Club Jade

NJOE was the first to notice that Random House has posted the summary for Christie Golden’s Allies, the fifth Fate of the Jedi novel. Check it out below the cut. (more…)

Sue Rostoni was out on the boards today, and though she didn’t say much, she did say that Zekk, left adrift after the cancellation of the standalone Blood Oath, will make an appearance in Fate of the Jedi. She also clarified that the lack of an epic series post-FOTJ will not mean any less books.

Meanwhile, in the fan realm, TFN has a source that claims we’ll find out the fate of a familiar face in book five, Golden’s Allies. I don’t find this particularly worrying, mainly because Backlash is an Allston book. Sorry, I misread this originally, and honestly now I’m a lot more doubtful of this ‘spoiler.’ Not because of Golden, but because it seems too early for Allies ARCs, the most likely source for something like this.

In any case, this news is going to be blown totally out of proportion by the fandom. Thanks, Paul. :P

NJOE spotted a blurb for Fate of the Jedi: Allies – the fifth book in the series, and second by Christie Golden – on Amazon.co.uk. The second half sounds like it could be a bit spoilery for Backlash, so highlight to read.

In the middle novel of the bestselling nine-book “Star Wars” series “Fate of the Jedi”, an uneasy – and unprecedented – coalition of Jedi and Sith enter the dark and treacherous area of space known as the Maw to search out the strange being that has been reaching out to Luke Skywalker during his journey to retrace the travels of his late nephew, Jacen Solo. Forced to wait on the planet Klatooine for reinforcements from Lando Calrissian, this already fragile alliance is threatened by the presence of the Hutts, and while Leia, Han, Jaina, and Jag walk a fine line between obeying the law of the Galactic Alliance and supporting Luke, Jedi Ben Skywalker and Sith Apprentice Vestara Khai may be the ones to lead the mission to triumph – or disaster.

Allies is due out May 25.

In other news, StarWars.com treats us to the Fate of the Jedi: Allies cover. It also lacks females, if one ignores Christie Golden’s byline. We can, however, be fairly sure the book involves some. (And Sue Rostoni has already revealed that the ‘mystery man’ here is Vestara’s father.)

Aaron Allston, Christie Golden, and Troy Denning talked with Del Rey’s in-house blog at SDCC.

EUC updated today with the rest of the FOTJ panel video from SDCC. I’d sum up, but I haven’t even had a chance to watch them myself yet… Everything is under the cut, natch. (more…)

Huh.

EUC has uploaded video from the panel and it’s stayed up this far. This is only the first ten minutes; keep an eye here for more.

Topics in this first bit includes the tone of the series and the relationship between Luke and Ben.

So I’ve pretty much given up any hope for a complete Fate of the Jedi panel report at this point (this is the last time I’ll bring it up) but Sue Rostoni did make a post on the StarWars.com forums about the Fate of the Jedi story conference that was held at SDCC. It’s not that long, all things considered, but here’s the bulk of it:

I feel honored to be able to contribute creatively and watch the really talented people take a small idea and come up with captivating situations. And the interaction among the authors works exceptionally. Christie would have a spark of an idea that Aaron would hit on and set up in his book; Troy would see something developing in Christie’s book that he’d want to finish off; some small throw-away line would become a set-up for something happening somewhere else…

Okay, so I lied about updating that last post, as I forgot all about the Fate of the Jedi panel. First of all, a big thanks to EU Cantina for live-tweeting this so I could write up the post in real time (their roundup of today is here) and please don’t hate me for quoting you too much… Hopefully one day I can repay the debt.

• FOTJ. The name of the sixth book (Denning’s second) will be Vortex.

• Zahn’s upcoming. His 2011 book is indeed a follow-up to Allegiance, and scheduled for that October.
• Blood Oath. “Postponed indefinitely but not canceled.“

We should be getting detailed panel reports later tonight.

The Pretender’s Crown by C.E. Murphy
      For all my issues with the ‘revelation’ of the first book (which, no, I won’t spoil,) I found it integrated fairly quickly here, and ceased to really bother me as a plot point. But on the other hand, as a finale the book felt a bit lacking. The premise, once I got used to it, is rather intriguing…
      I certainly wouldn’t avoid further sequels, but I won’t cry if they never come. [Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Powell's]

The Courts of the Sun by Brian D’amato
      For all this book is pegged as time-travel, the first half is really a mainstream thriller – or at least that’s how it read to me, mainstream thrillers not really being my bag. This is book that has a lot of… Not technobabble, exactly, but a close cousin. (Not being particularly familiar with games of chance, it took me a while to grasp some aspects of ‘the game.’) I was almost relieved when we finally got to Mayan times, except that then our hero ” blunders into dead end after dead end, though he does finally meet his goal. Well, a goal. Sort of.
      The book isn’t bad, it’s just not what I expected… For all the whatever-babble, It seemed less sci-fi than a Dan Brown-style ‘historical’ thriller with a bit of time travel thrown in.
      And make no mistake, this is very clearly the first book in a trilogy or series, and you will be left at a hanging end. Still, once this comes out in paperback you could do worse for airplane reading… Though probably not if you’re heading out for vacation. [Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Powell's]

Santa Olivia and Naamah’s Kiss by Jacqueline Carey
      Carey is one of those authors that people either seem to like or absolutely despise: Her two Kushiel trilogies, which form the background for Naamah’s Kiss here, are the kind of books that get a lot of Mary Sue finger-pointing among people who do that sort of thing, and I can’t totally dispute their point. They do get rather ridiculous at points, and the purple prose is pretty hard to miss. Still, some of us happen to have a weakness for that sort of thing.
      Santa Olivia is none of these things. (Well, maybe a little purple.) It’s set in a town that is currently in a buffer zone between the U.S. and Mexico, and cut off entirely from either country, save for a single military base. It actually has quite a bit in common with Red – a genetically engineered hero, a post-apocalyptic setting, romance – except Santa Olivia is good. It’s a departure for Carey, and unlike her previous attempt at getting away from the Kushiel formula, I found it pretty fascinating… Even with boxing, of all things, as a major plot point. If you want to try Carey but find her main series a bit much, check this out. Recommended. [Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Powell's]
      Naamah’s Kiss is more ‘standard’ Carey – set in the world of the Kushiel books but several generations on, it could be read as a standalone, but probably shouldn’t. Still, I found it a fun read, though I’m not sure if it would really appeal to anyone not already familar with the series. [Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Powell's]

Fate of the Jedi: Omen by Christie Golden
      And here we have the book whose fault it is I didn’t post this batch days ago. Which is not to say that Omen is a bad Star Wars book – it’s not, and if it was this would be a far easier review for me to write. It is, quite frankly, a perfectly servicable middle-of-the-road Star Wars novel.
      There were a few ticks in the prose that I found mildly annoying – too many characters referred to by their full names once too often, some awkward turns of prose – but that’s all nitpicking, and that couldn’t be fixed with some minor editing.
      It has a lot of nice moments – I’m even mildly intrigued by Vestara and the new flavor of Sith introed here, and I’m very rarely interested in OCs. Luke and Ben seem to work pretty well – though I have a hard time seeing any teenager getting along quite that well with their parent, even a Jedi teenager – and even the Han/Leia/Allana parts took us some new places.
      I still find myself feeling a tad uninvolved in this series, though… This one felt very formulaic (yes, I know what I was reading: Moreso than usual) and I’ve about had my fill of seeing D-list Jedi go bonkers. Maybe Denning can kick this up to the next level in Abyss – or maybe I’ll be back here in a month saying that very same about Allston and Backlash. [Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Powell's]