Archive for April, 2010

Novels or Series Mentioned

Rogue Planet

MedStar II: Jedi Healer

Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader

The Legacy of the Force

One of my favorite aspects of the prequel novels is how they flesh out the inner-personal struggles going on inside of Anakin Skywalker.  I find them to be fascinating.  You rarely read or see in movies a hero of prophecy struggle the way Anakin does, and I find it to make for great reading. 

Anakin’s struggles remind me of my time teaching middle school.  Middle school students are stupidly fascinated with dangerous things.  One dangerous hobby the students at my school had took place in the math class adjacent to my classroom.  They enjoyed sticking pencils and silver gum wrappers into an electric socket to watch the sparks fly out of the plug.  It is a miracle none of them electrocuted themselves or others.  When they would do this, the circuit breaker would flip and the electricity would go out in my room and that wall of the math classroom.  It seemed to always happen as I was typing up quizzes or entering in grades, and when the circuit breaker would flip, my computer would cut off, and I would lose not only the data I didn’t save, but all kinds of information because a 15 year old computers can only take so much abuse.   It seems that every time that breaker flipped, I would lose another vital program that made my computer good. 

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Spoiler conscious review of X-Wing: The Krytos Trap

Novels or Series Mentioned

X-Wing: The Krytos Trap

X-Wing: Rogue Squadron

X-Wing: Wedge’s Gamble

X-Wing Series

Shawdows of the Empire

            Even though I am mindful not to spoil this book for you, any review will reveal some things regarding the book, but I hope this review will excite you enough to go and read it, instead of ruin the story for you.

I have never been one to plan my week around a television show.  That is not to mean that there are not shows I love.  I called my best friend Boner just so I could be more like Mike Seaver, but if I was busy hanging out with friends, or out golfing,  or chilling out, maxing, relaxing all cool, and shooting some b-ball outside my school, I did not watch my watch to run home to catch a TV show.  That all changed when in high school I discovered The Practice.  I loved this legal drama.  I don’t know what it was about this show.  I never wanted to be a lawyer, and other than trying to find ways out of speeding tickets, I am not even that interested in law.  My love for legal shows continued when I followed Alan Shore from The Practice to Boston Legal.  Just a side note if you have not watched Boston Legal, you are missing the greatest television show in the history of the known universe.  All you need to know about Boston Legal is Denny Crane.  He makes the show magical.  Also, there are only two movies I must watch if they come on TV even though I have seen both hundreds of times, and they are the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and A Few Good Men.   I tell you of my love for legal dramas and legal comedies for one reason, and that is to explain to you why I loved X-Wing: The Krytos Trap. 

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Spoiler Conscious Book Review of The Clone Wars: Wild Space by Karen Miller

Novels or Series Mentioned

The Clone Wars: Wild Space

The Cestus Deception

Shatterpoint

The New Jedi Order

The Legacy of the Force

Even though I am trying to be spoiler conscious, you cannot review a book without giving some of the plot away, but I try to not ruin the story for you if you have yet to read it.

Of all the places I have day dreamed about in the Star Wars Universe, Wild Space is at the top of the list.  Why is it wild?  Is it just unexplored like the Unknown Regions, or something more?  Are there girls just more fun?  Is it in the Western part of the galaxy?  Do they have corrals?  I know my questions are probably answered somewhere in the Star Wars Universe, but I have yet to come across it.  I would love for you to e-mail places where I can read about Wild Space, but I am getting a little off topic.  The point is that Karen Miller’s The Clone Wars: Wild Space was my first trip in this arm of the galaxy that I have pondered so often, and although, you do not explore much of Wild Space, just one planet, Wild is definitely an adjective I would use for this book. 

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Novels and Series Mentioned

Medstar I: Battle Surgeons

Medstar II: Jedi Healer

Medstar Duology

Coruscant Nights Trilogy

I love a good Star Wars story; don’t get me wrong…I mean I am addicted to reading them, but I believe it is the characters more so than the stories that make the Star Wars Universe so great.  The first trilogy of movies had a young farm boy, a princess, a scoundrel, and a big fur ball trying to save the galaxy from the scariest man in black I have ever seen…throw in a yella belly…I mean a golden droid and a robot filled with courage and you have a great story before you ever get to the plot.  In the books, you discover more legendary characters like Thrawn, Jacen, Boba Fett, Mara Jade, Corran Horn, Wedge Antillies, and more, and when you think at just how big the Star Wars Universe truly is you think you have met every possible character, and then, you meet a Den Dhur. 

Den Dhur is an investigative reporter for the Galactic Wave, and we are trained to not like the liberal media.  My wife tends to follow politics, and I follow sports, and in both arenas, someone says something stupid, and they all give the same response when confronted with their stupidity.  Just recently Jerry Jones, the owner of the Dallas Cowboys, said that his former coach Bill Parcells is not worth a…well let’s just say Bantha poo-doo.  In reaction to getting publically caught on video saying this, Jerry Jones commented later that it is well known by people close to me that when I say you are not worth poo-doo, I think you are pretty good.  Now to test out Mr. Jones theory that poo-doo can be a compliment, I went home looked my beautiful wife in the eyes and said, “Honey, I love you so much and let me say that today you look like poo-doo.”  I had a sirloin on my eye for the next two hours…Ok, I made that up because no one is gullible enough to believe that poo-doo is a compliment. 

