Reviews Books The JC Lit Reviews Special: THE OLD REPUBLIC: FATAL ALLIANCE (spoilers)

My review here.

6.5/10

 

Average score: 206.6/29 = 7.12

 

Sean Williams has never before written a really good Star Wars novel, so I was coming in with pretty low expectations for what looked to be a generic tie-in throwing every TOR class into a McGuffin-chasing muddle. For a long time, Fatal Alliance proved to be a very pleasant surprise. It's absolutely terrible at constructing a setting, as no one who hasn't read extensively of the pre-release game info is going to have any clue what the hell's going on, but I've read enough to know what was going on and so I could roll with it. With that out of the way, Williams had a pretty engaging little adventure going. The cast is of course stuck with the fact that it's a collection basically of class avatars from the game, but Williams manages to bring some sense of life and personality and arc to them. They're still somewhat generic, but Williams somehow makes it work by making them just distinctive enough. Some of the character work actually gets interesting, with Ula Vii being put in a very interesting position and slowly developing and making realizations about himself, before ending in a pleasantly unexpected, but complex and real, place. Eldon Ax also comes off pretty nicely, as a young but vicious and hateful Sith apprentice negotiating a relationship with a Master she resents and remaining interesting as a sort-of-protagonist without ceasing to be a pretty loathsome person even after being affected by the events of the climax.

The plot also has a pretty good setup, with multiple factions being drawn onto neutral ground for an auction where a lot of agendas are intersecting. That's a great setup, one rife with potential and tension and interest without relying on the typical battle or big-threat plotlines. Unfortunately, Williams isn't really the man to handle that kind of complex politicking plotline, and he neither sets up the situation very well, nor does he exploit it sufficiently, instead diving almost instantly into battles over the McGuffin. He still draws a fun enough sense of adventure out of it, but the full potential of the plotline isn't anywhere near realized. After it moves past that setup, the plot runs into a lengthy climax centered on defeating the hexes, which is a fairly engaging bit of battling, but what ultimately undoes the novel is the ending. After building up to a big revelation, we get a silly and muddled conclusion that ends everything abruptly and fails to resolve the character arcs of at least half the characters, skips a lot of the actual action so that it can expositionize its way over it later, and then retroactively plunges the entire novel into absolute incoherence in a remarkably terrible epilogue.

Ultimately, Williams sets himself up a good plotline, but can't maintain it with any coherence (frequently raising questions like why certain people are being sent on missions; why troopers are being sent to destroy the incredibly dangerous hex factories on the ground when orbital bombardment is being used effectively by the ships in orbit; why four hexes are almost impossible for a Jedi, Sith, Mandalorian, and a handful of soldiers to defeat the first time we meet them, but in the climax, near-infinite hordes of hexes, which are implied to be even more advanced, are relatively minor obstacles for assault teams, etc). A handful of logic blips would be easy to forgive with the goodwill Williams builds up with a fun, pulpy-adventurish feel and the intriguing character and plot potential through the start, but as they build up and the plot and characters peter out, the issues loom larger, and the horrendous ending absolutely destroys that goodwill and lays the problems of the novel in stark relief. Had it managed to find a solid resolution after the Nal Hutta section, I would have given it an 8 or 8.5 -- a not-great-but-good, refreshingly fun little adventure. As it stands, it's a fun enough little diversion but it fails to live up to its potential in either character or plot, and completely self-destructs at the end. I kind of want to give it a 7, just because it really was a fun ride up until the

 

Average score: 213.5/30 = 7.12

 

Up until the what, Hav? The what??

 

Up until the post truncation!

Average score: 222.5/31 = 7.18

 

I found the start a little confusing and therefore the entire book. It still enjoyed it, and I liked most characters (except Dao Stryver). I'll rate this book 6/10

 

Average score: 228.5/32 = 7.14

 

This book has pride and place of my SW books [134 and counting]. I found the detail, the storyline, the new worlds and old scenarios convincing. I especially liked the Sith apprentice [Eldon Ax] and the bounty Hunter [ Stryver]. Combining Sith and Jedi master /apprentice was genius. . The droids were inventive. It is the book I can't put down.

10/10

 

Eh, what do you mean?

I blame that we are still in the ear were writers want to show relativism and have this idea that “normal” people should be afraid or suspicious against others with “strange” powers

 

Average score: 238.5/33 = 7.23

 

I enjoyed reading that book very much - my first SWTOR-Book. And my present signature is from it.

The only thing I have to complain about is, that after the defeat of the hexes, the end is to much rushed. Sean Williams described the end of the planet Sebaddon very roughly and scarcely and I still do not understand why there is not a planet called Sebaddon anymore. Any clues about it?