Mercy Kill was Ocean's Face's Eleven, though, and as such exempt from genre misdirects.

Heck, it was more Ocean's Eleven than Scoundrels.

If they were going to go for an Ocean's Eleven style feel I think they should have called it Wraith Squadron: Mercy Kill rather then X-Wing: Mercy Kill. I was a good book but it didn't feel anything like the X-Wing novels to me. Even when the Wraiths were undercover during their X-Wing trilogy they were doing as many missions in fighter cockpits as they were commando ops.

I did like the cameos in !ercy Kill though. Lara Notsil, or whatever her current name is, was a nice touch. The original Wraith series was very good at making you care for the characters as they were being tortured by the war.

Yeah I didn't hate the book but I still feel it was the worst of his Star Wars novels.

I think his worst was probably the second Fate of the Jedi book, Backlash. I hate the first of his Legacy of the Force books, Betrayal, because the ending of that book was so gratuitously cruel, but I thought it was a really effective book and very interesting. Backlash was simply really boring.

The thing for me is that I went into Mercy Kill expecting a lot more from it then I was expecting from Backlash.

Very true. I guess it just worked better for me.

Fate of the Jedi in general was so bad I didn't even finish it.

On a more positive note: Lords of the Sith was a pretty solid book. Kind of left me wondering how in the world Luke was a threat to them.

His best book was IMO Starfighters of Adumar.

I personally preferred Solo Command. Getting to see Han commanding a fleet in combat from the bridge of a warship was awesome IMO.

Fate of the Jedi was a pain in the neck. It was supposed to be lighter, and Allston's books were lighter, but Denning just took it all the way back to "super dark" in Apocalypse. I still love Conviction, but mostly for the character moments, not for any larger story.

I haven't read Lords of the Sith, mostly because I don't see it eclipsing Dark Horses's "Betrayal" storyline in their Empire comic book line. That wasn't a perfect line, but it was a really excellent and dark look at pre-A New Hope Vader and Palpatine.

I go back and forth on Allston's best book. Sometimes I say Adumar, because really, it is amazing, but Solo Command is a really fantastic finale that wraps things up that built for two previous books in an incredibly effective way. It depends on what mood I'm in, I guess.