From Vector Prime to Invincible

Xander Vos · From Vector Prime to Invincible

Well, around this time last year - I think - I made myself the pledge I'd read my way through both mammoth series, with Dark Nest in between.

Currently I'm sitting on Book 1 of the Force Heretic Trilogy, so I'm well on my way to reading Invincible when it's paperback comes out - which was actually my aim, distracting myself from the temptation to buy the hard cover. Wink

So far I'm really liking my re-read of NJO, and think it's leagues beyond Legacy in every aspect. However, with Legacy knowledge, Jacen's character in NJO takes on a new aspect, especially as the series approaches and then passes Traitor - which is what really sets him up for Betrayal. Liked Traitor a lot more this time around, and I'm really enjoying myself so far.

What dissapoints me is the speed in which the Galaxy recovered from the Vong, especially after Coruscant was so thoroughly destroyed. Ah well, here's hoping to filler books between NJO and DN, or DN and LOTF.

Rive Caedo

Hm, yes... I am interested to see what direction they'll go with the original trilogy characters now. There's obviously still a market there. But they've basically hit the point in the timeline where if they go much further Han's going to start die of old age Razz

I think if Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor sells well, we might see more of that. One shot novels at random points in the timeline with tight focuses. I don't think I'd mind that, personally. I still haven't read the last 3 or 4 Legacy of the Force books - partly because I've been told by yourself and others how disappointing the last couple are. It's really unfortunate when you get a lousy ending after 3000 pages instead of 300 Razz

Thank goodness New Jedi Order ended well - if a bit expectedly. A really bad ending after over 7000 pages would have been devastating! I could see myself rereading through certain books in the series - but not the whole thing.

Lord Vexen

Rive Caedo

Heheh, no kidding. It reminds me of the old "adventure" books they released way back in the 80's.

"Han Solo and the Lost Legacy" "Lando Calrissian and the Flamewind of Oseon" being two I can remember off the top of my head.

Even the cover art looks like a throwback to the 80's/90's era. They don't really do those BOOM covers anymore.

Xander Vos

Well Stover did say he wanted to re-capture the feel of those early novels.

Definately, I love the idea of that, especially if it's in the same vein as Tatooine Ghost, or Survivor's Quest, where the events won't have a dire consequence for the Galaxy.

Well, when I first read the series, I tended to skip the YV parts because I thought they were boring, (Don't know why Confused

) so when I bought a few more of the NJO books (I'm OCD and therefore MUST have my gaps in the serieses filled in Razz

) decided I'd read through them as a way of keeping myself distracted and not forking out more money on SW books. Razz

Kinda failed when I had to buy Jedi Eclipse and Traitor and probably will have to buy Final Prophecy, and now Dark Journey's literally falling apart, but it's been a fun on-the-side thing - I've been reading about 20 pages before I go to sleep and some mornings.

Xander Vos

Reading Joiner King and I'm amazed at all the continuity errors Denning makes - making multiple references to Leia serving in the OLD REPUBLIC, before the rise of the Empire, despite this being written after ROTS where we find Palps declaring the Empire before she was born. He also claims R2s were designed by the Empire, when in fact R2 was in service 13 years before the Empire started. *sigh*

Still, liking this series as the pace is far better as a trilogy than NJO or LotF as mammoth series.

Xander Vos

I'm on to The Swarm War now - I took a large break between King and Queen because I kinda forgot to start the new one - and a few of the errors were resolved, such as the R2 dating, but the other stuff still bugs me, no pun intended.

I now have Invincible, so I'm rather tempted to skip right to it, but I'll try and be controlled and actually read through Legacy. Wink

Xander Vos

Onto Betrayal now - the only good book of LOTF in my opinion - two chapters in. Kind of amazing it'll end up taking me over two years to read from Vector Prime to Invincible...

Rive Caedo

Yeah, I'm fairly certain there's a glowing review of Betrayal from me around here somewhere (the Anakin-bot being the only low point).

And then Bloodlines took that glowing hope and rived it to shreds.

Xander Vos

Yeah, Allston did such a brilliant job - I shuddered at reading a joking exchange between Jacen and Mara (He was saying he'd have to exact revenge on her for bringing Ben up to be sharp-tongued and she gestured to her lightsaber saying she could preorder prosthetics for him if he wanted to take a shot) given what's to come - at setting up the series, and then it just ground to a halt.

Here's hoping the lesson has been learnt for FOTJ.

Rive Caedo

Considering Legacy sold well enough to justify another nine book series? I'm going to guess: No.

I think Star Wars is far more suited to trilogies than "nonologies" and *shudder* "nonadecaologies" (New Jedi Order).

Xander Vos

Agreed. Trilogies and standalones work best.

HOWEVER, I do think NJO worked surprisingly well in comparison to LOTF, having read it through start to finish recently. Only Luceno reprises his role later on, and rather than creating contradictory personalities, it all seems to flow, rather than LOTF where it jumped around, focussing on Corellians, the Mandalorians, then Hapans, and back again.

Rive Caedo

Having not finished LOTF - I can't make a full judgment. But I do think that the series itself flowed better and had better characterization - but it still would have worked better as two trilogies than 19 books.

