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Allston's a pro, no doubt about it. I'm not a tremendous fan of his writing, but I've got a lot of respect for the guy.

You want really impressive, though? John Ostrander and Jan Duursema, before embarking on their Legacy project, made a point to read the entire NJO series, Dark Nest, and the manuscripts of LotF. This is something that they didn't at all need to do-- hell, Duursema's "just" the artist-- but that kind of research and dedication shows. Three issues in the galaxy feels infintely more post-Vong War than Traviss's prequel 2.0 aesthetic in Bloodlines does.

000 wrote:Allston's a pro, no doubt about it. I'm not a tremendous fan of his writing, but I've got a lot of respect for the guy.

You want really impressive, though? John Ostrander and Jan Duursema, before embarking on their Legacy project, made a point to read the entire NJO series, Dark Nest, and the manuscripts of LotF. This is something that they didn't at all need to do-- hell, Duursema's "just" the artist-- but that kind of research and dedication shows. Three issues in the galaxy feels infintely more post-Vong War than Traviss's prequel 2.0 aesthetic in Bloodlines does.

They sure took a lot of flak for some of the things they did, but were definitely one of the more notable VIPs on the TF.N.

Lord Poe wrote:Here is the difference between a true author and a hack like Traviss:
+http://www.echostation.com/echo3/allston.htm

ES: How much research was necessary before you began to write?

AA: A lot. I wish I'd had time to do more. I read every Star Wars technical manual I could get my hands on, plus Stackpole's novels, Zahn's novels, other novels in which Wedge Antilles and Rogue Squadron make appearances, comic books, and several of West End's Star Wars game supplements. I watched the movie trilogy repeatedly. I played the X-Wing computer game. I bought eight of the Action Fleet toys and used them for measurements and estimations of their performance in atmosphere. I read books on aircraft carrier life and pilot survival.

And all that I consider a bare minimum of necessary research -- it was all the research I had time to do as my deadline came bounding toward me. I'll do an equal amount before I'm done with the second book, and even more before the third book is done.

Fortunately, I like to do research.

I dunno if he quite starrted out that way in the first novel or so, but you could definitely tell as you gradually read eacho fhis books that there was changes, and he got away from alot of the crpa Stackpole pulled tech-wise (best shown in his "Enemy lines" duology.) He isn't perfect, doesn't pretend to be, but you can clearly tell the effort is there in each of his usccessive works.

That's not the only reason I like Allston as a SW writer: He writes interesting and well-developed characters, and manages to (generally) avoid over-wanking them the way Stackpole did Corran Horn. I remember reading Wraith Squadron and thinking he was going to do that with Kell Tainer, but when you read the other books, I was mildly shocked (and pleased) to realize that he did indeed spend time developing his other characters (each of them could stand on their own as characters: Tainer, Face, Runt, or Piggy come to mind.) And he wasn't afraid to have an interesting one die (I am still shocked to this day about Phanan's demise, because he was a likeable character.)

And not just with heroes, either. His villains (Imperial or otherwise) tend to be very cool as well. To this day I still love his representation of Zsinj - despite bieng the "bad guy' he is quite likeable in a manner of speaking (evne Melvar is.) and it contrasts with the more one-dimensional "Hurr hurr I'm an evil Imperial!" nonsense from the Courtship novel.

Agreeing wholeheartedly with Connor's praise of Allston and adding a little bit more.

One of the things I like about Allston is that he is the only author who has has managed to write good books without relying on Force senstive characters as part of the story. (I know he used Jedi in Enemy Lines, but i'm focusing on the Wraith Squadron trio of novels).

Tyria Sarkin was as close as it got and at the time in those books she had no control whatsoever. The Wraith books were good Star Wars without needing the lightsabers to show up and TK the problem away. Allston in those three books allowed several of his characters to get killed off, including my two favorite Wraiths Falynn and Phanan. As opposed to Stackpole, who killed one of his pilots and replaced her with her sister. Corran Horn not being eaten alive by Voxyn in the NJO was the most tragic non-moment of that series, because any book including that moment even if it was written by some hack would be a proud part of my collection.

EDIT (To stay on track):

Any sales figures for the book out yet?

Allston doesn't really have a good track record where "Force senstiive' subplots though. That was the one thing I loathed in Enemy Lines and Betrayal (granted, in the latter case I dont think its wholly his fault, but still..) still, its often a minor flaw and it doesn't detract majorly from the overall enjoyment of his books.

