Star Wars: Scoundrels Talkback

[JME2]

So has anyone else read Zahn's latest novel?

I read it at my local library branch two weeks ago and I really enjoyed it.

With his love of twists anda turns, Zahn's perfectly suited to the caper genre. I love the Ocean's Trilogy, so I felt right at home as he melded Steven Soderbergh with George Lucas.

Zahn's characterization of Han is also pretty much what we saw in Allegiance. If anything, it's a nice lead-in to the first Hand of Judgement novel, as Han was contemplating his own allegiance (or lack therof) to the Alliance -- and more importantly, Leia. The Han of Scoundrels is glad he made the choice to go back to save Luke at Yavin. But his priority is still to pay off Jabba, not to fall in with his new comrades. It's also interesting to see Han assume a leadership role in a field he has no experience in. It's a nice prelude to his becoming General Solo by the time of the Endor mission.

Best of all, it's a stand-alone novel with no ties to the Thrawn narrative.

[Adam Reynolds]

How does he handle the Lando-Han angle with regard to ESB?

[JME2]

How does he handle the Lando-Han angle with regard to ESB?

Spoiler

Lando gets dragged in without Han's knowledge (I can't say how without giving away too much). Lando admits that while he's still mad at Han, he's come around to believing that Han also got screwed at Ylesia.

Still, here's an uneasy peace between them and things go sour again by the end of the book.

[Adam Reynolds]

Having now read this myself I have to agree that it really was an excellent hybrid of the heist genre with Star Wars overall. I especially liked the double cross element, though I am not usually a fan of the overuse of the character that was behind it. One little thing that bugged me however was that Kell Tanier as the demolitions man seemed like he would have been far too young to be involved in the story at that point given that he was roughly 20 as of . In addition in Wraith Squadron I thought he was stated to have gained demolition experience as a commando after Endor. In addition it just felt too convenient using a known character, though with all of the new various thief characters that had to be added I can see why he went with a known character for that role.

[zman]

I enjoyed it allthough 2 things bothered me

1. I hate how it took place in between A New Hope and Empire. There really wasn't any reason why they couldn't have made it before A New Hope. I always felt like there had been a period of maybe a few years before Han and Lando met again in Empire. But now it seems like at most it was a few months.

2. I hate the twist at the very end. I saw it coming but there was no reason to put that character in the book.


I still prefer Mercy Kill to this one but it was still a lot of fun.

[The Dark]

I enjoyed it allthough 2 things bothered me

1. I hate how it took place in between A New Hope and Empire. There really wasn't any reason why they couldn't have made it before A New Hope. I always felt like there had been a period of maybe a few years before Han and Lando met again in Empire. But now it seems like at most it was a few months.

2. I hate the twist at the very end. I saw it coming but there was no reason to put that character in the book.


I still prefer Mercy Kill to this one but it was still a lot of fun.

Re: 1: Han's motivation would have needed to change if it was significantly prior to ANH; the loss of the glitterstim happened less than a year before the Battle of Yavin, based on the timing of events in Rebel Dawn. Between then and the start of ANH was the prison breakout of Zann at Kessel. It could still be done (I can't see Han Solo Trilogy-era Solo turning down a get-rich-quick scheme), but using the debt to Jabba helps it tie in to the average fan.

Re: 2: I agree.

[FaxModem1]

Just read the book over the past week. It was a fun little caper book set in the Star Wars universe. I felt that the end could have ended a bit better, with us seeing what happened to every single one of the thief characters, as they all seemed interesting.

I liked the shout out to Indiana Jones during the climax.

[Adam Reynolds]

Re: 1: Han's motivation would have needed to change if it was significantly prior to ANH; the loss of the glitterstim happened less than a year before the Battle of Yavin, based on the timing of events in Rebel Dawn. Between then and the start of ANH was the prison breakout of Zann at Kessel. It could still be done (I can't see Han Solo Trilogy-era Solo turning down a get-rich-quick scheme), but using the debt to Jabba helps it tie in to the average fan.

Re: 2: I agree.

The issue with using the debt to Jabba was that ignoring the EU, in ESB it was clear that he still had the money and was wanting to leave to pay off Jabba at the beginning of the movie but was stopped by the Empire. It would have largely been better if it was before ANH in that this represented his previous attempt to try and pay off Jabba that failed and resulted in him working with Obi-Wan and Luke in ANH. However the issue there would have obviously been the Lando-Han problem which was another major issue with this story in terms of continuity as ESB implied it had been years since they had met.

Regarding the twist element, I agree as well, in a complete contradiction of myself. What I was actually referring to earlier was the fact that it was true to the genre rather than liking who he used.

[Thanas]

I loved the book and think it is the only star wars novel worth reading since Zahn's Allegiance / Choices of one. Zahn seems to be the only one whose dialogue has an OT feel to it. The plot was good as well and Zahn manages to create more interesting characters in one book than the rest of the EU did during the whole NJO arc.