Read it, I'll give it 8 out of 10. I enjoyed it

 

Started reading this at long last! Took forever and a day to ship from the US. Two things:

1) Absolutely love the Mist Encounter intro!

2) Eli Vanto OMG lol. The dude's soul life goal, of which he is very vocal, is to be a space truck driver. He basically is pissed as hell because Thrawn won't let him join the venerable ranks of a intragalactic FedEx fellowship.

 

I have a question about the Chiss in the new canon. Spoiler for those, who didn't read the book.

Spoiler

So we know that they are a rare sight in the universe (expect you have a couple of female Chiss mercenaries lol). Anyways, how did the Neimoidians, which Thrawn encountered in the past, know about the chiss ascendancy? They wanted to make an allianz with them to fight the empire, but I thought no one really knows them. Did Thrawn told them about the chiss ascendancy?

 

I finally finished Thrawn.

I'm sorry to say it, but I didn't like it at all.

In spoiler tags...just in case.

Spoiler

At first, I read it slowly so I could actually understand Thrawn's reasoning and get to know the character better, and at that point I enjoyed it. But I honestly couldn't stand it after a while. It seemed as if the majority of the plot twists involved merely saying "Oh, remember this event? Yeah, it was planned." IMO, that's a very cheap and lazy way of making the plot "interesting." As careful as I had been reading it, I got to the point where I would skim through the "explanation" for what Thrawn was doing because it was like "Okay, yeah, he did something smart and everybody's awed." And I'm not a lazy reader. In fact I put more effort into absorbing this book than I have ever attempted before, but it was a disappointing waste of time. I only wish I would have read it faster so maybe I could have returned the damned thing and gotten my money back.

It was gimmicky, directionless, and poorly written.

I honestly don't mean to be harsh. I'm just saying it as I felt. I really really tried to like this book.

 

This...is the best description of his character I've ever read.

 

Spoiler

Good point!

 

A very cool clip to share with you today. If you've seen Tim Zahn at a convention over the last year or so, he has often told the story of meeting with Dave Filoni and Lucasfilm where he learned that Grand Admiral Thrawn was coming to Star Wars Rebels.
Now is your chance to see part of that meeting via a clip from a behind the scenes feature from the upcoming Rebels season 3 Blu-Ray
Shortly after this meeting, discussion began for the new Thrawn novel which Tim wrote and was released earlier this year.
Star Wars Rebels S3 comes to Blu-Ray next week and will contain a host of features. Check it out!

http://nerdist.com/star-wars-rebels-thrawn-exclusive/

 

Thanks for posting this Diego Lucas! I hadn't seen it yet. Very fun to see the moment where Thrawn's reappearance is announced! I actually read them out of order (like I read the newer Thrawn book before I read the Thrawn trilogy) but I remember how excited my husband got when he heard that Thrawn was going to become canon again and I can only imagine how thrilling it must have been for Zahn!!

 

I'm a little over half done with this now. I was aware beforehand that Zahn claimed Vanto was more the Watson to Thrawn's Sherlock than Pelly, but I'm not really convinced. Vanto's a bit of a dunce who Thrawn seems to be dragging around like a big bilingual dictionary so he can say all those important English words like "notwithstanding" and "verisimilitude". Pelly had a background similar to Watson -- he had literal wartime experience and had made a name for himself as a doctor, so when Sherlock teamed up with him there was a degree of mutual respect there because each had experience the other lacked.

Vanto basically... lacks? It's as if old Ben Kenobi didn't die and kept teaching Luke while he was working with Leia on Yavin back with his General Kenobi title and Luke's just tagging along while Ben blows up the Death Star and goes to town.

Wow there's a thought.

Oh right, Thrawn. Yeah Thrawn's teaching this little kiddo. It's not a bad story. It's not Sherlock, but it's not bad. Thrawn really hasn't been this deduction-savvy since TTT. And kuddos to Zahn for not going overboard with the art like the fan stereotype has become -- Thrawn actually uses other cues too. Ruthless practicality. Love it.

I question his taking on Vanto, notwithstanding.

