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A review by gmvader
Order 66 by Karen Traviss
5.0
Female writers in the science fiction and fantasy field are fairly rare. One's that are any good are even more so. (This is not because women are bad writers it is because of Sturgeon's Law.)
Star Wars books tend to be an extreme subset of this culture. There are books by female authors but each one seems more painfully confused than the last. Kathy Tyers was quite good (thankfully, since she started off the whole Expanded Universe thing). Kristine Katherine Rusch was very good – she usually is – but only wrote one book. Then we were forced to trip through Barbara Hambly (the only Star Wars books that I have not been able to finish), Vonda McIntyre, K. W. Jeter, A. C. Crispin and Elaine Cunningham.
Then Lucasbooks released a book by a new author, Karen Traviss. To make things worse the book was a novelization of a video game for the XBOX. So now we have a tie-in novel for a video game in a tie-in universe. With some trepidation I picked up the first of Karen Traviss's Republic Commando novels and found myself living inside this universe in a way that only happens with the best of writers.
Karen Traviss is somewhat of an enigma to me. She writes books about science fiction militaries. She worked as a secretary to the British Minister of Defense for a number of years so she knows how soldiers think and act. She also writes books very fast – about three months each – but with never a word out of place. The dialogue always feels real and her writing flows smoothly. The dichotomy comes from the fact that Miss Traviss does not read. She hates reading and hates books. She gets her entertainment from television and movies and refuses to read.
Star Wars: Republic Commando: Order 66 is one of the most emotionally powerful books I've ever read. The story opens with the two Mandalorian Sergeants Kal Skirata and Walon Vau standing in the hangar of a clone trooper barracks on Coruscant reciting the names of all the fallen clones who died four years before at the Battle of Geonosis. Skirata and Vau trained the clones and adopted them as their own children.
The book is about the Commandos in Delta and Omega squads as they struggle to find meaning in a war that they are being forced to fight. Jokingly they call themselves wet-droids and give each other nicknames. Their names usually have to do with their serial number (Fi, Niner, Sev), some are representative of their personalities (Boss, Scorch, Fixer), others are Madalorian words (Darman, Atin). Each of the clones is unique.
Skirata, obsessed with saving his boys from their accelerated aging, has acquired all of Ko Sai's research into genetics and is looking for a new researcher, and a way out of the Grand Army of the Republic for his clones.
Anybody who remembers Order 66 from the Star Wars movies will know that this book is a tragedy. It moves toward the climax with a weight that tugs at every scene. The clones are stretched to their limit. Skirata and Vau are caught between the Jedi and their own agendas to save their adopted clone children. Darman, one of the clones in Omega squad, is married to Etain, a Jedi Knight and she finally tells him that he has a son. Atin struggles to overcome his hatred of Vau who abused him when he was younger in order to “make him tough enough to survive.” Niner just wants to walk straight and follow orders but he's torn with his loyalty to his 'father' Skirata and his loyalty to the Republic. Fi, reported dead after a near fatal head-wound fights with his own lost memory and coordination to become the man that he once was.
Then comes the moment when Chancellor Palpatine speaks the words that mean the death sentence of all Jedi. Darman, Niner, Atin and the others are hurled into chaos and pain that they were never given a chance to sign up for.
Karen Traviss's writing is as solid as ever. Her greatest strengths have always been the emotional impact of trauma on individuals and the great, realistic characters that she writes about. I have found myself thinking about the characters in these books as real people, comparing them to others that I meet.
Dialogue and description are some of the best I've read. Karen Traviss has woven a tapestry of culture and history into the Star Wars universe that makes sense out of the new movies and brings an emotional weight to Star Wars that it has been missing for... maybe forever.
Karen Traviss and her Republic Commando books are among the best Star Wars books out there and stand as shining examples to the world that just because it's Star Wars doesn't make it garbage. Order 66 is the best of the bunch and answers two questions that get repeated over and over. Can Science Fiction have good literature? and Can a tie-in book be good Science Fiction? The answer – according to Miss Traviss is “absolutely.”
