RebelPilot Issue 47

RebelPilot goes to the ends of the earth to track down the leading lights and legends of the Lucasfilm licensed galaxy that we all know and love.

Aaron Allston was the next on the RebelPilot Hit List and we've secured him for an Exclusive Interview.

Exclusive? Well we put forward the questions that nobody else was stupid enough to ask.

Read on and find out that Mr Allston is as quick witted via email as he is in a published novel.

Exclusive Interview with Aaron Allston

RebelPilot: What's your middle name?

Aaron Allston: Dale. It was my father's middle name. (My father's still with us, but it's no longer his middle name.)

RebelPilot: Why don't you throw the initial in your name like Kevin J Anderson or Michael A Stackpole?

Aaron Allston: I toyed with that back when Jimmy Carter was in the White House, but I decided that I liked "Aaron Allston" better as a byline.

RebelPilot: What's your favourite word in the dictionary?

Aaron Allston: I don't really have one. I usually have some odd word in mind, though, in case some joker should decide to ask me, "What's the word of the day?" Just recently, it's been "machicolation."

RebelPilot: You used the word 'reprobate' twice in STARFIGHTERS OF ADUMAR. Are you fond of the word? Do you think it's under-utilised in general conversation?

Aaron Allston: I just thought it was the correct word for the circumstances in which it was used -- in both cases, by Wedge Antilles to describe one or more of his pilots, many of whom tend to be more free in the trouble-making department than he is. I suspect that if it were to be used constantly in general conversation -- taking the place, say, of "like" or "uhh" -- that it would become necessary to destroy most of the English-speaking world.

RebelPilot: What wordprocessor do you use?
Aaron Allston: Wordprocessor _singular_? Are you mad?

RebelPilot: Um, okay, wordprocessors?

Aaron Allston: Let's see. I use WordPerfect for most of my writing, on both my desktop and my laptop. However, I do have Word installed as well; some of my game-industry clients use it exclusively. I use Final Draft for scripts. My palmtop, which is a Psion 5mx and doesn't speak Microsoft, has Epoc Word on it; I do a lot of outlining and writing of short scenes on it. For pure-text files, I use Programmer's File Editor, a freeware text editor. I also have Notepad, Wordpad, the MS-DOS editor, and Microsoft Works installed on my desktop, but I seldom use them.

RebelPilot: How many hours did you clock on the game X-Wing Versus TIE Fighter whilst writing the novels in the x-wing series? Do you still play much XVT?

Aaron Allston: I actually didn't keep track of hours, but it wasn't many. I'm just not that fond of computer flight simulators. Most of the games I play are paper role-playing games such as CHAMPIONS. As far as computer games go, I mostly like card and puzzle games -- several of the solitaires, and exclusionary logic games like SHERLOCK and DESCARTES' ENIGMA.

RebelPilot: If you chose multi-player on XVT and went head to head with Mike Stackpole, what starfighter would you choose and who would win?

Aaron Allston: If I were engaged in such a competition, I'd hire a ringer, a player who really loves that sort of game, and give him enough information to pretend to be me. Then I'd adjourn to let him wreak havoc. Knowing Mike, though, he'd probably do the same to me. So Mike and I would be in our respective offices working, and two hard-core flight sim nuts would be blasting away at one another, each convinced that the other writer was pretty hot stuff. That's good for everybody, because two gamers would be paid to play while Mike and I would acquire these phenomenal reputations.

RebelPilot: How much information does the publisher give you before you start writing a licensed SW novel?

Aaron Allston: I was given a timeline of events, a style guide, and what amounted to license to ask for copies of any licensed Star Wars material that would prove helpful to the novels I was writing. Over the course of four novels, Bantam Books, West End Games and Dark Horse Comics sent me a bookcase's worth of reading material, which proved enormously helpful.

RebelPilot: If you had the choice of your own fully functional capital star ship would you want a Star Destroyer or a Mon Calamari Cruiser?

Aaron Allston: Oh, a Mon Cal cruiser, definitely. I suspect that the stern regimentation that is characteristic of the Empire extends all the way to the design of their capital ships -- that's too gloomy for me.

RebelPilot: If you were to write Episodes II and III what's one big twist you'd incorporate into the script?

Aaron Allston: Young Obi-Wan would actually turn out to be Luke and Leia's dad. This could help explain why the cuckolded Anakin Skywalker turned to evil. Later, Luke could have a mid-life crisis after realizing he'd redeemed the guy who'd actually killed his true father.

No, I'm just kidding. I probably wouldn't leave the explanation of Anakin's conception to a bunch of randy midi-chlorians; the characters would accept that explanation only until the true father stepped up. Then, just as with THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK, I'd have the revelation of a Skywalker's paternity be a painful experience.

RebelPilot: In your opinion who's the coolest minor character in ANH, ESB or ROTJ? [except for Wedge, if he was your first choice.]

Aaron Allston: Tough call. I'd have to award the prize to Grand Moff Tarkin - he doesn't have _that_ much screen time, which arguably makes him a minor character, and Peter Cushing is one of my favorite actors. When STAR WARS debuted in 1977, I didn't know any of the primary actors, but Cushing's presence elevated the movie's coolness factor enormously for me.

