Lit The Official Scoundrels Discussion Thread (Spoilers Allowed)

Hold off on reading the book and tell us the previews!

 

Sorry. I'm just anxious to know more about Crucible and since the book won't come out where I'm at until until January I must know asap

 

Very. Thank you. I can wait for Zahn. It's not Zahn I'm worried about. It's Denning and Crucible.

 

(FYI you guys can read most of the Crucible and DotJ excerpts in the Amazon Scoundrels "Look Inside"...)

 

So what's this Lucas Books business for the UK editions? Previously it was Century / Arrow for hardbacks / paperbacks.

The difference so far? Price is a few quid higher, up to £15 net price from £11-12. A significant jump.

 

January? In 2014 or this upcoming year?

 

January 2013

 

Wait, what? It's not being released in the US until July 2, 2013. So you're getting it early???

 

The Wookiepedia page says Tomorrow

 

They are talking about Scoundrels, not Crucible. Curcible comes out in July, Scoundrels is January.

 

OK. I do know that Scoundrels comes out tomorrow. Sorry, ForceSmuggler's post was confusing, and I thought he was referring to Crucible.

 

hahahahahahaha Sorry about that. I can see why people might get confused. Made sense to me. Wanted to know more about Crucible and the preview is in Scoundrels. I don't know when I'll be able to read Scoundrels to see the preview. I'm not worried about Scoundrels but nervous about Crucible. Until Crucible comes out and I read it I will get every tidbit I can about Crucible

 

That

Spoiler

Darknell error is annoying.

However, the Crucible excerpt sounded actually interesting!
What's going on? Zahn's letting me down and Denning is delivering?

 

Anyone read the Dawn of the Jedi preview? The Amazon thing will not work for me.

 

I thought this was quite a good novel. The timeline and references are a little bit... odd, maybe, but its not a huge thing I think. Also, I've been reading really fast, but I'm mostly sure no reference or appearance by Thrawn, Mara or even Karrde, unless it was really minor, so none of them are shoved in here unnecessarily.

Spoiler

Heh, now this is a crazy heist. As usual, of course they don't get the whole amount, but at least they all got some money out of it and they all survived.

The whole Han and Lando betrayal thing is mentioned often, basically it comes down to Lando rethinking things and figures that Han isn't a huge crook, they're still not on great terms, but Lando does need the money. Han sort of tricks Lando at the end but it is partially for Lando's own benefit, and I think Han mentioned making sure Lando still gets a share of their money at the end, so Han is still playing mostly fairly. Also Chewie, while not doing a huge amount, is there as a reassuring presence. While Han and Lando are working quite civilly together and occasionally worry the other will backstab them, they know Chewie isn't the type to abandon teammates, and if something happens to Han, well... yeah, Chewie is not going to be happy. So basically Lando has cooled off somewhat and still isn't happy with Han, but not enemies. Yes, I liked Rebel Dawn's ending too, but that Yavin something story already added something else between Rebel Dawn and ESB, and its mostly easy to wave the Bespin friendly reception off as Lando trying to give Han a last few nice hours before handing him over to Vader.

Not entirely sure about the timeline and the Darkknell thing, I'm not good with details and this whole era is one really, really busy year anyway, but I just hope it can be explained as these two don't know that Armand has been replaced yet.

My personal favorite is that Han is portrayed as very smart the whole time. He doesn't find out everything, we as readers are the only ones to know everything, but he can tell when something is coming and prepares for it, so that at the end, while his situation has actually gotten somewhat worse, he was mostly never in danger for too long. His plan works mostly well, but most of them improvise a good deal too, and Han is ready for the last twist, or at least he avoids it, which I like.

There are possibly some parallels to Mercy Kill, in that both involve plenty of tricks, cons, that kind of thing, but I think I like this one more as... well, Mercy Kill at the end went off too smoothly, they weren't really up against a worthy opponent in that one (and it was mostly just all corrupt GA people, which is such a boring cliche by now, non-corrupt government officials are more rare these days). Heck, I don't even mind the villain in this one, Villachor isn't actually sympathetic, but he's mostly not stupid enough to try and backstab his boss or screw up in any huge way, he's just busy trying to figure out who is attacking him (since as a mid-level Black Sun member he knows he could be killed for supposed betrayal at almost any moment).

Its kind of similar to Allegiance in that a lot of groups are plotting and running into each other, but there's a few overarching plot threads too so its not quite as random as Allegiance's conclusion was with all the groups converging at the end. There's Han heist group, several Imperial Intelligence agents looking into Black Sun, the local Black Sun leader Villachor, the visiting Black Sun Vigo and you never know when someone else will show up.

While some phrases aren't quite translated properly, like the computer chips spinning thing, nice to see Aurebesh letters referenced so much, with code names for locations and High Galactic mentioned too. Some analogies don't carry over, but nice to be reminded that isn't officially all in English (or whatever your preferred earth language is). Malak and Revan was just a one-off, but nice to see Zahn using more recent canon, the ebook sort of prequel mentioned Rakata in terms of "art room full of ancient stuff" too.

