Timothy Zahn's Star Wars: Winner Lose All Cover Art and Release Info

Del Rey's Star Wars Books Facebook page announced yesterday the release date and pricing of Timothy Zahn's new original novella, Winner Lose All.  They also released the cover of the eBook which is shown above.

The short story is set to tie into Zahn's forthcoming novel, Star Wars: Scoundrels.

"Star Wars: Winner Lose All-A Lando Calrissian Tale" by Timothy Zahn is a special eBook original novella. The tale is a prequel of sorts to Zahn's upcoming novel STAR WARS: SCOUNDRELS (available in hardcover, eBook, and Audio on Jan 1) and will be available for all eBook devices on December 10 for only $1.99. Pre-order now for this fun adventure and don't forget to begin 2013 with some scoundrels! (Erich)

SOURCE: Star Wars Books on Facebook

New Star Wars Short Fiction E-Book Initiative: Essential Guides and New Timothy Zahn story "Winner Lose All"

Art by Joe Corroney from  "Underworld: A Galaxy of Scum and Villainy," Star Wars Insider 89

The e-book revolution has firmly taken hold and will continue to capture the digital hearts of Star Wars fans if Del Rey has anything to say about it.

At Celebration VI at the Del Rey and Essential Guide panels it was announced not only that books from the Essential Guide series would be making the conversion to digital e-book format, but also that Del Rey and Lucas Books are launching a new initiative of digital exclusive fiction.

Lucas Books' Senior Editor Jennifer Heddle summarized the announcement on The Star Wars Blog:

"Tim Zahn announced that he’s writing a piece of short fiction featuring Lando, as well as some other characters from Scoundrels, to be released in December, in e-book formats only. The up-till-then untitled piece was given the title “Winner Lose All” after Shelly wrote it down on a piece of paper for me right there during the panel and I said OK. As you can see sometimes the Lucasfilm approval process is extensive and exhausting. Ha ha. The plan is for this to be just the beginning of more regular e-only publications, giving authors and readers new opportunities to play in the Star Wars universe we might not have otherwise."

On Facebook Del Rey Editor Erich Schoeneweiss summarized the announcement from the Celebration VI Essential Guide panel, including the move of the EG series to include e-book editions.

"1) Beginning with WARFARE and READER'S COMPANION on October 2, Del Rey will release the Essential Guide books in eBook formats as well. After the first two books we will follow up with an additional Guide like ATLAS and GUIDE TO THE FORCE every few months. More to come on this."

It is good to see Del Rey attempting to stay ahead of the e-book curve in pushing new and exclusive content.  Early in the e-book days there where a number of novella's released as well as a few full length Star Wars novels.

I really enjoyed Karen Traviss' novella, Boba Fett: A Practical Man.  I certainly expect Timothy Zahn's "Winner Lose All" to be a winner, after all how can you fail when you have sabacc in the story?



SOURCES: STAR WARS BLOG and FACEBOOK

X-Wing eBook Discount Bundle: All 9 X-Wing novels for $56.99

Do you like your space battles with a liberal sprinkling of humor and healthy dose of emotional gut punches?

If you do then the X-Wing series of novels is for you.  I cannot suggest highly enough this serious of books, but the news today that I saw via Tosche Station regarding the price of a new bundle for the X-Wing Series did surprise me a bit.

Ever since the Star Wars catalog of novels went digital on June 28, 2011 riding the ebook wave, we have seen a standardization of Star Wars novel pricing.  For books that debuted or had an paperback edition printed their ebook price became a standard $7.99.

As with everything in life their are trade-offs, now we have all the Star Wars novels in digital versions however this means that you are actually probably paying more now then you had if you were an early adopter and purchased what Star Wars novels where digital before June 28th.  For example in 2010 when only certain books where being offered as ebooks, I ordered Kindle editions of all the Legacy of the Force novels.The Legacy of the Force series came in two bundles, Books 1-4 for $13.80 and Books 5-9 for $9.99.  A total of $23.79 for nine novels.  This was a tremendous value and something I jumped at because the paperback entries that I have for that series are pretty roughed up after multiple readings.

While I understand that since 2010 there has been a revolutionary change in the publishing industry and the fact that now publisher's must make a larger share of their profits from ebooks, but the price of this bundle still feels a bit high to me.

The X-Wing series began in 1996 and the latest book in the series (until Mercy Kill's release) was published in 1999. So these books are between 13-16 years old.  A price point of  around $40 seems like a much more reasonable cost for a bundle given the contents. If you are going to have such a high price fore the entire series, then I think you separately need to put a discount on the solo release of the first novel in the  series, Rogue Squadron and sell it for $1.99 instead of $7.99.  Create a real incentive for those unfamiliar with the series to begin reading the books and allow them to decide whether it is worth buying.  I think you would get a lot more sales with a $1.99 test drive and $40 series price then you would with a $7.99 test drive and $56.99 price. It is true that the ebook cover price of $7.99 for each novel individually would total $71.91, so it is true that you are getting a value.  It strikes me that unless you have read the books before a price point of $56.99 is going to be cost prohibitive for many readers or parents of younger readers.


SOURCES: Random House, Tosche Station, and Roqoo Depot