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I've become somewhat jaded over the recent years. What's the opinion; are these books worth reading?

Labyrinth of Evil
Dark Lord
Survivor's Quest
Outbound Flight

Thanks.

There's been a few threads on this, especially recently. We may want to put a sticky up sometime with "Stardestroyer Denizens Rate the Novels" and let everyone comment & review as they see fit, then folks can come in and see for themselves.

Although I'd put money on it that "Crystal Star" would be universally voted the worst of the worst overall.

Well it depends. If your one of those kind of people like me that would be interested during the CWs. Ex. how Anikan got his scar, why Grivious caughs all the time in ROTS, what realy happened on Cato Nemodia. But there are other people that just like the movies' but you don't get as much detail out of that.

Don't know about DarkLord and OutboundFlight, but Labyrinth of Evil and Survivors Quest are decent reads.

At least for me.

The only one of those I've read is Survivor's Quest and although its readable its far from the best Zahn book out there. Not knowing your tastes its hard to say whether you'd like it.

Its probably best just to see if you can get it out of a libary, seeing as then if you don't like it you've omly wasted your time and not your money.

Sonnenburg wrote:I've become somewhat jaded over the recent years. What's the opinion; are these books worth reading?

Labyrinth of Evil
Dark Lord
Survivor's Quest
Outbound Flight

Thanks.

I haven't read Outbound Flight (it was only just published), but my advice is that you read read James Luceno's novels Labyrinth of Evil and Dark Lord.

Tiriol wrote:I found both Dark Lord and Labyrinth of Evil both quite excellent, although the latter had the normal problem with minimalism (Dark Lord didn't go much into detailed numbers except when counting Wookiee prisoners).

True, but James Luceno is, IMHO, one of the authors that best conveys SW (and he's not as minimalist as some other authors...).

I found both Dark Lord and Labyrinth of Evil both quite excellent, although the latter had the normal problem with minimalism (Dark Lord didn't go much into detailed numbers except when counting Wookiee prisoners).

Can't give an opinion either way about anything else, but I can second that James Luceno's prequel-era books are definitely worth reading. Labyrinth of Evil, the Revenge of the Sith novelization (if you haven't already read it) and Dark Lord make for a great trilogy of sorts.

Sonnenburg wrote:I've become somewhat jaded over the recent years. What's the opinion; are these books worth reading?

Labyrinth of Evil
Dark Lord
Survivor's Quest
Outbound Flight

Thanks.

Labyrinth: an okay set up to RoTS. Can be a bit moving to one set of Jedi to another, but ti does show some interesting bits in regards to Palpatine, Anakin, and Obi Wan, and how aware and unaware they are of the whole manipulation that Palps was pulling. Luceno can be a bit overwinded at times, but not too bad.

Dark Lord: Iffy. The Vader parts are excellent reading in regards to Anakin realizing he's not the agile mother he was.You get a better understanding of the Sith and Palpatine which are good, but the Jedi in this book are pointless and forgettable. Too bad they take up nearly half the book. The ending is a nice nod to RoTS.

Survivor's Quest: Can't say, been too long and while Zahn is still a good writer, I don't remember anything significant about this book, honestly.

Outbound Flight: Decent. A bit too much Thrawn wanking(significant honestly, basically Thrawn is using a garbage scow versus an ISD type fight and wins), but the C'boath parts are pretty good but for me, it doesn't add much to the character.

Sonnenburg wrote:I've become somewhat jaded over the recent years. What's the opinion; are these books worth reading?

Labyrinth of Evil
Dark Lord
Survivor's Quest
Outbound Flight

Thanks.

Yes, yes, yes, and I don't know (I haven't read it yet).

Labyrinth of Evil is the best SW novel I've read since Star by Star, and rather creative way of leading up to ROTS without making the *cough*Palpatine is Sidious*cough* revelation.

And the start of the relationship between Vader and Tarkin in Dark Lord is quite interesting as well.

Survivor's Quest is not in the same league as the other two, but it is a departure from the usual pre-NJO plot scheme, and it does stay with you.

I'd go with all four Chuck. Then again, I'm of the opinion that anything Zahn writes is worth the money, and I've heard good things about Dark Lord. Labyrinth of Evil was pretty good.

Personally I found Survivors Quest really dissapointing. Ever since AotC and RotS came out the EU story lines have been painfully written to back track on things that the movies contradicted. In the case of Survivors quest i found the use of Destroyer Droids annoying. The Chiss also annoyed me.

Labyrinth of Evil
Dark Lord
Survivor's Quest
Outbound Flight

This depends on what you expect of the books. All of them are decent Star Wars books, actually, but not above average sci-fi. In fact, no Star Wars book is above average sci-fi.

I have just completed Outbound Flight. Now, as a Star Wars EU book, it does stand above most of the rest, but as a Zahn book, it is definitely not up to his other works. HOWEVER, that being said, it is an excellent companion to Survivor's Quest. Not only does it answer everything having to do with Outbound Flight (well, almost everything), but we get to see Thrawn, Jorj Car'das and Jorus C'Baoth in action. There are also, near the end of the book, several startling revelations which are subtly placed in the dialogue, but which have pretty far-reaching implications in terms of the threads Zahn has woven throughout the EU.