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Any Star Wars fans here? Got a few questions about books :)


peteed

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I watched the movies when I was like 5 and honestly didn't understand much. I mean they put you in in the middle of a war and the movie just explodes from there with a group of people the movie is based on these "Jedi" are an ancient order thats about to go extinct

 

I just got the feeling that there should of been more before that to explain where Darth Vader came from and what Sith are and and who the wrinkly green Goblin/Gremlin was and that sort of thing.

 

Fast forward to today and me being a SWTOR player, I want to learn more about Star Wars so I go to Galaxy Bookshop the best Sci-Fi and Fantasy bookshop in the country and they can't even suggest where to start in the shelves and shelves of Star Wars books they have.

 

Figured i'd ask here about what book to start with?

 

Would many of the Star Wars books be on the Amazon Kindle store?

Edited by peteed
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I would start with Timothy Zhan's Thrawn trilogy. They have been collected into a single collection (Heir to the Empire: The 20th Anniversary Edition), but the first novel is Heir to the Empire, the second Dark Force Rising and the third The Last Command. These take place after Return of the Jedi and were among the first Expanded Universe works.
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As with anything that expands, quality seems to have dropped. The Thrawn Trilogy is certainly accepted as one of the best trilogies as far as books. One of my favorites was the ORIGINAL expanded universe novel by Alan Dean Foster (who novellised Alien) 'Splinter Of The Mind's Eye'. Tales of books are also very good and give you an idea of expanded universe writers that you may like.

 

As I said there are alot of novels out there not so good, e.g. As a classic Star Wars fan, most of Drew Karshyn's (sp) books don't appeal to me and Bioware lore of the universe is somewhat grating so again I'd recomend to avoid those. I'd also look at graphic novels such as The Golden Age of The Sith and if you can pick up the orignal Marvel comic series, you won't go wrong.

Edited by Caspian_Rho
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I would start with Timothy Zhan's Thrawn trilogy. They have been collected into a single collection (Heir to the Empire: The 20th Anniversary Edition), but the first novel is Heir to the Empire, the second Dark Force Rising and the third The Last Command. These take place after Return of the Jedi and were among the first Expanded Universe works.

 

incorrect. They take place 5 years after Return of the Jedi.

 

1st book that took place DIRECTLY after Return of the Jedi. Truce at Bakura.

 

Also the Rogue Squadron books are a good read, Courtship of princess leia happens after the X-wing books, then you have Timothy Zahn's trilogy. Though you don't have to read the inbetween books to pick up Zahn's trilogy. But it does fill in a few gaps.

 

I still am hoping that 7-9 is the Zahn books and they just use CGI like in Starship Troopers "Invasion" or find replacements for the original cast. But i think that is doomed.

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incorrect. They take place 5 years after Return of the Jedi.

.

 

You misunderstand me here. I said in the Expanded Universe. The first book was released in 1991 and the EU grew from there. There were at least two other novels before that (Splinter is one), and the Marvel comic series but the EU formed after the Thrawn Trilogy and the Dark Empire comics.

Edited by Gratulor
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Well what do you want to know about? What period of Star Wars interests you the most? I figure your more into pre-film periods rather than ROTJ and all that, you talk about the origins of the Sith and play SWTOR and that so I'd suggest the following:

 

The Bane Trilogy - by far the best of Drew Karpyshyn, and definitely one of the best Star Wars novels out there. It basically all about the beginnings of the Rule of Two and the Order of the Sith Lords. Bane was the first Sith to follow the rule of 'one master, one apprentice' and establish the Grand Plan which would eventually culminate with the destruction of the Republic and the Jedi at the hands of Darth Sidious, a descendant of the Banite line. Really exciting stuff, and really interesting if your interested in the origins of the Sith and just like the dark side in general. The first book is called Path of Destruction, then Rule of Two and finally Dynasty of Evil.

