritty as well?"

It was, basically. It was felt that they wanted Chewie to "go out fighting," if I recall correctly, so to end that character and introduce a whole new chapter for the Star Wars universe, they chose for an author... R.A. Salvatore.

Yeah.

It wasn't a bad introductory novel, if I recall correctly (I've read worse in the EU), but I would hardly count having a moon fall down on him "going out fighting".

As for Anakin Solo, didn't Lucas himself actually ask for that, because he thought people might confuse Anakin Solo with his Anakin?

[Eleas]

It wasn't a bad introductory novel, if I recall correctly (I've read worse in the EU), but I would hardly count having a moon fall down on him "going out fighting".

Actually, I have to agree. In fact, I'd rate it as the best I've seen of Salvatore's work (although that's not saying much; I haven't read much more than the wretched Demon Apostle novel, plus some choice excerpts of Drizzt wankery). The problem isn't that Salvatore wrote a novel, it's that they chose an author like Salvatore to set the tone for a new era of Star Wars in the first place, and one that gambled a lot with the Star Wars formula to boot. You want a spectacular writer for that, not a second- or third-rate one.

[Guardsman Bass]

James Luceno probably would have been a better choice (although I don't know if Lucasbooks had even heard of him at that point). He writes pretty good "transition" Star Wars novels, like Labyrinth of Evil (which was pretty much a set-up for Revenge of the Sith).

[Havok]

As for Anakin Solo, didn't Lucas himself actually ask for that, because he thought people might confuse Anakin Solo with his Anakin?

As I recall it, yes. We are obviously too stupid to figure it out.