Lit Finished the Stackpole X Wing Books

I just finished the first 4 X-Wing Books: Rogue Squadron, Wedge's Gamble, The Krytos Trap, The Bacta War. The Stackpole Quadrilogy, the Bacta War Arc, the Corellian-Isard quartet, whatever they're called. I would love to hear whatever other names they have. They were good, but I couldn't say they were great. Not meh. Nice, light reads. Spoilers for a nearly 30 year-old book series, released from 1996-1997. I guess this thread is just to get my thoughts out here on the books, share yours as well.

I finished the first two and then took a year off before finishing the last two. They both kinda function as couplets, with the 1st book, Rogue Squadron, introducing the characters, the conflict, the formula. Basically Wedge and co. are going to take Coruscant. Then the 2nd book, Wedge's Gamble, has them taking Coruscant. The 3rd book is then more transition work that gets us to our finale, The Bacta War. They all feel a little different and a little similar, so taking that year off between the two halves wasn't that bad. Finished each book in less than a week, very light reads that flows rather well.

The big elephant in the room with these books is not Rogue Squadron, not Wedge Antilles, not even the X-Wings. It's Corran Horn. I did not like him until the 4th book. He starts out rather juvenile, with some angst but a lot of picture perfect character traits. Corran is written to have that extremely desirable archetype - former detective whose dad was a detective, ace pilot, fighting the Empire, gets all the ladies, Jedi. It is a good thing that Stackpole didn't write a movie character like this.

I guess I am glad that this wasn't a rock-hard military science fiction book. Corran adds some levity. Really, all the Rogues add some levity, but Corran gets the most POV chapters. And by book 4, he matures, he completes his character arc, and I'm happy that he's happy. Also, in book 3 he escapes from prison and Luke asks him to join him as a Jedi. Book 4? He fails a lot, squabbles with his future-father-in-law, and loses out on the final kill. I mean, he gets married too and still succeeds a lot, but definitely gets knocked down a peg and feels a little more real.

The villains are all around solid. I don't sympathize with any of them, other than everyone wanting to escape Isard. But each of them still have motivations for being evil, you know, they still feel like real folks and not cartoons. Kirtan Loor is the standout, moreso than Isard. She is the driving force, the main antagonist, but I do feel like she was trumped up a bit. A good character, just not really there until the last episode. Like the Emperor. But yeah, Loor's inner monologue, his POV, probably the best written stuff. You just feel the scum coming off this guy. And I love that he's physically just a "Tall Tarkin." lol

Then there's Wedge, Rogue Squadron, and the X-Wings. They're just about the entire rest of these books. I wanted more Wedge in the 1st book, but then I found out there was a whole 30 issue comic line about Wedge written by Stackpole before this and realized that's where all those stories were. No wonder Corran was the protagonist here. The Rogues are fun but their moments are few and far in between. Didn't care for Gavin. Ooryl was the standout. The X-Wings themselves, also a bit OP. I just remember how many times one gets vaped in the OT, but then I figured most of those pilots were rookies. Of course, in these books everybody is an ace who vapes somewhere between 8-20 eyeballs and squints. That's not a criticism; I am glad that Stackpole kept Rogue Squadron in character. I do like them a bit more when the Rogues are on the ground ("out of their element") or just chatting over dinner. The dogfighting scenes are inventive at first. Other types of action scenes tend to be better.

Some thoughts on each of the books:

Rogue Squadron - Meh, the most forgettable, but I think it set up everybody well. Not many new characters after this one. Can't exactly skip it. The Great Filter.

Wedge's Gamble - I was too hyped up for Coruscant. It was very creative how they took it. I am glad that it wasn't just, "And the Empire had 30 Executors but we had our X-Wings and after 30 days we won!" I am interested in that story but this one was better. It is harder to remember all the details - probably my IRL time skip isn't helping. It just didn't make me want to pick up the next one, despite the cliffhangers.

The Krytos' Trap - Well now things start getting good. Some plotlines are getting their conclusion or moving into the 3rd Act, the litigation was kinda a drag as was the politics and prison time. Some characters get some flesh on their bones. The trap itself is another smart move and all the NR's responses. Has the best plot twists, even if you see them coming.

The Bacta War - Now we're at the 3rd Act and "you better wow them in the end." Nice to see this didn't take the form of "And the Empire had 30 Executors but we had our X-Wings and after 30 days we won!" Instead, it's 1 Executor and a little smarter than that. I still want to see that story but I would have to write it myself methinks. Finally felt like Wedge vs Isard. Corran calms down and grows a bit. Almost could be a standalone book. I get the sense this was going to be the climax of book 3, but he had too many good ideas and figured out a way to get 2 books for the price of one. They both still stand on their own really well.

