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[ManaByte]

http://www.starwars.com/eu/lit/novel/news20050322.html

Since 1991, fans of Star Wars literature have wondered about the mysterious Outbound Flight project. This Fall, Del Rey and author Timothy Zahn will reveal all.

First briefly mentioned in the watershed novel, Heir to the Empire, Outbound Flight was an ambitious project that sent an expeditionary mission of six Jedi Masters, 12 Jedi Knights and 50,000 men, women and children beyond the borders of known space to make contact with intelligent life. It was the brainchild of Jorus C'baoth, but even so influential a Jedi Master had to navigate the cumbersome Republic bureaucracy to get this monumental proposal approved.

With the foiling of a murderous plot, C'baoth gained the influence he needed to get Outbound Flight underway. In truth, this turn of fortune was carefully engineered by Darth Sidious, the shadowy Sith Lord who wants Outbound Flight to begin, and ultimately, to fail.

The mission is doomed from the start, for lurking within Unknown Space is the Chiss Ascendancy, and the brilliant alien mastermind who will someday become Grand Admiral Thrawn. Not even the presence of Obi-Wan Kenobi and his young Padawan learner, Anakin Skywalker, aboard the gargantuan vessel can avert disaster.

Star Wars: Outbound Flight by Timothy Zahn is slated for a hardcover release on October 25. Here's a look at the cover art by Dave Seeley.

 

[Dan]

Wait, now Anakin and Obi-Wan were aboard this flight? Goddamnit. Is this pair going to be involved in everything big while they were alive? This reeks of Zahn trying to pad his creation into some even more important event than it was originally. Not only is it the virtual birth of two of his own characters, now Anakin and Obi-Wan are in the mix. Meh.

Zahn, I loved your first trilogy. It kicked ass on its own and introduced a ton of cool stuff to the universe and sparked a whole massive onslaught of further adventures. Everything after that though, it's just been about stroking your own ego by randomly re-inserting your own characters into the storyline with no respect for how other authors have developed the universe.