I was reading fast, but I still like the image of the end of how they pulled off the heist. Instead of trying to sneak into the multi-layered vault, they simply blow away the inner sphere and send it rolling across the grounds.

Winter is mostly fine characterization-wise, I think, its pretty soon after Yavin, she knows Alderaan has been destroyed, but she hasn't yet heard whether Princess Leia is still alive or not, so Han gets to tell her that at the end. Kell is young and not a Rebel yet I think (compared to undercover Winter), but I think there are a few references to his future freezing up problem, but he's not under too much stress compared to being a full-time X-wing pilot later on. And both are still haunted by Alderaan's destruction too of course.

A few references to older Zahn works, like references to Mazzic and hijarna stone being part of the vault, but don't think it focused on any of Zahn's normal pet characters.

Also, I didn't see the final twist coming, but then I often miss stuff. Don't click if you don't want to be spoiled, I hope I'm being vague enough.

Spoiler

Boba Fett is in this story, I won't say anything more, hope that's vague enough.

I kind of love this story, its a standalone, but no Force-users, plenty of intelligent fringe characters, plenty of nice references, don't think it screws up canon too much, and Zahn just writes a great Han Solo. Nice way to end/start the year. Mostly its just a nice, simple, classic Star Wars fun story. Compared to the angst in the two previews, its so refreshing compared to most other eras. Not to mention having an action Han at an appropriate age. Although I admit I am a bit of a Zahn fan too.

As for the previews- Crucible

Spoiler

Han and Leia are in a cantina somewhere waiting to meet up with Lando, but then someone else shows up with a message supposedly from Lando, who is supposedly at one of his facilities in the middle of a very dangerous space storm, then turns out their contact is sort of trying to avoid local... gangsters, in simple terms (hinted at corrupt corporation/pirates/Mandos/cyborg lizards... yeah, not going to try to sum that up), bar brawl breaks out, weird stuff happens, and Han and Leia and the kid run for it. So far no Luke I think, or any indication that its anything more than a big pirate problem or just another Han and Leia old-age adventure. I remember FotJ mentioned Sith pirates everywhere (another of FotJ's many unfinished/dropped loose threads), so maybe that's related, but otherwise just same old status quo I think.

The DotJ preview is somewhat boring and generic, at least for me, especially compared to the main DotJ comic, but that's just my opinion so pardon the biased summary, but anyway

Spoiler

There's this Je'daii Ranger girl, she had a brother who was probably really screwed up but she thinks he's been dead for years, she's called in by the Je'daii Council quietly to stop a secret group that has a dangerous plan (something about a supposedly mythical hypergate and a group gathering dark matter to power it up, which could also create a micro-black hole that would consume Tython, which sounds a bit more sci-fi rather than space fantasy than normal to me), and surprise, her brother isn't dead and is possibly leading that group. Other than being confined to the Tython system and plenty of references to mysterious Tython (and some references to various conflicts, but she basically sounds like just a typical Jedi Knight in all but name compared to the more unusual blacksmiths or breeders or monks we see in the comic), not really excited yet, to be honest. Its still only an early preview, but just wish it didn't read so much like a typical prequel era "Jedi with issues called in by Council to go on a mission that happens to be related to their issue" preview.

And now I really should go to sleep, reading a book half-asleep (could only download it at midnight) probably isn't really a good idea. So if I got any of the details wrong, sorry, its probably the lack of sleep.

 

Just got a copy as late Christmas present (though won’t get to reading until tonight) I had to already had to at

Winter; living recording rod

in the dramatis personae

 

Not reading any of the spoilers. I've had to order this from Amazon US as the UK site has a 1 to 3 week delivery delay. I also ordered the CW Omnibus #3 in the same order.

 

If that's how everyone thinks of her in the EU, no wonder she ended up with Ackbar.

 

I'm about 3/4 of the way through, having a grand time reading it. Love Leverage, so mentally there is a degree of crossover there. Unlike Mercy Kill, which I wanted to like but was rather bland, so far it is a fun story. Action, tension, excitement, and all on a single world, without the fate of the galaxy hinging on things.

Winter is nice to see get more attention, even a number of viewpoint sections. Han and Lando have a frosty demeanor towards each other, both a bit nervous about the other, but work well together still. Wukkar is nice to see, a welcome change from Coruscant, Yavin, and Tatooine.

The timeline issue with Darknell is a bit of a problem, but Given the mess that Force Unleashed added to Bel Iblis and the Death Star construction, I can let it go.

There is one minor thing that makes a scene in an Allston book even funnier. The bit where Cubber and Kell are working on the X-Wings when Han arrives becomes absolutely hilarious when Cubber starts bragging about recognizing the Falcon and tells Kell that he can be proud to have seen Han once, only to be completely ignored by him. Funny on it's own, but now it makes it seem like Kell is merely humoring Cubber the whole time, having worked with Han before.

Also liked the bit about there being at a least a dozen Landos on wanted criminal lists, and without a last name, there is no way to tell if Calrissian is one of them. Adds a bit to making names more common, which is a nice touch.