Lit Heading into the Denningverse for the first time (DNT, LotF reading journal)

Well that went over my head

 

Vestara fundamentally is out for herself. She doesn't want Kesh found, or her family harmed. But she won't die for Allana, she won't sacrifice Ben for a Jedi she never met.

She's selfish in the sense that she will not put her neck out for just about everyone else. She isn't altruistic might be a better way to put it. Not revealing Kesh's location actually doesn't demand that much of true selflessness-she just refuses to say. Or give up the information.

Also we should distinguish between culture and character here-Vestara is more selfish as a matter of her sith upbringing, she obviously isn't a remorseless dark lord or cackling sorcerer utterly disinterested in life apart from their own, but caring about people, helping people especially strangers is anathema to how she was raised.

That isn't to say she doesn't in some way resent this-her "letters" to her imaginary father shows that the harsh and empathy-less nature of the Sith has indeed brought a toll on her. But in the end(so far as FOTJ is concerned)-Ves will not give herself up. If you ask her to die for Allana or a bunch of Coruscanti civilians, she won't do it. Ben Skywalker-whatever you might say else about him was raised and is different in character that if self sacrifice is necessary he will do it.

 

No she won't die for a stranger. Neither will Han by the time of ANH, Ben almost killed a kid when he was 14. But the heroes don't treat them anywhere near as bad as the jedi do Ves.

She won't throw her life away for nothing, but the jedi expect her too. They dam her for not wanting to for the same people who have hunted and held her captive.

Spoiler

Ves has to go against literally everything she has been taught and to help people who have been her enemy, not just in a theoretical sense, but in a practical sense. Luke and Ben killed people close to her. They hunted her, they held her captive. To think that she would just accept their views in a month is unrealistic.

But we can discuss this more when she arrives.

We still have to get to Betrayal.

 

The answer is "Denning has a terrible sense of humor." He seems convinced that constantly inflicting obnoxious, grating idiots on the reader who operate on bizarre logic and irritate the protagonists is hilarious. See the hilariously zany Squibs constantly reappearing, the hilariously incompetent Juun and Tarfang becoming master spies, the hilariously illogical Killik nonsense-reasoning . . .

 

That makes a lot of sense. I have much less of an issue with the Killiks' weird nonlogic for some reason -- I guess because they're the enemy and that makes it feel less pointless and more frightening in an "angry child with an axe" kind of way. Having an enemy that's hard to reason with and whose alien logic you have understand before you can deal with them is a nice scifi touch that I can get behind.

 

@cthugha you might give your post a quick EDIT

 

I like the Killiks as a concept too -- the idea of a sentient enemy you can't reason with, especially combined with all their other features, makes a compelling challenge to the Jedi -- but Denning definitely finds all their brrrrbbbrrrrrbbbbbbbing and arm-rubbing a way more entertaining and "hilarious" gimmick than it actually is. But the Killiks work because they're an opponent to overcome. The Squibs and his own personal Jar Jars in Tarfang and Juun are so much more obnoxious because they're not really framed up as this genuinely alien culture that provides an overarching challenge to our heroes -- they're characters who act like obnoxious idiots without any excuse and are presented as bad, poorly-integrated-into-any-serious-setting comic relief. "Hahaha, Tarfang and Juun fly an unmaintained deathtrap! Hilarious! Hahaha, they're brain-dead but now they're basically the GA's leading spies on the case because they bumbled their way to success! Hahahaha, the Squibs show up literally out of nowhere in Han and Leia's way being jerks for the forty-sixth consecutive time!" It's seven-year-old humor.

 

Denning's idea of humor seems to be about eight years older than seven a lot of the time. Or rather "serious" writing.

Anyway-I like the idea of the Killiks as antagonists but not villains. Because generally the Killiks aren't malevolent. Basically make them a less malevolent Borg with the joiner business, that could have really been interesting. They are so different and too much contact with them leads to joining(which is not good for the Joiner as an independent being) could have presented some interesting and intense dilemmas.

 

So to be frank, the rest of this book was a slog. Not sure how much of that were my personal circumstances versus the writing or the plot, but I found it hard to get through it and harder to enjoy. That's weird, because I liked the space battles in the last part, and the big one here was even mostly comprehensible, with some picturesque ideas like the splintering moon full of bugs or the Chiss space fleet going down into the atmosphere to give ground support. But somehow none of it connected - not the predictable retread of the Alpha Red plot from NJO, not the forced Jaina-Jagged encounters that keep happening throughout this series without ever going anywhere (seriously, this is not a narrative arc so much as a scatterplot) -- not even the lightsaber battles, which Denning managed to at least make interesting (in his own hyper-violent way) in the last two volumes. I kept waiting for Luke to use the promised Force Lightning (he didn't, right? or did I accidentally skip over that part?) or to do anything interesting at all, but apparently the climax was him throwing a bugcruncher droid at Lomi, gloating about his trick with the hospital ship and then quartering her while quipping all the time.

So, what, that was the plan he convinced Bwua'tu with earlier? Seems… thin.

I think it was two things that made this hard to like. One was the sheer obtuseness of everyone involved - everyone is constantly hard-headed, confrontational and petty, whether the situation (or the established characterization) calls for it. The other was the railroading and narrowing of the plot. The trilogy set a few interesting things in motion and posed some interesting questions - like the role and internal structure of the Jedi Order (though frankly after every other NJO book retreading that issue it is getting rather stale), Jacen's relationship with everyone and the Force, Zekk and Jaina's struggle to hold on to their individuality as Joiners, and/or to reclaim it afterwards, in contrast to Raynar's journey and Lomi Plo's dark side variant of it… all of those would have been interesting to see resolved, or at least developed in a meaningful way. Instead all we get is Luke quadrisecting Lomi Plo and knocking out Raynar, and an epilogue featuring snarky Leia being snarky.

