Customer Reviews

Hard Merchandise (Star Wars: The Bounty Hunter Wars, Book 3)

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(17)
3 star:		(16)
2 star:		(12)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

This was a great conclusion to the series. I really was enthralled with this book. It had a lot of surprises which kept the story line interesting and suspenseful. I think that this trilogy was a good portrayal of boba Fett and for those who think not, Stop reading those stupid comics!! I have a point to make regarding these books. I am a blind reader who relys on the audio version of books to stay on top of current titles. Though the audio version of Star wars books are usually abridged, they usually come with sound effects and music which turns the book into a kind of audio movie. I think the trade off is worth it and would rather listen to an abridged version which basically tells the main story rather then read a full version with additional yet unnecessary passages. I say this because I find when listening to these books they really put you in the Star Wars universe and you don't get bored! Take my advise and listen to a few, you'll be glad you did!! Maybe then you wouldn't find some of SW books too long or boring!

Hard Merchandise : Star Wars: Book 3 of The Bounty Hunter Wars
by K.W. Jeter continues the story of Boba Fett, Neelah and Dengar after the battle on Tatooine. This book had the most surprises and was really unique in both the style and tone. I really enjoyed reading it. Overall the only problem I really had with the series was the characterization of Dengar as a not so brutal bounty hunter, something that takes away a little from the character. Other than that I have to give Jeter high marks for effort. He took the most mysterious and one of the most cherished characters in the Star Wars universe and crafted a well-written tale that did not totally destroy the perception of that character. Well done Mr. Jeter.

Hard Merchandise is the conclusion of K. W. Jeter's The Bounty Hunter Wars trilogy. Boba Fett is back in action, although lacking his beloved ship Slave I, and he wants to know who tried to bomb him on Tatooine and why. Adding to the mystery is a cryptic recording of the slaughter of Owen and Beru Lars by Imperial Stormtroopers that we saw the aftermath of in A New Hope. The specialized smell sensors used add to the recording a sign indicating Prince Xizor might have been involved in this tragic event. None of the characters really believe that's true, but Fett smells credits at the end of the trail and wants to find out where the recording originated and why someone would want to implicate Xizor.

I haven't mentioned much in my other two reviews of this trilogy about Neelah, the escaped slave from Jabba's Palace. This is partially because her story unfolds painfully slowly, and it's only in this volume that she gets any answers about her mysterious amnesia. When she does get them, they're not particularly revelatory. We also find out the extent of Kuat of Kuat's plotting and why he is so keen on having Fett eliminated.

The theme of Boba Fett as super-human bounty hunter continues even more strongly in this book. By the end, he's piloting a Star Destroyer by himself! His gaining the upper-hand in almost every scene becomes boringly predictable, and even when it appears he might have been bested by Black Sun at the climax, it's almost certain that he'll win when he takes on the entire organization, based on his characterization here. It's lucky for Dengar that he plans to retire, based on the competency level Jeter grants him.

I simply felt worn out at the end of this trilogy from the endless repetition of names, descriptions, dialogue, and character motivations. There are some entertaining sections and the kernels of a good single book lurking in here, but the trilogy is too drawn out for me to recommend.

I would not have read this novel except that I'm an avid Star Wars fan and nothing new had been released since "Isard's Revenge" when it came out. Well, I found the first two in this series lacking terribly and this book was no exception. Although it had its moments when I forgot that I was reading a second or third-tier Star Wars book, KW Jeter still makes too many mistakes. The space battles were not written correctly (evidently KW Jeter has never heard of ion cannons and only once, if memory serves, makes mention of shields) and we get still more of a jabbering Boba Fett who, although fooled by Xizor, is impossibly brilliant all-knowing and nearly all-powerful. How boring and predictable. The main plot is resolved to be gimmicky and downright lame. How anticlimactic. The idea that one of the galaxy's most powerful corporate heads could be bothered with the affairs of a bounty hunter to the degree that he was is ludicrous.

If you have not started this lackluster series, save it for when you are really bored. There are so many better Star Wars books out there. And, once again, the editors at LucasFilm have done a disgraceful job. Not only did they fail to head off or substantially fix the 'mechanical' errors in this novel, at one point a particular capital ship is referred to as a "Zebulon-B frigate." I'm NOT joking. It's on page 325. I wonder if they could spell i-n-c-o-m-p-e-t-e-n-c-e, eh? A better name for this would have been "Horrid Merchandise."