 

I love Thrawn's relationship with Eli. Even after he quickly rises through the ranks, he relates to Eli as an equal. They're even college roommates! This book, for lack of a better term, humanizes Thrawn a great deal. Previous works showed Thrawn the untouchable god-admiral, this book is Thrawn the man.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

I think I liked how Eli humanised Thrawn more than I actually liked Eli himself. But maybe the character will grow on me if he ever shows up in future books.

 

Dude Sundic WTF I'm not done reading the book!

Blarrrrrg.

There goes my theory Vanto's gonna snap at some point. He's too much of a starry-eyed "yessir!" bumpkin. He probably watches Captain America promotional videos for breakfast.

 

Hey, at least your response works well with that new pouty Kylo Ren avatar.

(...Is "pouty Kylo Ren" redundant?)

 

OK so I really like Pryce in this. I still haven't seen the episodes she's in so I dunno how she matches up, but I'm a major fan of Zahn treating her like a normal person working her way up the employee ladder like a regular joe. Er. Regular Jane. Regular Jade. Regular Mara Jade.

Er -- ANYWAY I really liked that. She's not like the old EU lady Imperial officers who got their jobs by sleeping with superior officers (Daala, Tavira, strongly hinted Isard), or from their dad (Isard), or in the case of Sariss, both at the same time. Yeah she wasn't really an officer but she commanded stormies and I felt like putting that there. I ran out of Imperial women anyway. (that is not an invitation for one of you humorless geeks to name off obscure characters to show how much you know and miss the point of my post YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE.)

So yeah Pryce is like a normal person and I like it.

Except.

Except one scene near the end.

"I'm on the road to power now!" - p.278 when she turns bad

Like seriously... who says that out loud? Did she say it with a cackle? I bet she said that with a cackle. And Yularen's standing right there. I bet Yularen's expression was like "......................." because that was how I felt. Talk about a personality 180. That came from nowhere.

 

Book climax:

Zahn:

 

So, I just got the Barnes & Noble edition, and when I tried to remove the poster I accidentally tore it. Has anyone else had this problem? Is there some easy way to remove it that I'm not seeing?

 

I don't know and I'm sorry to hear you tore your book.

 

Pryce was always this way. She's like female Palpatine. To an outsider it feels like a personality 180 coming out of nowhere to see Palpatine going from saying, almost in tears, how much they "love democracy" to "Unlimited POWER!!!". But those in the know realize Palpatine and Pryce were like this all along.

 

Not the book, just the poster.

 

Oh, I am sorry to hear that too.

 

Loved the book.

Anyway, would the dates go something like this? What do you think?

9-8 BBY = discovery (1 week) + Royal Imperial Acad. (3 months) + Blood Crow (18 months under Virgilio; ~3 months under Rossi out on patrol) + Ascension Week
7-6 BBY = Thunder Wasp (1 year passes before Thrawn replaces Cheno; ~4 weeks of repairs & "alliance" with Pryce)

--Azadi is imprisoned; Tarkin gives Pryce the governorship of Lothal
--"...after nearly four years of serving with him..." (Eli)

(almost?) 5 BBY = Chimaera (is promoted to Commodore & Eli is given the promotion he wants, bless him)

--Pryce returns to Lothal (after "over a year" since the governorship), ousts Renking (3 months later); 1 month; then visit to Eriadu + Ascension Week
--Rebels S1 starts???
--4 BBY = Azadi escapes imprisonment (Rebels S2)

3 BBY = Botajef incident (is promoted to Admiral & is given the 96th Task Force; Thrawn has a "few months" to adjust to its command)

c. 2 BBY = Batonn insurgency (is promoted to Grand Admiral & is given the Seventh Fleet)
--Rebels S3 starts

 

Ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

but we see inside her head for several years, including her morals/values/dilemmas/etc. It's not until the end of the book where she snaps. There is nothing remotely similar to Palpatine here except the word "power". Which seems out of place when she says it because her background is entirely different.

 

I think I've figured it out: the poster was put in backwards. There's a serrated, tearable edge at the top of the poster, which in my copy faces outward. This is the edge that was supposed to be glued to the binding, so that the poster could be easily torn out. I seem to have a defective copy.