IDEAS OF WHAT NEW DEL
REY NOVELS COULD DO
From next year, the licence for Star Wars related novels
has reverted back from Bantam to Del Rey. In my opinion, I feel
that Del Rey needs to reinvent the 'Expanded Universe'. Nearly
every year after the Battle of Endor up until 'The Hand of
Thrawn' duology there has been some major crisis; I think that
this time period has been jam packed enough, and other events,
times and places need to have their stories told. I think that by
now, the idea of a new superweapon or someone trying to bring
back the Empire has grown a bit tired. Thankfully, Timothy Zahn
has tried to bring conclusion in his latest novel - 'Vision Of
The Future', with a peace treaty signed by the New Republic and
the Empire. This novel, easily one of the best so far has created
avenues that future story weavers can follow. We now know that
the Unknown regions were mapped by Thrawn, and his race are now
known - the Chiss. It would be great for stories to be located in
that area - find new enemies, etc . . . something to replace the
Empire. Zahn hinted that the Chiss have important family
structures and traditions, so to explore that more in depth would
be cool. Add to the fact that Luke Skywalker and Mara Jade are to
be married, that in itself leads to story possibilities. George
Lucas has set the time period of +25 years after 'ROTJ' for the
fabled sequel trilogy. Ok let him have that, but why not have
story arcs 35, 40 to 50 years after 'ROTJ' when Anakin, Jacen,
Jaina Solo and Luke and Mara's eventual children are grown up and
Jedi Knights. Are why not go one further, why not have stories
set around 4,000 years after 'ROTJ' - like an opposite to the
'Tales of the Jedi' comic series, in this case, the adventures of
Luke Skywalker are fabled tales of myth, etc . . .
One area I would LOVE to see covered, is for Del Rey to do
a giant novel (500+ pages) about the formation of the Old
Republic and the Jedi knights! That would be one of the best
ideas so far to do, and it is a good example for what I mean -
explore new area's, and not be bogged down in a ten to twenty
year time period. With the advent of the prequels, we will have a
ten year period between Episode I and II, and a year period
between II and III. This opens up story opportunites, but I hope
that it isn't flooded and saturated like at present. I think that
is a good point, the Star Wars market is a bit flooded at the
moment. I would be happy with around four major Star Wars novels
a year with the quality of Timothy Zahn. Getting back to the
prequels, characters like Qui-Gon Jinn and Mace Windu can have
their back stories told. I would also love to see Del Rey go out
on a limb and experiment with ways of story telling that are
untried. 'I, Jedi' is a great example of what I mean - a story
told from the first perspective. If we do have to go over old
ground with the Empire, why not have a story from the BAD guys
point of view! That would be cool, I don't believe that has been
done in mainstream science fiction before. Imagine a story in
Palpatine's point of view, etc . .
I hope that this has given you something to think about,
maybe we should drop Del Rey and email or two to their site and
give us their opinions. I think it is our right as a fan to have
input where are loved 'universe' is headed, after all, we pay
their wages by buying their books!
Until next time!
MTFBWY