Well, Jeter did it again. He totally screwed up the Star Wars storyline. This entire trilogy has been a waste of paper, time, and money. In the first book, everybody acted stupidly. Fett talked way too much, Dengar was an idiot, and Bossk-well, lets not go there. The second book was pretty much the same. That's why Jeter spent the first third of Hard Merchandise trying to correct his mistakes. The first chapter has Zuckuss and 4-LOM paired up the way that they should have been through the entire series. But you never see either of them again. The first book was a plus when Jeter paired Fett and Dengar together the way that Tales of the Bounty Hunters describes. But he totally messed up when he broke off the partnership in this book. If he had decided to do any research, he would have seen that Fett and Dengar are still working together in Dark Empire. It is in that book that the partnership was terminated. The end scene when everything blew up was nice, but no one person can pilot a Star Destroyer through an exploding shipyard and manage to man the guns at the same time. You would need at least a skeleton crew of a hundred people to do what Fett did. Sorry, but as good as Fett is, even he couldn't do all of that. There is a lot more inconsistencies that I could talk about, such as Fett paying Bossk for the location of something, which he would never do, but if you want to waste your time reading this, go ahead. Personally, I would read Zahn or Anderson again.

Fett, Dengar, and Neelah find out answers to important questions that they've been thinking and talking about endlessly since The Mandalorian Armor.
NOTE: Based on the novel (read years ago) and the audiobook.

I Liked:
The mystery that is the meat and bones of this novel is fascinating. As I read Boba Fett talking to Kuat of Kuat and relating it, I was actually impressed with the detail and intricacy that Jeter put into it (even as I was frustrated at the same time). I liked how the enemy wasn't the Empire, wasn't the Hutts, but a new person completely.
Once again, when Jeter does include an action scene, it is a good one, well-written, very appropriate for his characters.
Also, I really did enjoy reading adventures about Fett, Dengar, and even Kuat of Kuat. Fett is really well-done (if too talky and too perfect), Dengar is a really relatable character (I love his relationship with Manaroo), and Kuat of Kuat really proved to be an interesting character...

I Didn't Like:
but couldn't the characters just shut up once and awhile? Every scene is littered with endless talking, talking, talking or thinking, thinking, thinking. Fett and Dengar visit Kud'ar Mub'at and they talk. They learn nothing of value, but they talk. Then Fett and Dengar visit Balancesheet and they talk. They learn they have to go back to Tatooine, where they meet Bossk. Boba Fett and Bossk meet at opposite ends of gunpoint and they talk. Finally, Bossk hands over the falsified evidence to Fett and Fett is off to KDY. Then Fett, Dengar, and Neelah get caught by KDY and chew the fat with them. In between, Neelah thinks, moans and gripes about her lost memory. Because I was listening to the audiobook, I started toning things out or yelling at the narrator (God bless his soul) to stop talking already! It seemed like people would do something...and stop to talk about it. While they are talking, they would stop to think back on the history of something. Then they would talk. Then they would do something. And on and on and on until I wanted to strangle myself.
Bringing Kud'ar Mub'at back to life was lame. If he's dead, he's dead. I don't care what species or other lame excuse you use to bring him back. Plus, his scene was completely worthless.
Neelah was a freaking annoying character who I wanted to die. I also wasn't fond of how her sister was so evil and all that jazz.
I wasn't that fond of the overemphasis placed on the Battle of Endor or the falsified evidence of who killed the Lars family. Let's keep our Big Three in their own stories and leave them out of the side stories like this one. We have enough stories with them int he limelight.
And Boba Fett talks too much!

Dialogue/Sexual Situations/Violence:
Little to none.
Other than Neelah being a dancer (yes, I know it's annoying, but if you read the book, you'll find it does the same thing), nothing.
Fett and Bossk face off. Kuat Drive Yards is destroyed.

Overall:
It's a pity. There is a good story, a good mystery hidden in this trilogy. But the unfortunate thing is the trilogy is hidden behind people TELLING you the answers instead of the characters SHOWING you the answers. And that's the biggest crime: Jeter tells you, doesn't show you. He doesn't show the investigation, he tells you through Fett expositing how he learned such-and-such by doing this-and-that, which never is shown in the book. He doesn't show you Xizor planning, he tells you his plans through Xizor yapping with Palpatine and Vader. Sometimes an author has to exposit, can't show a scene, or doesn't want to repeat a whole scene again (the typical "X told Y about Z"). That is completely okay. But when an entire trilogy is one long expository dialogue, it is more than tiring, it is painful.
Unless you are a Boba Fett fan and are eager to read him talk, skip. Hopefully, a different author will come along and write a much better Fett-centric story in the future.

