Celebration VI: Dark Horse & Brian Wood Recap

Like Del Rey, Dark Horse only made a small number of new product reveals this time around at Celebration VI. One of their upcoming titles, though – Brian Wood’s Star Wars – definitely earned showcase attention, with a Friday evening session in the Star Wars University room dedicated simply to Wood and editor Randy Stradley holding an hour-long casual conversation with fans about the series.

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Celebration VI: Secrets of the Chiss Jedi

For all the high-profile events a Celebration convention can bring – Mark Hamill or Carrie Fisher, Last Tour to Endor or The Clone Wars Red Carpet Premiere, even The Maker himself – there is always great fun and insight to be had at the smaller, less prominent panels. One of this year’s true highlights for me was a Thursday evening panel in the Star Wars University room: Ryder Windham’s “Secrets of the Chiss Jedi,” discussing the Secret Missions young-readers series and its starring character, Nuru Kungurama.

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Celebration VI: EU Author Allston Lays Down Tracks

In his lecture “Laying Down Tracks,” Allston likens writing a novel to creating a polished musical recording in a studio. One at a time, a track of each different instrument and voice is captured and saved, then layered one on top of the other and meshed into harmonic excellence. He suggests that this process is transferable to writing a novel, and may in fact help you to write more efficiently or with greater speed.

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Celebration VI: Del Rey Panels Recap

Celebration VI featured two panels to discuss upcoming Del Rey products in the Expanded Universe: Friday morning’s panel on the novels and Sunday afternoon’s panel on the Essential guidebooks. Although the number of new product reveals was small, especially with San Diego Comic-Con’s announcements just a month before, fans did learn about a number of new initiatives to help increase the EU’s visibility and availability.

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