Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

"The TIE wibbles and wobbles through the air, careening drunkenly across the Myrrann rooftops - it zigzags herkily-jerkily out of sight." And that was the moment when my eyes started bleeding. Numerous other reviewers have noted the poor writing style of Chuck Wendig. Those other reviewers are correct. This book is horribly written, with a jarring present-tense narrative. The characters are dull and formulaic... the tech genius teenager and his estranged mother, the regretful drunken ex-Imperial, the hard-as-nails bounty hunter. As I read, I found myself not caring what happened to any of them. Whether they lived or died made no difference to me, and that's a bad sign. The descriptions of the environment and the action reminded me of the narrative of a game master describing something to his players in a role-playing game. "It's a spare, severe room - red walls lined with manacles. In the middle, a desk whose surface is made from some Sullustian frozen in corbonite. On that desk is a blaster, a collection of quills in a cup, a bottle of ink. The room features only one other piece of furniture: a tall black cabinet, sealed tight with a maglock." (p. 142) I half expected Wendig to add "So, what do your characters do? Roll a perception check." What really depressed me about the whole mess was that there were moments I enjoyed, moments I wanted to see more of... only for the book to go back to the boring main story line about the cliched-band-of-motley-rebels-coming-together-reluctantly-to-stop-the-Empire. The interludes, which had nothing to do with the main plot, showed the effect of the Empire's fall on planets across the galaxy. While they weren't written any better than the rest of the book, they showed the reactions of people to the collapse of Imperial rule. A family dinner gone awry as siblings argue. Bounty hunters realizing they may not have much of a future. Politicians arguing the course of the future government. I found myself wanting them to continue, to see what might happen only for the chapter to end and the interlude characters never to be mentioned again. The only other exception was Admiral Rae Sloane, first introduced in "A New Dawn." I wanted to see more of her... an intelligent, reasonable (but loyal) Imperial who wasn't a stock character like the others. I'd like to see a novel about her, something written from the Imperial side as things fall apart. This is not a good start to Disney's new Star Wars post-RotJ universe. The company needs to hire a new writer who will write stories about characters and events that people actually care about. One with writing talent would be preferred.