Lomi Plo in particular I felt was underused. She's a Nightsister with a rich backstory and previous relationships with many of the heroes, who went through a series of traumatic experiences and came out on top of an utterly alien situation - but here in the end, none of this seems to matter. She could have been anyone, any random Darksider, some generic end boss for Luke to slay and be done with it.

Now here's the thing. My original motive for doing this, for venturing into this part of the EU I'd previously ignored, was to get a better sense of Lumiya. Being the slightly neurotic completist that I am, I decided to tackle the Dark Nest trilogy first… but now I’m worried. If Lumiya gets the same treatment in Legacy of the Force as Lomi Plo got here, I will be very disappointed.

On the other hand, LotF was a multi-author effort, so here’s hoping for something more than I’ve gotten to expect from Denning. I know I’m looking forward to reading Aaron Allston’s take on this era in “Betrayal” next.

 

I’d say Lumiya gets better treatment than Lomi Plo. But that’s just my opinion.

 

Even Alston couldn't make Betrayal a success for me

 

Nah, I bailed after Betrayal.

The entirety of LotF relies on the reader buying Jacen will go dark, which had been sprawled on a wall since DN2, and that its civil war idea works - neither of these did.

Did like the mention of Ziost and Darth Vectivius was an interesting idea, but that was about it.

 

Well Disney had their shot at a Solo going bad, and I'm not sure even after reading 'Rise of Kylo Ren' that they did any better with their take than LFL did with Jacen.

 

I held on after LOTF and hoped. Then got FOTJ and realised there was no hope left for the franchise until the Disney buyout and reboot. Aside from the Aftermath trilogy, Dark Disciple and even Bloodline (which I'm currently reading), I have found little to no issue with the new books.

 

Yeah FOTJ killed any hope fore good post NJO stories.

SWTOR was good though.

Charles Soule is a much better author than Denning though.

 

@AusStig

I'd argue that eventually though went off the rails a bit.

 

Yes it did. But it it back on track now.

 

There were a couple of good post -NJO ones - I liked Kemp's duo. It may not be his best, but Allston's last work, Mercy Kill, was great.

 

Legacy of the Force - Betrayal!

This should be fun. Let's dive right in.

Luke is having a bad dream, of a bad guy who "doesn't exist". That's odd... who could it be? Wonder how long it'll take for that to be revealed. Prediction: long.

Raynar's still alive, locked in a cell under the Jedi Temple.

...aaand there we go, prediction falsified. It's Jacen, right? And he's even there right at the beginning of the next chapter, walking through death and destruction.

In this chapter, Jacen is clearly enjoying his power - and teaching Ben to do the same. It feels a lot like a James Bond prologue, with all the chasing and sliding down the side of skyscrapers and classic postcolonial interventionism. A nice ride in all, and I suppose it serves its purpose of making Jacen and Ben relatable. So far I feel very well entertained.

Next up is Han and Leia in their new Sky House fantasizing about shooting their guests. Their guests, it turns out, being their families a.k.a. the full hero roster.

Awkward.

Apparently Cakhmaim and Meewalh are still around, presumably marking a new record in honor guard life expectancy. Am I the only one who finds it disturbing that these guys get less character development than the droids?

Han still doesn't like Zekk, but Allston apparently does, making him seem like a nice and relatable guy. I also like the digression about the Vongforming of Coruscant and the resulting "fuller shadows" - that makes me want to see new Coruscant adventures in this era, taking full advantage of the storytelling opportunities there.

Meanwhile, Han has been getting a case of the Opinions in his old age. That could explain some of his and Leia's homicidal banter at the beginning of this scene - in their case, inviting family means inviting galactic politics into the house, and that does not seem to be the best thing for their relationship right now.

The rest of this chapter and the next is almost pure exposition in dialog form. The basic conflict for the series is drawn up - I can see a government overreaching in terms of standardization and central control during the flush of postwar reconstructionism, even if the idea isn't terribly original - and we get a provisional villain in Corellia, which apparently has been secretly constructing a war fleet for ten years.

This is fine. Using Corellia as a galactic antagonist seems like it has potential; the Centerpoint plot device is getting a little old, but I appreciate the connection to Anakin. And while I've complained about this era's small-galaxy syndrome before, I actually prefer the use of an established economical powerhouse like Corellia in this role to the alternative of telling us some other big player we've never heard of has been around all along. (Like the d'Astas in Crimson Empire, Bornaryn Trading in YJK, …)

So with the stage set and the characters all ready to go, I'm actually pretty excited about this series for now -- or this book, anyway. Let's see what happens.

 

I really like the opening of this book. As you say it is like a James Bond Opening "Do you wax your beard? Put butter in it." "not getting enough food at the temple?" The dinner is good "Zekks not Family" "Not yet".

This was the first post NJO novel I read and I really enjoy it.

The conflict between the Government and Corellia is interesting, since neither is portrayed as wholly right.

 

Also, it's one of the few depictions in the post-ROTJ EU of an event that naturally grows out of its background, rather than being an old conflict that drags on (NR vs Empire in the Bantam Era) or an outside context villain (Yuuzhan Vong, Dark Nest, Lost Tribe of Sith, Abeloth).

 

Yeah and it also comes from a real place. The last war was devastating, so people would want to make sure they were better prepared, but of course other disagree. It felt more real than most conflicts.

 

I can't wait for when you get to the later chapters.

 

I'll wait till he reaches Invincible.