SWGC: Why did you create the Wraith Squadron?
MS: Bantam and I agreed that bringing someone else in to handle the characters I'd developed would be tough, so we decided to give the next author the same shot. That it turned out to be Aaron made me very happy.
AA: Mike recommended doing a series taking place at the same time as his first four X-Wing novels. It would involve a new squadron put together by Hobbie and Janson and their efforts against the Warlord Zsinj, who was featured in The Courtship of Princess Leia and peripherally in Mike's novels. Though Mike had pitched that idea some time ago, apparently it hadn't been seen by everyone who needed to see it. When they did, Lucasfilm let us know that the X-Wing novels all needed to feature Wedge Antilles -- a decision I certainly agree with. So I had a choice: Try to refit everything I'd done onto Rogue Squadron, or scrap it entirely and come up with an entirely new plot for Rogue Squadron, or have Wedge take a temporary leave from the Rogues and form a new squad. Obviously, I took the latter course, and restructured the Zsinj story so it would fit in the few months between the end of The Bacta War and the beginning of Courtship.
SWGC: You both bring real humor to the Star Wars universe. Is that an active attempt?
MS: Definitely. Star Wars has a very strong humor streak in it, and I love writing comedy. I can't imagine a world where there are no jokes. And writing funny stuff isn't easy -- in fact, it's often harder than the straight stuff.
AA: I'd say "active" is the right word. Humor is hard work.
SWGC: Corran Horn and Tycho Celchu from the original series, as well as Ton Phanan and Garik "Face" Loran, have become cult heroes, each with their own following. Are there people in your lives who you pattern your characters after?
MS: No, Corran and Tycho just grew out of the roles I needed for the books. I tend not to base characters on folks I know, because if a character has to die, I don't want a friend becoming upset about it.
AA: Face and Phanan aren't based on anyone in particular, though people have likened them to Hawkeye and B. J. from the M*A*S*H series. They're inspired by a tradition of wise-guy protagonists, including Nick and Nora Charles, anyone from a Howard Hawks movie and many others.
SWGC: Wraith Squadron introduces Voort "Piggy" Sabinring, a Gamorrean, and the Ewok lieutenant Kettch. How did these characters come about?
AA: Piggy was an experiment for me. A lot of writers deal with outsider characters, and Piggy is, in a sense, the ultimate outsider. The Empire doesn't like him (he's a non-human), the New Republic doesn't know what to do with him (they want to be non-human-friendly, but he belongs to a species that mostly causes trouble) and the Gamorreans want nothing to do with him (to them, he's an alien). He's trying very hard to make a worthwhile life for himself and not to sink into the self-pitying, bad-mannered personality pro-file of the disaffected loner. He may think of himself as doomed -- he is, after all, the first and last of his kind -- but wants to leave behind a legacy that proves his worth and inspires others in a way that he could not have been inspired. So, internally, he's quite complicated, though this isn't necessarily evident to his fellows. As for Kettch, he's the focus of a sense of surrealism that is inevitable in any high-stress environment.
SWGC: Each time the character Runt appears, I keep seeing that large orange monster from old Bugs Bunny cartoons. What exactly is he supposed to look like?
AA: He's more equine than anything else. Fortunately for me, a helpful artist by the name of Amy "Amara" Pronovost sent me the same question and some follow-ups, then generated a picture of Runt that comes pretty close to my mental image of him.
SWGC: What happened to Mynock, Wedge's R2 unit?
MS: Mynock got its memory wiped and software upgraded, so it became Gate (R2-G8). I did this because all over the place it's noted that R2-D2 is unusual, in that he doesn't get wiped. Whistler, Corran's R2 unit, doesn't get wiped either. Because wiping droids is a stan dard in the universe, I had to show it happening, and Mynock was the only droid I had with a personality (albeit a lousy one). I know some readers viewed that change as something akin to murder, but that's how the universe works. I think of it as intensive cyber-psychotherapy.
SWGC: What types of references did you use for the various characters?
MS: I just play off the films and the scripts and other novels.
AA: To keep the characters from the movies consistent, I envision my dialogue coming out of their faces from the movies. For instance, I put everything Wedge says through Denis Lawson's face and voice. As a secondary consideration, I try to imagine what sort of people those characters have to be -- rather than what they sometimes appear to be -- in order to do what they've accomplished.
SWGC: What other types of Star Wars projects would you like to take on?
MS: I'm pretty much game for anything. I love the universe, and there are a lot of stories to be told here.
AA: I'd like to do stories about New Republic in telligence -- somewhere between Star Wars and James Bond -- using characters originating outside the movies.
SWGC: What other projects are in the works? MS: My new BattleTech novel, Prince of Havoc, and my fantasy novel, Eyes of Silver, are on the racks. Next spring will be Isard's Revenge, and late in '99 or early 2000 look for The Dark Glory War, another fantasy novel. I should actually have five new novels out in 2000, but I can't talk about three of them at this point.
AA: After Solo Command, I'll be finishing up Sidhe-Devil, the sequel to Doc Sidhe. Then I hope to be able to do a proposal for my very own Dreaded Fantasy Trilogy. I'm also working on some game projects: a series-length expansion to my Strike Force game supplement, and a standalone science fiction role-playing game called Astro-Rangers.
SWGC: Thanks for taking the time to chat with us. Anything else you'd like to add?
MS: I'd like to thank all the readers who took a chance on the X-Wing books and then came over to my other stuff. Working in the Star Wars universe is a dream come true anyway, and the fans just make it that much better.
AA: I encourage readers to visit my Web page. Hope to see you there.
