Star Wars, Geek Culture, and Power Converters
This week saw the release of the eighth and final installment of Overdraft: The Orion Offensive, a Kindle Serial by prolific Star Wars author John Jackson Miller. The Orion Offensive is Miller’s first novel set in an original universe and my first introduction to him as an author. I was already excited for his upcoming novel Kenobi, and after reading The Orion Offensive, I can’t wait for more original stories from him. More specific thoughts after the cut.
The Official Star Wars Books Facebook page announced that they will be hosting two live chats with Star Wars authors next week.
Tuesday, 5/21 3pm EST – Please join us for a chat with Star Wars comics veteran John Ostrander, who penned the prequel short-story to INTO THE VOID (featured in Star Wars Insider Magazine #141).
Wednesday, 5/22 4pm EST – Please join us for a chat with first time Star Wars author Tim Lebbon, author of the just released INTO THE VOID. Tim will be joining us from across the pond in the UK.
Be sure to check them out especially if you have any questions about the newly released Dawn of the Jedi: Into the Void or the related comic penned by Ostrander.
Fifteen? Really? I mean. Wow, those years kind of flew by.
As Harry Potter hits its fifteenth birthday, Entertainment Weekly reports that Scholastic plans to celebrate by re-releasing the series in trade paperback form. A bit of a welcome surprise, however, is all new cover artwork for the novels.
The new artwork will be illustrated by Kabu Kibuishi, the artist behind the Amulet graphic novels.
I do have a fondness for the original covers, but I must say this updated look is quite nice in my eye.
The Wheel of Time. I know, with that one title, some of you are completely uninterested in this post now. Please, bear with me, this is not what you think. After I finished A Memory of Light this week, I was thinking about the story and how I would write a review of this book. I was trying to consider how much I could talk about it. I was concerned about spoiling elements of past books. I was worried about the overall length of the book.
Mostly, though, I worried that I am not up to the task of writing this review. I am not a book critic, I play one on the internet. I write about genre fiction contained in a fairly narrow field. This book is something that you could easily label as being literature. Emily would jump on me about that statement. Really, all books should be considered some form of literature, even if you don’t think it adds anything to the culture. To me, though, this is a book that talks about a lot, and one of the things that this book in particular added to the series’ themes, the human condition.
That’s as much as I’m going to say about the plot of this, the last book of the Wheel of Time.
What I am going to talk about is my experience with this series.
It’s always nice to see a good science fiction novel become available for free. Even for a limited time. Today you can get your hands on an e-copy of On Basilisk Station, the first book in David Weber’s Honor Harrington series.
INTRODUCING
HONOR HARRINGTONHaving made him look a fool, she’s been exiled to Basilisk Station in disgrace and set up for ruin by a superior who hates her.
Her demoralized crew blames her for their ship’s humiliating posting to an out-of-the-way picket station.
The aborigines of the system’s only habitable planet are smoking homicide-inducing hallucinogens.
Parliament isn’t sure it wants to keep the place; the major local industry is smuggling; the merchant cartels want her head; the star-conquering, so-called “Republic” of Haven is Up To Something; and Honor Harrington has a single, over-age light cruiser with an armament that doesn’t work to police the entire star system.
But the people out to get her have made one mistake. They’ve made her mad.
You can pick up the book from Amazon or directly from the publisher’s website. As a note, Expanded Universe author Timothy Zahn has recently teamed up with Weber to write a Honor Harrington spinoff trilogy.
When I was younger, I used to love getting my hands on long books. A long book was always better than a short book, because there was more story to tell. And as a practical matter, long books were always worth the money, especially if it was a hardcover. Short books just couldn’t be as interesting; not only that, they were a waste of money. Why should I spend my hard-earned cash on a 200-page book when I could spend the same amount of money on a 500- or 1000- page tome?
(Ignore the fact that storing and carrying around doorstoppers could get old pretty quickly. Thankfully, with the advent of e-readers, I can carry around the entire Harry Potter series without breaking my back.)
As I’ve gotten older, however, I’ve stopped caring how long books are. Actually, that’s not true. Continue reading
Scoundrels is coming and because we were all good little girls and boys, Del Ray and Timothy Zahn teamed up to give us a short digital exclusive story that serves as a sort of prequel to the forthcoming novel as an early Christmas present.