Some final words:
So um yeah... it's military sci-fi. Top Gun In Space. Hyped up? Sure. Overrated? Eh, depends. It is commercial fiction. It does have its audience. Personally, I feel like if I was 23 years old in 1996 I would enjoy this a lot more. Or maybe just 5-10 years younger than I am now. The whole atmosphere around Star Wars has changed, too. This comes from a more hopeful time. All the books get (mostly) happy endings. I grew up more with the Prequels and Star Wars still had some charm. And there has been a lot of attempts to reclaim that feeling. Theses books are pretty good at getting you that. But again, I can see why some people would love this and others be more meh with it. In the "About the Author" blurb Stackpole does say he typically gets a book done in 200 hours. Which is not bad at all. I wish I could do that. Doesn't mean everybody would like what I had written, but I am sure some masterpieces of literature were written in that timeframe.

So yeah, this gets, idk, a 7 out of 10? a 76 out of 100? I'm no English teacher or movie critic, so can't really say much about the score. Here's to the Allston X-Wings!

 

Stackpole did do another X Wing book Isards Revenge and he also did IJedi which was a Quasi Prequel he did in conjunction with Timothy Zahn and his Hand of Thrawn Duology. I'd be interested in what you thought of those.

I always thought Corran was a self insert character by Stackpole but I could be wrong

 

I think Stackpole was the only one to officially play live action Corran in the old EU.

Might not be an intentional "self insert" character, but a character he felt really strong about after writing for him after so many novels. Corran's arguably the character he wrote for more than anyone else in his career.

 

I plan on getting around to the later Stackpole books when I get to them in the timeline. Before Isard's Revenge I have Allston's Wraith Squadron Trilogy, Courtship of Princess Leia, and TTT. Then DE and JAK before I, Jedi. And the rest of the Bantam era before HoT. The Bantam Era is one I am not caught up with yet. Maybe I'll post my thoughts on all the EU books that I have read up until this point.

And yeah, I imagine Corran is a self-insert. Stackpole's face was even used to model Corran's, which I don't mind. Raphael used DaVinci's face for Plato because it's convenient. I think Zahn dressed up as Karrde a few times. We are supposed to insert ourselves for Corran too. He's an avatar for most Star Wars fans - he's got an X-Wing, an R2 sidekick, a lightsaber, and now he's married to a smuggler. There's nothing wrong with a fantasy book giving us a good fantasy. Although I have heard this develops into every Jedi being like Corran around the NJO books. But eh, I'll see if I can get there.

 

I actually think of the first three books as a "taking of Coruscant" trilogy, and the fourth as something of a standalone (while still obviously being integral with the rest of the series).

 

Wedge kind of bookends the X-wing series. He's the main character in the comic books you mention, and then he's the main character again in Starfighters of Adumar. Basically, you see his earlier days in the comics. Then you see him raising two batches of X-wing pilots in the novels - Rogue Squadron, then Wraith Squadron - who understandably take more of a center stage. And then he returns to the spotlight again in the last book for a more intimate story that's kind of his mid-life crisis.

(Technically not the last book, but Mercy Kill is thirty-one years later with an almost completely new cast and set in a radically different context).

Curious to see how you feel about the Allston books. I read the Stackpole books when I was in my last year of high school and loved them, but couldn't get into the Allston books for some reason; I love them now, but it took me a few more years before I read and really appreciated them.

 

I was kind of semi opposite. I enjoyed Stackpoles plots but honestly some of the dialogue is pretty awful. Lots of monologues and winking at each other while Corran being the best at everything can kind of grate after awhile. Just for once I wanted him to lose or be beaten but he never does.
Allston otoh had fantastic dialogue, I could read his conversations all the time and his characters never felt like supermen insert characters that Corran was

 

Well, just finished the Wraith Squadron books by Aaron Allston and the Courtship of Princess Leia by Dave Wolverton. The "2nd X-Wing Quadrilogy" or the "Zsinj Saga" or the "Kettch-verse." Altogether much more enjoyable than the Rogue Squadron Quadrilogy. I started reading back in February and finished Wraith Squadron in a couple of days. But I took most of March and April off, only finished Solo Command and CoPL this weekend. Personally, if you read the 8 books in order then each one is a little better than the previous one. Allston's books lived up to the acclaim and CoPL was a surprise hit. Spoilers from here on.