Allston isn't the only writer who can pull that off though. Luceno does that pretty well (His Han Solo duology was mostly devoid of Force crap) and Brian Daley could DEFINITELY write a rousing adventure without Force-stuff of any kind. (Daley remains one of the top writers of SW fiction, and that's also another reason why Luceno is so high up there too.. they're both of the same caliber/mindset.)

Connor MacLeod wrote:Allston isn't the only writer who can pull that off though. Luceno does that pretty well (His Han Solo duology was mostly devoid of Force crap) and Brian Daley could DEFINITELY write a rousing adventure without Force-stuff of any kind. (Daley remains one of the top writers of SW fiction, and that's also another reason why Luceno is so high up there too.. they're both of the same caliber/mindset.)

Wait, wasn't Daley the one who came up with Corellian bloodstripes? Or was that someone else?

Daley came up with the bloodstripes idea, ,though I think in its original incarnation it wasn't quite expanded to what it means nowadays (its been awhile since I read those novels so I could be wrong) Daley's Han Solo novels were wonderful pieces of fiction, however.

I completely agree with Connor. The bloodstripes were a piece of background detail for Solo, a mark of signifigant accomplishment respected by those who could recognize it in the same way an important military decoration is today. The more recent wanktastic uberness associated with them was absent from Daley's work.

Really? Ok cool - I've read "Han Solo at Star's End" and it was good, I have the other two books but haven't read them yet.

I just found the bloodstripes to be ludicrous, but I can totally believe that while Daley introduced them and probably handled them in a low-key, incidental fashion, some arsehole would take the idea and run a marathon with them.

Stofsk wrote:Really? Ok cool - I've read "Han Solo at Star's End" and it was good, I have the other two books but haven't read them yet.

I just found the bloodstripes to be ludicrous, but I can totally believe that while Daley introduced them and probably handled them in a low-key, incidental fashion, some arsehole would take the idea and run a marathon with them.

The Daley books remain my favorite SW books ever. Let me know what you think when you read the other two.

Daley was also the first to chronicle the infamous Ford chin scar to Han Solo!

Three issues in the galaxy feels infintely more post-Vong War

I must say I've liked SW:Legacy so far, even though I'm still worried about Cade being Quinlan Vos 2.0. If they keep up the pace, this might turn out to be a good read after all. I think that might have to do with some measure of increased freedom, with brand new characters and organizations who's futures haven't been determined due to an upcoming film, like half the cast of the SW:Republic stories.

VT-16 wrote:

Three issues in the galaxy feels infintely more post-Vong War

I must say I've liked SW:Legacy so far, even though I'm still worried about Cade being Quinlan Vos 2.0. If they keep up the pace, this might turn out to be a good read after all. I think that might have to do with some measure of increased freedom, with brand new characters and organizations who's futures haven't been determined due to an upcoming film, like half the cast of the SW:Republic stories.

Shit, Quinlan Vos wasn't even killed during Order 66, so why not have Quinlan finally after a hundred years come out of hiding to teach Cade!

"It isn't the dark side its just depper into the shadows, TOTALLY DIFFERENT." Ok......


@ Connor

Luceno is sort of the anti-Allston to me. Whereas I think AA does non-force using characters well but doesn't succeed so much with Jedi, I think it is sort of the opposite for Luceno. By that I am not saying Luceno can't do non-force users at all, but I think his best writing in his best books was writing for the established characters, especially Sidious and Anakin/Vader and Dooku to an extent.

Shit, Quinlan Vos wasn't even killed during Order 66

That was on request from Lucas, apparently. God, I hope he doesn't make an appearance in the tv series now. -___-

VT-16 wrote:

Shit, Quinlan Vos wasn't even killed during Order 66

That was on request from Lucas, apparently. God, I hope he doesn't make an appearance in the tv series now. -___-

I've seen this claim over at Wookieepedia and also seen it mentioned elsewhere. However, it isn't accurate. According to Jan Duursema, they came up with several alternative endings for Star Wars Republic #83 and were told that either one was alright.
+http://www.darkhorse.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=119943

Hahah, wonder how that even started? Lucas-haters who also hate Vos? Lucas-lovers who also love Vos? :P

VT-16 wrote:Hahah, wonder how that even started? Lucas-haters who also hate Vos? Lucas-lovers who also love Vos?

Good question... Oh, and reviewing the thread I linked to, I can't believe that I missed John Ostrander's post further down that page:

I actually scripted it both ways. One were he died and one were he lived. Everyone was expecting Quin to die -- and I don't always like to do what's expected. We ran the ending you saw past LFL and they didn't mind so we went with it. Where all has been doom and gloom, a touch of hope seemed nice.

I was prepared to kill off Quin if that made a better story. IMO, we went with the better ending. That simple.