As the title might indicate, Winner Lose All takes place around a sabacc tournament and stars none other than the king of gamblers himself, Lando Calrissian. Lando just wants to win the tournament and get rich. Obviously, because this is Lando, things don’t go his way and he finds himself involved in a scheme he hadn’t planned on once he encounters the Kitik twins and learns that the grand prize could very well be a fake. Things end up spiraling out of control as they quickly realize how convoluted the scam is and it’s going to take a master scheme and a fair bit of luck for them to wind up on top.
Winner Lose All is a fun and entertaining read and exactly the sort of thing I hope we see more of with these e-stories. It tells a good story and lets you get to know all of the characters and also plays in a corner of the Star Wars universe that might otherwise have gone unnoticed. Zahn does a good job with each of the characters, not letting just one overwhelm the story. The plot also has enough twists and turns without becoming ridiculous and keeps the reader engaged and wanting to know what happens.
Above all, the story serves its purpose well: to serve as a prequel and to introduce readers to some of the new characters who will be appearing in Scoundrels. In just fifty pages, I already found myself getting attached to Tavia and Bink Kitik, the twin ghost thieves who have differing levels of approval for their business. They may share the same face but they definitely have their own distinct personalities and don’t fall into the any tiring twin tropes. Zahn also introduces the twins’ partner in crime, Zerba Cher’dak who will also be appearing in the forthcoming Scoundrels. He’s definitely not someone you’d want to play against at sabacc though because he is just that good at cheating.
Bottom line is that I suggest you all go get this because not only is it a fun read but it’ll help tide you over these last two weeks until we can all finally read Scoundrels.
Official news came down the pipeline today that the rumors are true: Random House and Penguin are merging in a massive business deal that will create the largest publishing company in the world. Why is this Star Wars news? Well, as Dunc over at Club Jade pointed out, both Random House and Penguin both have imprints in DelRey and DK that print Star Wars material.
But don’t get too excited yet. This deal is still subject to regulatory approval, and that may be a problem. Dunc and I have both posited that this could be a case for anti-trust investigations. Why? Right now, in the UK, Random House and Penguin make up 27% of book sales. Forbes speculates that in the US, that number jumps to about 40% of trade book sales. Globally, according to the Huffington Post, the two would make up 26% of world wide book sales. I would note that none of these numbers specifically address the academic publishing arms of these companies either; Pearson (owner of Penguin) has a massive education publishing arm, and combining with Random House could end up with a larger share of the textbook market as well, and any college student taking a look at textbooks in their college bookstore knows what kind of problem that might be.
It is important that in all of these articles, the words “subject to regulatory approval” or “anti-trust approval” come up. The fact that both Random House and Penguin are European-based companies could complicate matters. And for those of us who are aspiring authors, this new conglomeration could be good or bad (see the Forbes article linked above.) In any case, this smacks of desperation on the sides of the publishers in the face of ebooks (especially after the Department of Justice came down on the agency pricing model). But don’t look away yet. The Huffington Post also reports that NewsCorp is looking to add to HarperCollins, so more big publisher mergers may be on the horizon.
Fans of Timothy Zahn’s Expanded Universe entries can check out his original works in ebook format thanks to Open Road Media.
Timothy Zahn is best known for reviving the Star Wars Expanded Universe with his bestselling Thrawn Trilogy novels. But Zahn is also the author of many original works, including the Blackcollar Series, Spinneret, and A Coming of Age, now available as ebooks.
To celebrate the release, we have created a mini-documentary on Timothy Zahn. You can find the video on YouTube here.
Additional novels include: Deadman Switch, The Backlash Mission, Triplet, and Warhorse. For more about these new releases and to see the brand new covers, visit his Author Page.
- The Blackcollar Series is a military science fiction series about a group of superhuman combatants.
- A Coming of Age is a thoughtful tribute to what it means to come of age, face your fears, and even save the world. Readers of Dune, A Wrinkle in Time, Ender’s Game, and The Chronicles of Narnia will be delighted to discover another tale that records the difficult yet crucial passage into adulthood.
- Spinneret poses a scientific puzzle whose answer could threaten humanity¹s salvation, or destruction.
Both Nanci and I have greatly enjoyed Zahn’s original works. In addition to these new Ebook releases, you may want to also check out The Icarus Hunt, which for my money is Zahn’s best work.
If you’re a fan of military science fiction, you’ll want to hop on over to Amazon or Barnes and Noble to buy yourself an e-copy of Five by Five, a collection of short stories featuring notable Expanded Universe authors Kevin J. Anderson, Michael Stackpole, and Aaron Allston.
Allston has a bit more about the book written on his blog as well as links to other sellers.