(9/10)
Star Wars books tend to be an extreme subset of this culture. There are books by female authors but each one seems more painfully confused than the last. Kathy Tyers was quite good (thankfully, since she started off the whole Expanded Universe thing). Kristine Katherine Rusch was very good – she usually is – but only wrote one book. Then we were forced to trip through Barbara Hambly (the only Star Wars books that I have not been able to finish), Vonda McIntyre, K. W. Jeter, A. C. Crispin and Elaine Cunningham.
Then Lucasbooks released a book by a new author, Karen Traviss. To make things worse the book was a novelization of a video game for the XBOX. So now we have a tie-in novel for a video game in a tie-in universe. With some trepidation I picked up the first of Karen Traviss's Republic Commando novels and found myself living inside this universe in a way that only happens with the best of writers.
Karen Traviss is somewhat of an enigma to me. She writes books about science fiction militaries. She worked as a secretary to the British Minister of Defense for a number of years so she knows how soldiers think and act. She also writes books very fast – about three months each – but with never a word out of place. The dialogue always feels real and her writing flows smoothly. The dichotomy comes from the fact that Miss Traviss does not read. She hates reading and hates books. She gets her entertainment from television and movies and refuses to read.
Star Wars: Republic Commando: Order 66 is one of the most emotionally powerful books I've ever read. The story opens with the two Mandalorian Sergeants Kal Skirata and Walon Vau standing in the hangar of a clone trooper barracks on Coruscant reciting the names of all the fallen clones who died four years before at the Battle of Geonosis. Skirata and Vau trained the clones and adopted them as their own children.
The book is about the Commandos in Delta and Omega squads as they struggle to find meaning in a war that they are being forced to fight. Jokingly they call themselves wet-droids and give each other nicknames. Their names usually have to do with their serial number (Fi, Niner, Sev), some are representative of their personalities (Boss, Scorch, Fixer), others are Madalorian words (Darman, Atin). Each of the clones is unique.
Skirata, obsessed with saving his boys from their accelerated aging, has acquired all of Ko Sai's research into genetics and is looking for a new researcher, and a way out of the Grand Army of the Republic for his clones.
Anybody who remembers Order 66 from the Star Wars movies will know that this book is a tragedy. It moves toward the climax with a weight that tugs at every scene. The clones are stretched to their limit. Skirata and Vau are caught between the Jedi and their own agendas to save their adopted clone children. Darman, one of the clones in Omega squad, is married to Etain, a Jedi Knight and she finally tells him that he has a son. Atin struggles to overcome his hatred of Vau who abused him when he was younger in order to “make him tough enough to survive.” Niner just wants to walk straight and follow orders but he's torn with his loyalty to his 'father' Skirata and his loyalty to the Republic. Fi, reported dead after a near fatal head-wound fights with his own lost memory and coordination to become the man that he once was.
Then comes the moment when Chancellor Palpatine speaks the words that mean the death sentence of all Jedi. Darman, Niner, Atin and the others are hurled into chaos and pain that they were never given a chance to sign up for.
Karen Traviss's writing is as solid as ever. Her greatest strengths have always been the emotional impact of trauma on individuals and the great, realistic characters that she writes about. I have found myself thinking about the characters in these books as real people, comparing them to others that I meet.
Dialogue and description are some of the best I've read. Karen Traviss has woven a tapestry of culture and history into the Star Wars universe that makes sense out of the new movies and brings an emotional weight to Star Wars that it has been missing for... maybe forever.
Karen Traviss and her Republic Commando books are among the best Star Wars books out there and stand as shining examples to the world that just because it's Star Wars doesn't make it garbage. Order 66 is the best of the bunch and answers two questions that get repeated over and over. Can Science Fiction have good literature? and Can a tie-in book be good Science Fiction? The answer – according to Miss Traviss is “absolutely.”
(9/10)