+http://www.darkhorse.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=119943

Was it ever stated what Han did to gain the 2nd and 1st-class bloodstripes? I havn't been keeping up lately, but I recall that the 1st-class is almost always awarded posthumously. That being said, I hope that nobody ever writes "Han Solo and the Corellian Bloodstripe", because NOT knowing what he did makes it that much more badass.

I like that sort of thing, the dropping of references and internal consistency. Hell, it was almost two decades between princess Leia saying "Clone Wars" and us actually finding out what it was. That sort of depth is priceless.

btw, if Karen Traviss gives Boba or Jango a bloodstripe, I may flip out and bite someone.

CaptainChewbacca wrote:Was it ever stated what Han did to gain the 2nd and 1st-class bloodstripes? I havn't been keeping up lately, but I recall that the 1st-class is almost always awarded posthumously. That being said, I hope that nobody ever writes "Han Solo and the Corellian Bloodstripe", because NOT knowing what he did makes it that much more badass.

I like that sort of thing, the dropping of references and internal consistency. Hell, it was almost two decades between princess Leia saying "Clone Wars" and us actually finding out what it was. That sort of depth is priceless.

btw, if Karen Traviss gives Boba or Jango a bloodstripe, I may flip out and bite someone.

Bloodstripes are for Corellians, not Mandalorians.

On the other side, this is Karen Traviss ...

I acutally may have had a hand in starting the whole "Lucas saved Vos" deal. I was giving John a hard time about Republic's ending on TFN at some point awhile back and from what I remember he said someone "higher up" in Lucasfilm told him explicitly to keep Vos alive.

I don't feel like searching for the post in question, although if there's enough interest I reckon I could dig thought my history.

As a side note, that whole exchange and others like it are another reason why I have a good deal of respect for Ostrander and Duursema, whether I like their work or not (and I do actually like a good deal of it). They've gotten their fair share of criticism, and they deal with it like true pros-- the defend themselves, but are never rude, dismissive, or get overly offended. It might sound cheezy, but both of them (indeed, like I've said before, most of the VIPs at TFN) are genuinely good folks who are a pleasure to interact with.

000 wrote:I acutally may have had a hand in starting the whole "Lucas saved Vos" deal. I was giving John a hard time about Republic's ending on TFN at some point awhile back and from what I remember he said someone "higher up" in Lucasfilm told him explicitly to keep Vos alive.

I don't feel like searching for the post in question, although if there's enough interest I reckon I could dig thought my history.

As a side note, that whole exchange and others like it are another reason why I have a good deal of respect for Ostrander and Duursema, whether I like their work or not (and I do actually like a good deal of it). They've gotten their fair share of criticism, and they deal with it like true pros-- the defend themselves, but are never rude, dismissive, or get overly offended. It might sound cheezy, but both of them (indeed, like I've said before, most of the VIPs at TFN) are genuinely good folks who are a pleasure to interact with.

Yes. they seem to handle themselves well (I'm not much of a comics fan, so I can't comment on the stories themselves). John Ostrander's quote above seems to be pretty conclusive.

FTeik wrote:Bloodstripes are for Corellians, not Mandalorians.

On the other side, this is Karen Traviss ...

Shh.. don't give her any ideas. She'll "retcon" the idea that Bloodstripes were actually mandalorian in nature and the Corellians put out misinformation to distort the truth, or something like that.

Connor MacLeod wrote:

FTeik wrote:Bloodstripes are for Corellians, not Mandalorians.

On the other side, this is Karen Traviss ...

Shh.. don't give her any ideas. She'll "retcon" the idea that Bloodstripes were actually mandalorian in nature and the Corellians put out misinformation to distort the truth, or something like that.

Pfft, it'll become "Han Solo was a Mandoa dropout and the bloodstripes aren't a rank of pride but in fact failure!".

or

"The bloodstripes are a Mandalorian symbol of brotherhood, thus demonstrating of the time when Han was once a part of the great Mandalorian brotherhood before betraying his best friend Boba Fett"

Naw, Han Solo being Mandalorian would undermine the glory of the real mandalorians (Aka Fett and his clones and the like) so he'll probably be the mastermind behind the disinformation campaign, out of hseer jealousy of how uber-grreat the Mandalorians are.

In fact the Mandalorians would have ruled the galaxy had not everyone else been jealous of them and actively sought to keep them oppressed. Anti-Mandalorian legislation and all that.

Wanna read something funny?

Sharon Crevice wrote:

karentraviss
2006-09-25 11:05 am

I love parody. I really do. Total sucker for it.

Why doesn't she just do like her avatar on that page?