Wraith Squadron (Star Wars: X-Wing Series, Book 5)
by Aaron Allston
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Book Summary Information
Author: Aaron AllstonReader: Anthony Heald
Edition: Audio Cassette
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Format: Abridged, Audiobook
Published: 1998-02-02
ISBN: 0553478885
Publisher: Random House Audio
Book Reviews of Wraith Squadron (Star Wars: X-Wing Series, Book 5)
Book Review: Readable, lightweight, and disposable.
Summary: 3 Stars
First: I did not like Stackpole's X-Wing novels, even though I persevered through all four of them. I dislike nearly everything about Stackpole's style, so I bought "Wraith Squadron" at the local thrift shop with an open mind, thinking that Aaron Allston's attempt could not be much worse. And I was right: Mr Allston is not a worse writer than Stackpole, and in fact he has far fewer annoying stylistic tics, and the humor is a refreshing change from Mr Stackpole's deadpan seriousness.
However, it takes more than a readable style to make a good book. The basic problem with "Wraith Squadron" -- and the entire X-Wing series -- is that they somehow manage to avoid space combat. There are more dogfights on the covers of these books than on the pages. In this book, Wedge recruits a new cadre of pilots to be a sort of flying commando squad, so they spend most of their time infiltrating, spying, and sneaking about, and occasionally flying their X-wings for a page or two. I was a kid in the mid-Nineties who loved the X-Wing computer game, so I expected something similar from the books, not all this amateur espionage stuff.
The second problem is one of characterization, and this is as true for the whole series as for this particular entry. Mr Allston improves over Stackpole by making it into a proper ensemble cast, whereas Mr Stackpole focused exclusively on boring old Coran Horn. Except we still get a hero, angst-ridden Kell Tainer. Kell is smitten with a fellow pilot, Tyria Sarkin, and the romance proceeds like something out of a John Hughes movie. None of the characters is really convincing as a battle-hardened fighter pilot waging an endless galactic war. At least some of the other members of the ensemble are colorful and kind of fun, like a former child actor and a slippery former surgeon. Additionally, there are quite a few exotic aliens, who all tend to occupy that uniquely Star Wars territory of 19th century racial archetypes transplanted into outer space.
So that's about all I have to say for this series, which I have tried to enjoy for what it is, but which has totally failed to entertain me. If someone actually wrote a starfighter-based book that bore some resemblance to the battle scenes of the movies, then I'd be right there eating it up. As it is, we've got adolescent characterization and plots that read more like thrillers than war stories, so I'm not sure what the point of it all is.
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