Author Analysis: Sean Stewart

This is our first single-novel author, so although I generally discourage simple book discussion in an AA thread, a good deal more of that will be accepted this time. You know the drill; how do you feel about his author, what are his strengths and weaknesses, does he fill a niche or do something better than anyone else, etc? And remember, please no pointless gushing.


Previous Author Analyses:
Haden Blackman
Greg Keyes
Michael Stackpole
Kevin J. Anderson
Matthew Stover
Michael Reaves
Aaron Allston

Go at it.

 

How about teasing the thread creator about his spelling?

But about Sean Stewart.

I really have no complaints about him so if I write much it will turn into gushing. Dark Rendezvous was an excellent novel and I hope he writes another Star Wars book.

 

Yeah. I totally wish Stewart would write another Star Wars novel. Dark Rendevous one one of the deeper Star Wars novels without over-the-top violence and/or gore, which made it even better.

Plus, getting to see the pathos of Dooku in action...

 

Stewart? I love his stuff. For me, it just boils down to the fact that Stewart just seems to be having fun in the Star Wars universe. It's a feeling I get from reading, say, Jan and John, but not really from other people. He's not afraid to poke fun at Star Wars while addressing serious issues. While it seems to be aimed in some part at a younger audience, there's pieces that hit right home. And he does awesome, awesome dialogue, the sort of dialogue I wish we got more often in the EU, and in the movies. The best parts of Dark Rendezvous, I think, are actually the conversations between Dooku and Asajj and Dooku and Sidious. The confrontation at the end suffers from inevitability, and I think it doesn't quite live up to what the rest of the book built up, but it's still....darn good. And I wish the book was longer.

That said, he's clearly new, and while he's obviously trying very hard to do his research, there's a few obvious errors. But they don't seem to be lazy errors, rather errors of misinterpretation.

I'd like to see more from him, but I don't think he's writing novels so much these days.

 

Oh, shut up, you!



Besides, I fixed it.

 

*Sets up shop and waits for Excellence to stop on by*

As for me, I really enjoyed DR. Although the final confrontation was pretty weak.

 

I liked DR because it had a lot more of the evil dark-side-ness I'd read in a novel in a good long time. Cheers to Stewart if Whie was taken from a kid in AotC or prior knowledge of RotS instead of being invented by him.

I liked the inclusion of the assassin droids from Jabiim, but didn't like the fact that Stewart frequently interchanged the CIS and the Trade Federation as if they were exactly the same thing.

 

Sean Stewart is, IMO, a very good author.
Dark Rendezvous, while some might dislike it (*cough* Excellence! *cough*), was very well-researched, and he did a good job of making Dooku seem human and not basically a lesser form of Palpy.

 

The only thing that bugs me is his whole take on the Jedi Temple and the thing with kids, for it was too Harry Potter, Hogwarts-sy for my taste.

 

Yeah. It should have been more along the lines of fraternities and sororities.

 

Stewart did one thing that will forever make me hold him in reverence: He made Asajj Ventress an interesting character to read.

 

I also liked his use of flechette launchers to kill jedi. Way more effective and sensible than Grievous and his magnaguards. No complaints here.

 

Stewart is, IMHO, very good at writing prose, but he's tripped up by his tendency to make things to Earth-y, too American. A lot of his name choices (both people and places) and idioms just pull you out of the story. He's also very good at exploring the psyches of some preexisting characters (which is in many ways harder than OCs) and adding depth to them. However, his OCs just seemed flat and cliche to me. They had potential, but it just didn't come off that well. He's also very good at dropping references in, but he has a tendency to over-rely on one reference instead of varying them.

That said, if he can work on his flaws, I think that he would make an excellent, top-flight addition to the stable of repeat Star Wars writers.

 

Actually, I'm not even going to bother. The storyline was a complete waste of credibility, the book itself was nothing more than another young adult / apprentice read, and you damn well knew Dooku wasn't going to defect, or even defecate. And writing every name in full and even with title every single time showed the formidable powers of both experienced editors and author. To comment further on this waste of paper would be a waste of time. For some it was a thrilling read, for me, it was pilot light of incentive to write again when I had burned out, and for that I soar with gratitude to the many books that continually and perennially shock me.

 

I liked the book. Stewart's offering was better than Jedi Trial or any Medstar book, that's for certain. It was an extremely cool read, and I'm glad I found this gem among the Clone Wars sludge. It was actually exciting, and the subplot was cool, even though you knew the end result. It shows that even a loyal Sith can be tempted . . .

I really wish he was one of the authors involved in LOTF. Not to go after Allston or Denning, but Stewart's lone book trumps all of Allston's and most of Denning's books.

 

I loved DR. It was the only book, Star Wars or otherwise, that I was able to finish in just over a day. Making it a record for me.

I really enjoyed how he combined numerous aspects of the Clone Wars and was able to make them all fit together for one amazing story. Such as the inclusion of the Dooku doppleganger from the New Droid Army game. I also thought that he hit all the charecters dead on and the conversation between Yoda and Dooku was one of the best EU moments in my book.