Trilogy One: Victory of the Chosen
Vector Prime (Introduction of the Vong and Chewbacca's death)
Agents of Chaos (Dealing with fallout from Chewbacca's death and elaborating on the Vong assaults)
Star by Star (Fall of Coruscant)

Trilogy Two: Downfall of the Chosen
Enemy Lines
Traitor (including stuff from Force Heretic)
The Unifying Force (including stuff from The Final Prophecy)

We'd miss out on some of the more minor character development. But I think it would have worked much better overall.

Xander Vos

Hmm, I guess so. But then you miss out on characters like Droma, the fall of the Jedi on Yavin, Jaina's struggle with the Dark Side following Anakin's death, the setting up of characters for the later series - the Hapans and their politics, for example - and all the nice links to the old EU in the Force Heretics Trilogy.

I dunno, I just can't say I was unhappy with NJO I guess. However, I can say that LOTF could have been a trilogy, with [warning, spoilers for Invincible as far as I know them]:

Spoiler:

Darth Samuel

NJO was great. some of it was weird, but I liked it. Traitor is one of the greatest star wars novels ever written.

Xander Vos

I used to hate that novel, but I re-read it during this read, and I really liked it. Really well written. Can't wait to get stuck into Shadows of Mindor when it is paper-backerised.

Rive Caedo

Traitor was one of my favorite NJO novels too. Thus why I picked it as one of the "big six" in my reimagining of the saga as shorter.

I was disappointed by the Amazon.com rating Shadows of Mindor currently had/has (3.5 out of 5 stars). Since I was hoping for 4. Thus, I wasn't planning on reading it.

But I just took a second glance and it looks like the people with the right mindset (knowing/expecting that it's a throwback to the 80's era of Star Wars novels) really really enjoyed it and are giving it 4/5 star reviews.

So I suppose I will snag the paperback version (in Octoberish, I'd think).

Darth Samuel

Stover said that it was his attempt to get writing back to it's pre-zahn roots.

Rive Caedo

Yep, stuff like this:

Go Lando go!

Darth Samuel

Didn't one of those books have Rokar Gupta of whatever?

Xander Vos

Darth Samuel

HSC????

Xander Vos

Higher School Certificate. Wikipedia it you fool.

Basically end of school exams.

Rive Caedo

Xander Vos

Humph. Whatever. Razz

Xander Vos

Up to Inferno, so this is taking a little longer than I thought.

I thought Sacrifice was better second time through, though Boba still pissed me off. Mara's death was just horribly out of place, and the way she tries to pull on our heartstrings when Mara leaves Luke for the final time doesn't go down well.

Xander Vos

Triple post.

Interesting Harry Potter reference in Inferno, referring to Jag crinkling his forehead, making his scar into the shape of a lightning bolt.

Dakoth

Well that makes me cry.

Xander Vos

Most understandable post of the year...

Dakoth

See now I cant tell if you're being sarcastic or not.

Xander Vos

Sarcastic as to why an HP reference would make you cry.

Almoosst done. Up to Fury now.

Xander Vos

Wow, coming up to two years since I started this mammoth project... up to Revelation at the moment. It's good, because I can't remember the plot from here, Fury was the last one I could really remember, and I haven't even read Invincible yet.

Xander Vos

Well boys and girls, it's been a long, arduous journey, but I've finally done it.

Last night, 5th August 2009, I finished Invincible of the Legacy of the Force Series, 2 years, 12 days after I started reading Vector Prime.

What can I say?

The NJO series was an emotional rollercoaster, and this time through I feel it made a lot more sense to me, with the added emotional impact of Jacen's slow descent towards the Dark Side. A lot of the side-plots and character development were also instrumental in setting up both the Dark Nest Trilogy and LOTF.

The DNT was a nice re-cap of the NJO action, befor charging head long into future events. The transition from the Jacen of the NJO series to the Jacen of the DNT worked well I thought, and besides a few issues I had with the Trilogy, I felt it worked very successfully as a lead in to LOTF.

LOTF has actually improved a lot in my eyes. Traviss' books were less grating for me, and I actually enjoyed them as having read Order 66, they made a lot more sense. The complete dissapearence of several plot elements in Invincible was almost made up by the fact for once someone other than Traviss used Mando'ade, and carried on her plots, which I give him kudos for.

Over all, I feel this, the Del Rey saga so far (excluding MF and FOTJ) has been over all a success, although I feel that a series written by one author a la DNT or X-Wing, works a lot better, and feels a lot less disjointed in terms of character personalities.

It's hard to give a mark out of 10 for something consisting of 31 books, and over 2 years of my life, but if I had to, I would give it a 7/10. Delivers when it needs to, but falls of badly in the lulls.

Crozeus

Fury, Invincible?

What are your next titles going to be, Knights of Cydonia and Supermassive Black Hole?

Xander Vos

My titles? Confused

And there's a Muse song called Fury?

Darth Samuel

Xander Vos

Nah Map of the Problematique is fairly good, as is Time is Running Out. Their two new ones are pretty awesome too.

Darth Samuel

Uprising kicks ass

Crozeus

Uprising is beast. Eurasia is... odd.

Just going to make this point once again: seeing them live, Sam isn't.

Xander Vos

Uprising is awesome, and Eurasia is incomplete... I like it because I love Queen, but it gets to the "Eura-SIA-SIA-SIA" bit and its like its finally getting to the main bit of the song, and then it ends...

Crozeus

Sirak Sazen

I'm surprised you have the intestinal fortitude to read 31 complete books.