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Spoiler Conscious Review of X-Wing Wedge’s Gamble by Michael A. Stackpole

Novels or Series Mentioned

X-Wing Wedge’s Gamble

X-Wing Rogue Squadron

X-Wing Series

            This review will be spoiler conscious.  Although you can’t do a review without mentioning some aspects of the story, I will be thoughtful as to not ruin this book for you.

In X-Wing Wedge’s Gamble, you have a story of a team that does one thing so well, but in this book, the same team does something completely different.  In X-Wing Rogue Squadron, Rogue Squadron does one thing great fly missions.  The wall to wall action in the space battles is what made X-Wing Rogue Squadron such a great read.  Well, in X-Wing Wedge’s Gamble, Stackpole definitely gambles by taking Rogue Squadron out of their element where they excelled and placed them in a completely different one.  It reminds me of Bo Jackson and Michael Jordan where both athletes left the sport in which they highly succeeded and took a chance in another arena.    

If you are my age, you will remember Bo Jackson in all of his glory.  He signed to play baseball for the Kansas City Royals in 1986 and became a starting outfielder for them in 1987, and wowed us all with his sheer athleticism.  I cannot tell you how many times I have tried to run a semi-circle up and down and wall like he did when making a catch in the outfield…just to let you know I couldn’t do it.  Bo was amazing.  Then in 1987, Bo does the unthinkable.  He signed with the L.A. Raiders to play football, and he was unbelievable in that sport too.  He flat out embarrassed bold talker Brian Boworth by running around, away, and just plain over him on a Monday Night Football game in 1987.  Watching Bo Jackson do two sports so well is still an achievement I am glad I got to witness. 

            If you are my age, you will also remember Michael Jordan quitting basketball because he had nothing left to accomplish and put his effort in becoming a Major League Baseball player.  Unlike Bo, this switch was painful to watch.  Jordan just looked awkward and strange in a baseball uniform, and although Jordan was a better baseball player than I ever was, you just wanted him to go back to baseball because watching someone who is so great at one thing flounder in another was painful. 

The question becomes will X-Wing Wedge’s Gamble be a Bo Jackson and succeed in their second element and be great, or will they be a Michael Jordan and need to return to where they are comfortable?  

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Novels or Series Mentioned

Star Wars

Agent of Chaos I: Hero’s Trial

Invincible

The New Jedi Order

The Jedi Academy

The Legacy of the Force

            Super weapons are an ingrained aspect of the Star Wars Universe.  Ever since Obi-Wan said, “That’s no moon,” in Star Wars, super weapons have been an integral part of the Star Wars story.  Most notably the empire has researched and created these super weapons to control the galaxy with an iron fist.  The empire created the Maw Installation where super weapons were the focus and goal of the day, and the empire has created quite a few super weapons like the Death Stars, the World Devestators, the Sun Crusher, the Nanokiller, among others, but the empire does not have a monopoly on super weapons.  The Chiss developed Alpha Red to kill all the Yuuzahn Vong.  The Corellian system has Centerpoint Station, and the Yuuzahn Vong themselves have Dovin Basals, which was used to destroy Sernpidal.  There have been others, but as you can see super weapons are a part of the fabric of the Star Wars Universe.  Today, I want to give my thoughts on some of these super weapons. 

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          Star Wars fans can be quite opinionated, and I wanted to share my thoughts on the entire canon controversy going on between the Canonical and the Expanded Universe in Star Wars.  So many fans are at each other throats, like a rancor on a Twi’lek dancer, about what is essential to the timeline especially when it comes to Mandalorians in the Clone Wars cartoon and the Karen Traviss’ and Karen Miller’s  books among others.  I have a few thoughts on this subject that I hope will help us gain a little perspective.   

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Spoiler Conscious Book Review of X-Wing Rogue Squadron by Michael A. Stackpole

Books or Series Mentioned

X-Wing Rogue Squadron

X-Wing Series

New Jedi Order

This review will be spoiler conscious.  Although you can’t do a review without mentioning some aspects of the story, I will be thoughtful as to not ruin this book for you. 

It has taken me a while to begin the X-Wing series.  Even though I know the significance of this series because it introduces several key characters and back story, when standing in the book store, I still chose other books over this series.  Even though I know Michael A. Stackpole is one of the best Star Wars authors out there, I still chose other books over this series for one reason…the hardest thing for a writer to write is a space battle.  How many times have you read a maneuver described in a space battle and thought, “what did the pilot just do?”  Space battles are tough to write because I, and most readers, have never experience space flight to connect these maneuvers to pictures in our mind.  I end up reading space battles for the facts of: who shot who down, who won the battle, and who survived, but rarely do I get caught up in reading a space battle and the description is so clear that I can see the battle in my mind.  Again, I do not fault writers for this, but my lack of knowledge of space maneuvering in a space craft.  This difficulty has always caused me to pause in buying the X-Wing series because it focuses on space battles, but thankfully, my wife for my birthday bought me X-Wing Rogue Squadron, which then sat on my shelf until I finished about a dozen other books, but I finally read it, and I was glad that I did.

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