 

Darth Plagueis - many people refer to this as 'Episode 0'. Its not so much action based and more political, but still really interesting, really engaging and most importantly well written. Its all about Darth Sidious' master, Darth Plagueis and Darth Sidious' apprenticeship to him, and it takes you all the way up to the opening events of The Phantom Menace. Excellent read.

 

Grievous Intrigue - just started this one, not as good as Darth Plagueis (same writer) but still an excellent read. Its all about Anakin and Obi Wan and how they uncover the plot to capture Palpatine and learn of Darth Sidious. Again a nice filler in between the movies.

 

So far that's all I can suggest. If you want to know more about Darth Vader I'd suggest Dark Lord: Rise of Darth Vader. Also by James Luceno, the other of the two above. However I've heard its not as good and the characters are a little flat. But I'm sure you'll still enjoy it, I can just imagine how interesting the character of Darth Vader will be.

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As with anything that expands, quality seems to have dropped. The Thrawn Trilogy is certainly accepted as one of the best trilogies as far as books. One of my favorites was the ORIGINAL expanded universe novel by Alan Dean Foster (who novellised Alien) 'Splinter Of The Mind's Eye'. Tales of books are also very good and give you an idea of expanded universe writers that you may like.

 

As I said there are alot of novels out there not so good, e.g. As a classic Star Wars fan, most of Drew Karshyn's (sp) books don't appeal to me and Bioware lore of the universe is somewhat grating so again I'd recomend to avoid those. I'd also look at graphic novels such as The Golden Age of The Sith and if you can pick up the orignal Marvel comic series, you won't go wrong.

 

I have to 100% disagree with you. The books and comics you are describing are the worst of the worst, well other than a few bad decisions like the Star Wars Galaxies novel. They are terribly dated in terms of being old fashioned, poorly written/drawn and most of the ones you mention will leave this poor guy in worse shape in terms of understanding current Star Wars Cannon than never having read at all.

 

For example, Splinter of the Mind's Eye was a tie-in novel much like a happy meal toy as a tie-in. It was written with no regard for even the rest of the original trilogy and is probably the novel of most questionable cannon status.

 

For the OP, I recommend reading Heir to the empire first and following from there in chronological order. At whichever point you want, read the tie-in novels to this book. You might as well skip the clone wars era novels as they are also of questionable cannonicity at this point.

Edited by annabethchase
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I have to 100% disagree with you. The books and comics you are describing are the worst of the worst, well other than a few bad decisions like the Star Wars Galaxies novel. They are terribly dated in terms of being old fashioned, poorly written/drawn and most of the ones you mention will leave this poor guy in worse shape in terms of understanding current Star Wars Cannon than never having read at all.

 

For example, Splinter of the Mind's Eye was a tie-in novel much like a happy meal toy as a tie-in. It was written with no regard for even the rest of the original trilogy and is probably the novel of most questionable cannon status.

 

For the OP, I recommend reading Heir to the empire first and following from there in chronological order. At whichever point you want, read the tie-in novels to this book. You might as well skip the clone wars era novels as they are also of questionable cannonicity at this point.

 

 

While Splinter was on the shelf after A New Hope. I think the flavour of what I suggested is closer to the source than the EU after The Thrawn trilogy. Even if canonically it's considered secondary.

 

Regarding the poster that mentioned the X-Wing series - Stackpole's writing I felt was a bit too militaristic for me to enjoy within the universe. Although the comic was pretty decent.

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It's an excellent side-bar series. However, it's not core to what Star Wars is all about.

 

Not core? Umm, leads up to the courtship of princess Leia, how the Rebels took Courscant, and sets up the Zahn series, and there is book 9 which takes place directly AFTER Zahn's trilogy and you see wedge promoted to General. You see the trail of how Corran Horn becomes a Jedi, Wraith Squadron, who pop up all the time in the EU universe, hell there is a book after the legacy series that stars Wraith.

 

Has nothing to do with the core of the EU? Are you high?

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