Tag: canon fiction

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Canon novels will be premium paperbacks

swb-premiumsRemember way back in 2009, when LucasBooks announced that the Fate of the Jedi paperbacks reprints would be in the slightly taller premium paperback format – and then changed their minds? Well, it seems like it’s just as well, because now it gives Del Rey a quick, easy way to make the canon novels stand out among the piles of Legends when they come out in paperback. The A New Dawn paperback, due out late next month, will be the first, but Tarkin and Heir to the Jedi have all been listed with the new format.

Props to Florian of Jedi Bibliothek for bringing it to my attention – though the Star Wars Books header photo in question has been up since January.

The premium paperback issue was rather controversial back in the day, but it seems that EU fans have bigger fish to fry these days. Below, a picture I took in 2009 to show the differences between trade paperback (The Clone Wars: Wild Space,) premium paperback (Stephen King’s Just After Sunset) and mass market paperback (Dark Force Rising.)

premiums

I miss Borders.

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Catching up with Marvel: April solicitations, reprints, and what can we do for more Leia?

Princess Leia #3 (Marvel)Marvel solicitations for April are out. (Hattip to ‏@DarthSpiriah.) It includes Kanan: The Last Padawan #1 (which has a little art peek at StarWars.com,) but the real curiosity may be Princess Leia #3 – or rather, the second woman on the cover. Some are suspecting it’s Winter, a Legends character it would make sense to bring back given that we know the miniseries is dealing with Alderaan, but I wouldn’t say no to a brand-new lady pilot. Either way, we’ll find out in April. UPDATE: She’s a new character.

And depite the million or so copies in circulation, Star Wars #1 is going back for a second and third printing. In CBR’s latest Axel’s In Charge Q&A, Marvel Editor-in-Chief Axel Alonso talks a bit about Star Wars #1 and the line in general. On that note, Darth Vader #1 is looking like it’ll sell more than 200,000 copies.

There was a report from Bleeding Cool yesterday that a Lando Calrissian comic is in the works. It’s a nice idea, but don’t expect any announcements today, per Marvel editor Jordan D. White.

Meanwhile, on his Tumblr, White has answered a few Star Wars questions. Here’s one to be aware of – while the current Leia comic is a 5-issue miniseries, it could lead to an ongoing if sales are good enough. As for Mara Jade? “Only time will tell.” Waru, on the other hand, gets a pretty firm “nope.”

But for those hungry for more prequel era stories beyond Kanan, Jordan does say he has “a couple of ideas for series I think would fit really well there.”

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Out this week: Marvel’s new Star Wars #1

The first new Star Wars of 2015 is Marvel’s flagship Star Wars #1 on Wednesday. It features an utterly insane number of variant covers and sales to match.

It’s not the only Marvel release this week either, per Diamond. There’s also the first volume of Star Wars: The Original Marvel Years, an 880-page hardcover that collects Star Wars #1-44 and the series’ first Annual. Amazon lists it as coming out January 27, but your comic shop may have it Wednesday.

Speaking of January 27, that’s when Joe Schreiber’s Darth Maul: Lockdown will come out in paperback. Our first new (and canon) novel of the year, Kevin Hearne’s Heir to the Jedi, will be out March 3.

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A more detailed blurb for Heir to the Jedi

hearne-luke-heirRandom House has updated their blurb for Kevin Hearne’s Heir to the Jedi, the third of the new canon novels. It looks like we can count on there being at least two new female characters being vital to the plot. No, neither of them sounds like someone who will secretly end up to be Mara Jade.

Luke Skywalker’s game-changing destruction of the Death Star has made him not only a hero of the Rebel Alliance but a valuable asset in the ongoing battle against the Empire. Though he’s a long way from mastering the power of the Force, there’s no denying his phenomenal skills as a pilot—and in the eyes of Rebel leaders Princess Leia Organa and Admiral Ackbar, there’s no one better qualified to carry out a daring rescue mission crucial to the Alliance cause.

A brilliant alien cryptographer renowned for her ability to breach even the most advanced communications systems is being detained by Imperial agents determined to exploit her exceptional talents for the Empire’s purposes. But the prospective spy’s sympathies lie with the Rebels, and she’s willing to join their effort in exchange for being reunited with her family. It’s an opportunity to gain a critical edge against the Empire that’s too precious to pass up. It’s also a job that demands the element of surprise. So Luke and the ever-resourceful droid R2-D2 swap their trusty X-wing fighter for a sleek space yacht piloted by brash recruit Nakari Kelen, daughter of a biotech mogul, who’s got a score of her own to settle with the Empire.

Challenged by ruthless Imperial bodyguards, death-dealing enemy battleships, merciless bounty hunters, and monstrous brain-eating parasites, Luke plunges head-on into a high-stakes espionage operation that will push his abilities as a Rebel fighter and would-be Jedi to the limit. If ever he needed the wisdom of Obi-Wan Kenobi to shepherd him through danger, it’s now. But Luke will have to rely on himself, his friends, and his own burgeoning relationship with the Force to survive.

Heir to the Jedi is scheduled for a February 17 release. (via)

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A look at the movement to ‘save’ the Expanded Universe

anakin_chokeEric Geller at TheForce.net posted a lengthy piece today looking at the ‘movement’ to ‘save’ the Expanded Universe.

It’s pretty ugly, this movement, so much so that even someone with a cast-iron case of trainwreck syndrome (hi) will want to look away. Yes, Eric quotes me, but I haven’t made a study of these people: What I’ve already run across in my regular travels on Facebook and Tumblr is more than enough. I love getting silly and (yes) occasionally childish with fandom (ahem, Tumblr) but the hatred and negativity of all this is just above and beyond. And I cut my fandom teeth flaming Star Wars authors for ‘bad’ books. I used to read Fandom Wank regularly, for fun. I moderated message boards during the prequel era. I can handle more than your standard amount of fannish negativity.

There’s nothing wrong with being sad, or even a little angry, about the Legends announcement. There’s nothing wrong with wanting that timeline to continue. But there is something wrong with letting things get quite this toxic over a bunch of novels, no matter how beloved they may be. It poisons the well.

I hope these folks are channeling something like the snotty, flaming 17-year-old I was once, and they’ll grow up and move on, with or without Star Wars. There’s little doubt in my mind that this will die down, regardless. But it’s beyond sad to see EU fandom, even if it’s just the fringes, reduced to such a sad state. We’re better than this. I hope.

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James Luceno: Old Expanded Universe material “still there to pick and choose from”

luceno-tarkinAuthor James Luceno talks about Star Wars, the new canon and his upcoming novel Tarkin with SciFiNow.

He says he’s seen the series bible for Rebels and that when it comes to the old EU:

I chose not to really reference too much EU material only because of the setting of the story, but it was still there. It was still there to pick and choose from.

Though he does point out that there’s not that much to begin with in the primary setting of the novel. (5 years after Revenge of the Sith.)

However, as far as Episode VII goes? He knows nothing. But he makes a good point as to the Story Group:

Without spilling secrets they can say, ‘I think this isn’t a good place to go with this book’ or ‘You might want to steer clear of this topic.’ This is part of an effort to maintain a so-called continuity where every book and every game and every comic will all be part of a single story going forward, and that wasn’t the case earlier on.

Tarkin is due out November 4.