Wraith Squadron was very solid. A much better opening to a series than Rogue Squadron. The ensemble cast was handled better, each member of the squadron getting their moments and being a little better fleshed out as characters. Kell Tainer was something of the main character for this one, his arc about overcoming his father's desertion was a nice central thrust to the book. Admiral Trizyg was not the most memorable villain - typical Imperial officer fare. I was not wholly impressed by him or his demise - but he is the Wraith's first enemy, a warm-up to the final boss. Still, a single X-Wing squadron against a Star Destroyer? I guess it was a bit of a fluke, but these books don't stop Rogue Squadron's habit of making the heroes unbeatable. I also found his description of the Night Hawk (Corellian Corvette the Wraiths captured) to be a bit confusing. There's no way a ship of that size can hold that many fighters and the orientation of the bridge was messing with me. It still is a fun romp, a good action-adventure page turner for the evening or weekend. The best parts of the book are not the setting or main conflict but the characters and their relationships. There are some fun ideas but if you took out Piggy, Runt, Kell, Tyria, Wes, Wedge, Myn, etc. it would not really be Wraith Squadron without them.

It was two months ago when I read this and I've been engrossed in studies, so there's definitely somethings I have forgotten about it. Some general things about this series: I am glad that despite it being military sci-fi it still has levity. Allston does a good job at managing tone and shifting that around. I liked how Zsinj has some intelligence operation in each book - which both links it to the earlier X-Wing books but distinguishes them thanks to Zsinj, more on him in a bit. His planets are not all that memorable. Off the top of my head I can remember Aldivy, Binring, Halmad, and Selaggis Six - I don't think any of them come from this book. And they are fairly generic - forests, farms, factories, ruined settlements, etc. Even when there's a city it's fairly copy and paste human stuff. If you took away the TIEs and plasteel, it'd just be Earth. I suppose Stackpole's books fall into this last complaint a bit, although he tends to at least give some galactic importance - like Coruscant (the capital of the galaxy), Thyferra (the capital of the big pharma), etc. It's a bit harder for me to remember that the Wraith's blew up a repulsorlift factory on Halmad in the 2nd book. In fairness, having all these planets does make Zsinj's empire feel like a large polity that the New Republic could feasibly be struggling against.

Moving onto Iron Fist... Pirates! Alien experimentation! Really dumb Star Destroyer defeat! It has it all. Um, the deaths felt harder in this one, I guess. Actually that's just another general point in favor of Wraiths vs Rogues. Cubber, Ton Phanan, Falynn, Jesmin Ackbar, That Bothan Slicer > Lujayne, That Wolfman, That Bothan, [Insert Rogue?]. I think I read this one more intermittently than all the others. It was nice to see Face come into his own as a leader. Zsinj as the main villain was an improvement, even if he is a bit of an enigma. I can't decide if I liked him more as a villain than Isard. I'm leaning towards him besting Isard (as a character) but Kirtan Loor is a bit more poignant if not repulsive. One thing I liked about Zsinj was how he kept ordering people's deaths and then we never see said deaths. Made me wonder if he was joking or not and then thinking that even if he was, that's pretty messed up. That whole final battle... I wanted to like it but the crucial act was just so anti-climatic. Just sneak in as TIE and blow up the bridge shields and the battle was basically won. One of the less imaginative endings Allston has for his battles. At least there was some capital ship action but still. Fighter combat only goes so far for me, it really does start to feel the same after this long. That's another reason why I think the interpersonal drama is what really holds up these books - the whole bit with Wedge and Fel, with Gara and the Wraiths is more what's keeping these books together than the X-Wings.

Solo Command's best part is that it has Han Solo and he's just a secondary character. Still very important, in command of the fleet, but it's nice to have a Big Three without a whole character arc. Han just wants to do his job and get out of here. The Pethothel arc starts to consume this book but at I liked the way Iron Fist was taken out in this book compared to the previous Star Destroyer deaths. Still, the ensemble nature of previous books is be lost a bit here. Felt more like a plot beat by plot beat flow to the story than previously. I would say the entire Binring sequence is probably the single best part of the series. The subplot about brainwashing aliens to be assassins was the best scheme Zsinj had, something that was being set up all along, and was probably the best opening chapter in this series. All in all very solid, just many of the things I talked about previously apply here as well.For the three books I would give them an 8/10, maybe an 82 on average.

CoPL was the best of the four. I know it was written first and I would say the other 3 books do a great job of fleshing out the whole Zsinj thread. If not for the Wraith Squadron books I might rank CoPL a little lower since Zsinj as introduced is just a prop, some random bigshot Imperial. That's because he is not the focus of this book, more like a looming threat overhead. The Hapans and Witches are the focus and they are superb. Yoda's quote "repulsed by the witches" will stick with me. I have been anticipating them for years which doubtlessly impacted my enjoyment of this book even more. I read in the back that Wolverton is well-known for creating these otherworldly places and cultures and I can tell in CoPL. He just creates this nice niche that fits in with the Star Wars galaxy while still being its own thing. A nice contrast to the Wraith Squadron books, although there Allston is playing to his strength of character dynamics. Even in CoPL the characters are well-written and rounded. Isolder, Teneniel, Gethzerion, all worthy additions to Star Wars. I liked Luke's entire interaction with the Force and explaining it to others - you felt his growth from ROTJ. Same with Han and Leia - both a little more mature and hardened after a few years at war and politics. Threepio's quest to be matchmaker was nice - "Han Solo, what a guy! Solo" Fun stuff.

