As a preparation for the new movie, I read several Star Wars novels. One of them stood above the rest in it´s sheer awfulness. R. A. Salvatore´s "Vector Prime" was this waste of forest. Not only does Chewbacca get killed, it has an alien invasion ship that "scientists" believe to be an asteroid. Asteroid that travels faster than light. Star Wars has had often problems with astronomy - Empire Strikes Back has this monster inside an asteroid, which doesn´t make any sense (but SW asteroid belts seldom do when compared to their real life equivalents, in density etc) and in the Attack of the Clones Dooku´s ship looks like it has a solar sail, but it seems to have absolutely no use for it, etc - but this book beats all that has come before. The "asteroid" is only a top of an iceberg. Big iceberg,

Steven Barnes´The Cestus Deception started well, but then lost steam as the book progressed. And it didn´t really feel like Star Wars. Of course, Barnes is an apprentice of the evil Dark Lords Niven&Pournelle, which might have had something to do with my opinion of the book. But still, this book lacks in atmosphere and was was written by an author who didn´t seem to be comfortable with the Star Wars universe.

On the other hand, "Survivor´s Quest" by my favorite Star Wars novelist, Timothy Zahn, and "Tatooine Ghost" by Troy Denning felt both like "true" Star Wars. They had the right atmosphere, the feel. "Survivor´s Quest" had Saint Mara of Jade, but she was less irritating than usually, and Zahn gave more room for Luke and less time for his own creations. Of which I hope the smugglers all get cruel and senseless ends in future books. "Tatooine Ghost" binds the prequel trilogy with the original trilogy and it is in it´s own right a little gem of a book. The rodents are irritable, but a little nuisance in the end. Both books also have the adventage that they don´t have any loose Imperial superweapons.

Lastly I read Steve Perry´s "Shadows of the Empire", whose comic version I read some ten years ago. It is a book whose action happens just before the Return of the Jedi. The heroes are searching for Solo and Vader is searching for his son. Solid work, has the right feeling, the author knows SW universe, but Luke comes out a little bit weak. He´s more the rather backward farm boy from a backward planet that we see in A New Hope than the experienced Jedi knight in ROTJ. Still, it´s no "Vector Prime".