So in conclusion I would have to say I liked his writing.

 

I didn't like how Stewart shortend his writings. As a diehard SW activist, I think Iif you don't suffer sleep deprivation and gain bad eating habits, you havn't read a real book of the force. The commercialisation of our literature preturbs me.

 

Well I guess I'll revive this thread since I just finished this one, and all I can say is that it is an amazing, amazing book. The dialogue was just incredible, prose was beatifully poetic, characters were very fleshed out and Stewart made me care about them. The author really let you get inside the psyches of the characters. Also had some of the most humorous scenes of any SW book I have read; I was literally lol'ing at several points. He just nailed every character in the book, and had BY FAR the best Yoda characterization of any novel IMO (even better than the prequel films, which wrecked his character compared to the CT, IMO). For a book in which you knew Dooku would not change sides, Stewart really did a great job.

Nitpicks are minor: Kut-rate Kruises and the kids arcade were un-StarWarsy. Application of some of the joint locks were not realistic (but I practice Brazillian Jiu-Jitsu, so this is a very very minor nitpick that is actually negated because I loved the scenes describing the unarmed combat). The reference to Anakin killing Dooku's clone needed more back story, as this is a relatively obscure event.

Definitely one of the best SW books I've ever read, and I am VERY picky about what feel is quality SW lit. Please come back and do another book Sean!

Oh boy... it was completely blindingly obvious to nearly every soul who bought this novel that Dooku was not going to defect, yet for many it was still one of their favorite SW books of all time. If this was going to be a major problem for you (and obviously you knew it would be) you should never have picked up this book. Hopefully you have learned from this experience and will no longer purchase books with a plot that you know you will have a problem with.

So, by your own words, you pre-biased yourself to this book by believing it was not worth your time to read since the eventual allegiance of Dooku is already known, and yet you read it anyway, hence negating the validity of any criticisms you have and would put forth. But for the sake of overkill, I will continue to critique your criticisms:

I would recommend that if you ever read a book in which a full name that is used more than once, that you put it down immediately. For the vast majority, this is an incredibly minor nitpick that does nothing to take away from Stewart's incredible prose, dialogue, and characterizations.

For future reference, you should make the appearance of having no pre-existing bias (even if you do. I mean, how would we know if you didn't tell us ) before you decide to make an attempt to rip on what many feel is an extraordinary example of SW lit. I have skipped many SW books if I felt that the author was lacking, if the plot was not something I would not enjoy, or if it was based around characters that did not appeal to me. I personally wouldn't think of buying a book I know I won't enjoy, let alone reading it, let alone writing a review of it afterwards...

 

I second that.

Also, Ex: taking you up on a six-month-old post:

Eh... You must not have liked the prequels?

 

I just finished this book recently, so seeing as this thread's been revived, I shall add to it!

I really liked Dark Rendevouz, even though I can't spell it. There were some specific good and bad things in the writing style that I can point out, though.

Good
*I liked every single OC he wrote. Usually, I can't stand most of the OCs in a book, because they're just terrible cliches, too obvious in their motives, boring characters, or Mary Sues/Gary Stus. All his new characters were interesting and had their own distinct personalities, which was a great job on his part. I especially liked Scout.
*Obi-Wan and Anakin (though they were only in a few scenes), as well as Asajj, Dooku, etc were written well too, avoiding the 'if the OCs are good usually the canon characters are terrible' problem.
*"This is terrible. This guy is making me LIKE Asajj." My brother said that yesterday while he was reading the book, and it sums up my next point. He made Asajj interesting. He should recieve a medal or something for that.
*Vjun was an awesome planet. The whole idea of it was neat; evil and scary like Korriban without being a Korriban rip-off.

Bad
*The first of the book, until the spaceport, was very slow for me. I liked the tourny, but in general, everything sort of dragged while I was reading it until the spaceport fight. From then on, it was pretty good.
*Elaborating on above, the pacing seemed off in some areas. Some scenes were very slow and dragged on, and them some where over so fast I was like 'hey, what just happened again?'
*Everything was very... Earthy. Specifically, many things were rather French, which made my inner inability to spell or pronounce French words go cry in a corner. But really, some things were just TOO Earth-like. Or a lot of things were, but whatever.
*He seemed to focus so much on characters and plot (not that it was a bad thing; see the good points) that the technological parts seemed odd or only half thought-out. Though overall, it wasn't really important.

In general, I really liked this book and his ability to focus on the characters and their interactions so well. The setting and surrounding 'worlds' were kind of shaky for me, but that often happens when a writer's strength is characters rather than setting. In all, he did a very good job, and the book was very interesting for the insight it gave into characters and their motivations.

 

In tie-ins for movies where they have falcons and ducks, I'm more than willing to let other bits of Earth culture creep in too.

 

This thread topic is about someone in general, not a specific book. As my reading prowess begins and ends with just one sample, excusing myself from further discussion is sensible. He is, however, well known in literary circles, judging by the acknowledgement appearances in a diverse range of books. I'd like to see further discussion on a wider range of books, and how they compared to his SW one.