The Witches though - great new faction. I can see why later writers and creators keep pulling up Nightsisters left and right - the evil witch is just too big of a staple in fantasy and too easy to use. Wolverton gives an excellent introduction of the concept into Star Wars. Han and Luke really felt like they could die. Luke reminiscing how even Vader never actually was trying to kill him as opposed to the Nightsisters. It's nice to have a new faction of force users and despite some stupidity - assuming all men are weak, dumb battle plans, vulnerability to everything in space - they still feel like threats. Wolverton is very good at pacing. Just giving us a brief description, letting us chew on it for a second, and then advancing the story. It's another thing that puts CoPL above the 7 X-Wing books for me. Isolder and Teneniel with their various conflicts and alien cultures feel more well-rounded and real than Corran Horn or Myn Donos. Of course, the final easy kill of the ISD still gets me. Now that I see where it comes from, this 1994 book, it's easier for me to dismiss it as a trope. Now all those ISDs and SSDs that go down in the 7 X-Wing books have the excuse that "CoPL did it first." It's a little more forgivable.

Probably the book's biggest weakness is that the whole courtship of Princess Leia is... I don't know how to describe it. Wacky? Off to the sidelines? It's definitely there, throughout the book, just maybe overshadowed is the word? And the weirdness with Han reverting to being a scoundrel and abducting Leia with mind-control... maybe I just don't know what love is! But that ain't right! In general, Leia's part in the story is not minimal but for having her name on the cover you'd think it should be more. She does some diplomacy and makes her decision, partly on impulse, partly on the combined experience of the adventure, and in the end sticks with Han. I can see why some people don't like this book. I'm still sticking with it being the best Post-ROTJ book chronologically up to this point. I guess that warrants a 8/10, maybe an 88. Let's see if the Heir to the Empire can claim that throne.

 

Great reviews
Have you done Isards Revenge and Star Fighters of Andumar ?
And the big one IJedi ?

 

I think Allston is superior to Stackpole in a lot of ways, probably most ways, but the battle scenes are one place where that's not true - they generally leave me indifferent.

It doesn't help that some of it, like a Mon Cal cruiser going head to head against not one but two not Star Destroyers but Super Star Destroyers just... breaks the suspension of disbelief for me at some point. Booster's move at Thyferra with all the weapons locks and torpedo tubes nearly did the same thing but it just barely squeaked by for me, because it's not an actual battle, just a gigantic bluff: I can just manage to believe that Booster really is that convincing that he can make the Imperial officers lose their nerve. But in this case it isn't a bluff, the battle actually happens and Mon Remonda actually does get pounded by two Super Star Destroyers simultaneously, so instead of "... I'll allow it," my reaction was just "oh, come on."

It might actually be my favorite Han portrayal in this time period. Much as I love the guy in the Han Solo Adventures and the Han Solo Trilogy and various other stories from before or during the original trilogy, it always felt like the EU didn't really know what to do with him after Return of the Jedi. They want him to continue being the fun badass smuggler getting into fights in cantinas and narrow escapes in the Millennium Falcon forever, but they never really feel like they let him move on to other things and greater responsibilities like Luke and Leia did. This is one of the few times that he did. (And you get to see that he is, in fact, pretty good at the bigger responsibility of commanding a battle fleet, even if he hates so much about it).

 

This was back when SSDs were 8,000 meters long. Still big and deadly but less...crazy to picture. For reference, I prefer 8,000 meter long Executor-class Star Dreadnoughts.

 

The problem with 8000 meters is it doesn't match what we see onscreen in ESB and RotJ. Vader's flagship is clearly about ten times the size of the regular 1600 meter SDs. If you want to envision other SSDs as half the size of Vader's Executor, that can help some.

 

Wasn't the Razor's Kiss crewed only on the bridge by the infiltration team and the rest of the ship was sealed off, full of Imperials loyal to the central government? So it's guns aim would be whatever they could manage from the bridge in a hurry. More of a light show than anything really effective.

 

I’ve been reading the Bantam Post-RoTJ books in chronological order so far. I’ll see if I make it to Isard’s Revenge, I was thinking of skipping to the Jedi Academy Trilogy. I’m definitely reading that before I, Jedi.

That and their main goal was just to escape. Zsinj would have ignored the Mon Remonda entirely if Solo didn’t position her in their flight path. I also recall Razor’s Kiss having some engine and shield difficulties which I would think is more important than engaging offensive combat.

 

We have an oversized bridge tower and extremely small CR90 in ROTJ. And CW animation wasn't all that great at keeping size consistencies either.