John C
I\'ve loved pretty much all of Zahn\'s previous works and was thrilled to see more exploration of Thrawn\'s \'origin\' story. Unfortunately, this particular endeavor left me wanting and as the first audiobook version, I had very mixed feelings about the interpretation.
Regarding the audio production, the effects and music were initially nice at enhancing the atmosphere, but eventually felt very artificial and looped. For the most part, the mixing/balance were quite well done; that said, there were a few more \'intense\' scenes of combat or tension where the dramatic music or explosions almost overwhelmed the dialog. The chapter headings did help break apart sections and the narrator was able to use distinctive voices to help clearly identify who was speaking. However, many seemed more caricature than character, falling to very modern and worn stereotypical speech patterns. Worse, some of the aliens were so heavily processed to be nearly unintelligible. (The description of one such voice is, admittedly, both musical and grating; however, I would gladly have sacrificed some of the \'realism\' for something easier to understand and less likely to make me want to pull my earbuds out until that passage was over.) Finally, Thrawn\'s near-constant inner monologue as he \'reads\' his companions and opponents is distinguished from his dialog with a well done echo filter, but becomes *extremely* repetitive.
*** Spoilers Follow ***
First the good: Thrawn is one of the most complex and interesting characters in fiction and this certainly extends that impression of unparalleled strategy and tactics. The introduction of the Chiss Ascendancy as a concept and Eli Vanto as Thrawn\'s aide and protege definitely got me hooked and left me wanting much more; hopefully, a series of full novels will explore both. Nightswan also is an intriguing foil and, in my opinion, should have been given a little more time for development. Or maybe this is just a teaser...
Now the bad: As noted, structurally, Thrawn\'s musings and analysis are initially compelling to show his process of sizing people up with body language and his near-infrared spectrum sight. Similarly, using Vanto as an expository device effectively provides a way for Thrawn to explain his tactics and strategy. However, after a few chapters of this, the former becomes extremely tedious and repetitive and the latter simply artificial. Nevertheless, both still work within the structure of the novel.
Alas, I cannot say the same for the treatment of Arihnda Pryce, who gets plenty of development, but all highly unlikeable and not very compelling or believable. For all the premise of her extremely savvy politicking and willingness to do anything to advance her power and career, this IS the Star Wars universe we\'re talking about and I cannot buy her not getting a blaster bolt through the head much past a third of the novel. She is pretty naive in combat and dirty tricks and, as we\'ve seen in the Clone Wars animated series and elsewhere, many rivals would have taken her out through poison or treachery rather than risk her further manipulations. Most of the supporting cast of her threads were equally uninteresting and I felt like that entire portion of the book was tacked onto the more engaging Thrawn/Vanto storylines as a contractual afterthought that the author had little investment in.