Being a star wars fan and avid reader I felt like I should give them a try, did some research and the consensus seemed to be that the thawn trilogy was the best, read book one and hated it for how one-dimensional the characters were, nothing at all noteworthy from a literary perspective
I read the Jedi prince series and then the thrawn trilogy as a kid and teen. Jedi Prince does not hold up as an adult lol but was really good for my age at the time.
One thing I will say about reading EU novels is that it made hate the sequel movies when they came out for just throwing away the beloved characters instead of the expanding on them.
99% Invisible had a mini-episode about movie novelizations. I think the Star Wars novelizations were mentioned in it, and the whole thing was rather interesting. Particularly where the author has limited info and has to guess about what might happen in the movie.
They aren’t going to change you view on life, but most are pretty solid. I highly recommend pretty much any books in the High Republic era, particularly “Light of the Jedi”. It’s the first of the new era and it’s a great introduction to the setting. It’s all set a few hundred years before the movies, so the Authors were able to pretty much do whatever they wanted within the basic Star Wars universe.
I’ve read a few over the years and always enjoyed them. They’re never amazing or anything imo, I’ve never run into one that knocked it out of the park or anything, but I’m not a huge Star Wars fan anyway.
But they also kinda get a baseline level of decent worldbuilding and natural conflict that keeps them from being dull or anything.
If I was, say, in an airport and needed to buy a book, it’s exactly what I would reach for if I saw it. Favorite was the one that followed and explained Mace Windu.
Add comment