Brought to you by:
*C.S. Light*

Hard Merchandise by K. W. Jeter is the last book of a trilogy about the Bounty Hunter Wars, i.e., a three-part series about the indestructibility of Boba Fett. As I explained in my reviews of the previous two books, I have no problem reading stories about Fett. I think he is an extremely interesting character. His skills are amazing, and he always seems to know just what to do. I just wish another author had written the stories and had condensed them to one book. There is not nearly enough material here to warrant three books. As a result, the books are crammed with analyses of everything the characters are thinking. We just don't need explanations of what the characters are thinking before they perform some amazing feat. The story itself, although way too complicated, could work if it were left to stand on its own without all of the filler.

In this last book of the trilogy, Boba Fett stumbles across evidence that appears to implicate Prince Xizor in the murder of Luke Skywalker's aunt and uncle. Fett realizes that the evidence is a deception, and he sets out to find out who was behind it. The trail eventually leads him to the Kuat Drive Yards, the giant spaceship yard that builds all types of new vessels for anyone with sufficient credits. Neelah and Dengar are still trailing along with Neelah playing a major role once things get cleared up. The plot is extremely convoluted but eventually plods along to an acceptable conclusion.

I cannot recommend The Bounty Hunter Wars highly. The plot is interesting at times. Boba Fett is fun to watch, and you will know more about all of the bounty hunters when you're done. That's about it.

Okay, I... thought this trilogy had the makings of a great read. If you don't expect too much, the three books are suitable for, say, reading in the bath tub. It has the mysterious Boba Fett in it - good - I do think Jeter could have said more about Fett's background, and who he is.

On the downside, Jeter does ramble - at great lengths. I've read War and Peace...so if I found Jeter's lengthy explanations to be boring, they must be bad, eh?! I won't go into the monotonous repetition of the word 'barve', I think enough reviewers have taken care of that one. His characterisations were weak - one of the cardinal rules of writing an extension to an existing series (or in Star Wars' case, an existing universe!) is to make sure your characters' personalities match up with the ones previous authors have already given them! Boba Fett's long paragraphs were out of character...much like, say, giving Spock (in a Star Trek book) an excited, emotional personality.

And as for the ending in this third book - are you sure it's a trilogy? It ended as a cliff-hanger - how will Fett handle this Black Sun conspiracy?! If there is a book to come, it's the perfect lead into it. If this was the last book, then Jeter has seriously botched it.... My mental jury is still out on the Neelah storyline - it didn't seem to be woven in to the main storyline properly, so it sits a bit oddly.

Jeter is a good writer (do check out some of his original books), but I don't think he is right for the Star Wars universe. I'd like to see Zahn try his hand at something about Fett.

Although many people find this book to be lacking greatly, I thought that it was quite detailed. All of the important bounty hunters are closely examined, including, of course, everyone's favorite, Boba Fett. I started reading this book first--hey, I didn't know it was a series--so I do not know anything about the first two, but oh well. The plot was perplexing enough. The characters were pretty cool, actually, like the leader of the Rebel Scavenger squadron that is staking out KDY, and the giant space spider thing that Boba Fett crashes Slave I into. Some of the action is detailed, too, like when Slave I is being blasted to bits. You can accurately visualize the ship disintegrating. Plus, it has Star Destroyers in it that get stolen by the Rebels, which is cool scene. Even if you haven't read the first two books, you should read this one, because it is one of the best Star Wars books I have ever read.

While K. W. Jeter's series is not close to the quality we have expected from the Star Wars universe, his two previous books have managed to keep readers reading with plot twists, Prince Xizor, and the big question of what the heck is exactly going on. Who is Neelah? What does Kuat of Kuat have to do with anything? How will Dengar and Boba Fett's partnership end? Finally, all of these questions are resolved in Hard Merchandise. Undoubtly the best of of the book cycle, Jeter manages to neatly tie everything up, with an ending where I could actually hear John Williams' score in the background. However, the problem with the series is, why wait so long to make the series so good? Why is it that even when Boba Fett finally explains everything, the reader is plagued by paragraphs of pointless thought as the characters analyze every word spoken? Also, the characterization of Boba Fett has been altered to some point, and there are several noted incosistancies within the series. If you can sit through reading the first two novels, then you will definitely feel well rewarded when you finish this one. A great end to a more or less mediocre book cycle