RebelPilot: You go into a cantina, what would you order; bantha steaks or dewback ribs?

Aaron Allston: I guess it would have to be steak. Though I frequently rib people, I'm just not a rib man.

RebelPilot: What does bantha taste like?

Aaron Allston: I suspect, given banthas' physical resemblance to elephants, that it would be something like elephant meat, which is, according to accounts I've read, supposed to be somewhat greasy and chewy. Hopefully they have cooking techniques and recipes to improve it.

RebelPilot: Who was it that said (in reference to non-writers): "Everyone wants to be a writer but no one wants to actually write"?

Aaron Allston: Coincidentally, that was also Grand Moff Tarkin, in his salad days, when he was still torn between careers writing holodramas and blowing up planets.

RebelPilot: Let's say you're the executive producer of WRAITH SQUADRON The Movie. Who would you cast for the parts of Wedge, Wes, Kell, Face, Phanan (et al) from the current batch of Hollywoo. . . Hmmm, I see you've already been asked that a million times. Here's one I hope was overlooked and will make myself look intelligent in the process . . . Who would you cast for Squeaky's voice over?
Aaron Allston: There are a lot of actors who would be appropriate. Peter Cook being dead, I'd probably cast Alan Rickman -- his performance in DOGMA was as cutting and sarcastic as I imagine Squeaky to be.

RebelPilot: You get to choose a director and a producer for the Wraith Squadron movie. Who gets the nod?

Aaron Allston: For director, Nicholas Meyer. As a novelist (THE SEVEN-PER-CENT SOLUTION et al) he knows about taking other creators' characters and writing them so they remain true to their sources. As a screenwriter (the movie version of THE SEVEN-PER-CENT SOLUTION et al), he's demonstrated that he's skilled at adapting written works to the screen -- adapting the gist of the original work without remaining slavishly attached to its every detail. And as a director (THE WRATH OF KHAN et al) he's demonstrated that he can handle science fiction, can present interesting and distinctive characters, and can manage action sequences.

For producer, Debra Hill. She's best-known for horror films (often working with John Carpenter) and for a series of TV-movies trying to recreate the style of 1950s teen melodramas, but she has produced several films I've liked in various genres (HALLOWEEN, THE FOG, HEAD OFFICE, GROSS ANATOMY, THE FISHER KING), manages to get production values and casts that are admirably suited to her movies, and has experience as a screenwriter.

RebelPilot: What sort of chair do you sit on in front of the computer?

Aaron Allston: It's a Globe brand chair I bought at Sam's Club. It's wheeled, padded, no armrests. Its back tilts but provides good support for my lower back. I like it a lot.

RebelPilot: Have you ever considered when writing an X-Wing novel to throw a bunch of a, b, x and y wings together and calling them Alphabet Soup Squadron? (I reckon they would have been the REAL heroes of the rebellion)

Aaron Allston: Ummm... no. I haven't. But I do think there's a lot of unexplored territory for fiction set in the very early, most desperate days of the Rebellion, when squadrons _would_ have been made up of whatever people could cobble together that would fly.

RebelPilot: Who gets your vote for best (Lucasfilm approved) star wars artist? (assuming of course you know any or take notice of them)

Aaron Allston: Well, I've seen a lot of the Star Wars art books, but I was never looking at them to gain an appreciation of specific artists -- I was looking for details pertinent to something I was writing. So I'm probably not qualified to answer that question.

RebelPilot: Have you ever considered writing an (unauthorised) autobiography of your life?

Aaron Allston: Nope. The problem with an autobiography is that it ought to lead up to some sort of thematic conclusion, and I'm not sure that my life so far supports any sort of thesis statement. I guess I'll wait until I've really become a bad example for people to point at while shaking their heads.

RebelPilot: If they made it into a movie, who would play the lead role?

Aaron Allston: I'd kind of like to see Richard Masur do it, but, hey, he's twelve years older than I am, so it's not likely to happen.

RebelPilot: Will we see the Wraiths, as an intel team, do an encore in a new novel?

Aaron Allston: I hope so, but I really don't have any say at this point in whether that will happen.

RebelPilot: What planet in the Star Wars universe would you most like to have a holiday/vacation on?

Aaron Allston: Oh, definitely Coruscant. I'm not exactly a nature-loving boy, so a while planet topped in concrete city suits me just fine. I expect there would be some mighty fine hotels and sophisticated diversions available there.

RebelPilot: and some fashion questions: What's cooler. X-wing pilot outfits or TIE fighter uniforms?
Aaron Allston: TIE fighter pilot uniforms, definitely. The New Republic's eye-hurting orange flight suits don't do much for me.

RebelPilot: Which would you prefer? The Jedi brown robes or the Sith black cloak?

Aaron Allston: The Sith cloak. Obviously, the bad guys have more fashion sense in the Star Wars universe, and Lando didn't have enough screen time to, well, bring Balance to the Fashion.

RebelPilot: What other projects are in the works?

Aaron Allston: I'm currently writing SIDHE-DEVIL, an urban fantasy, the sequel to my 1995 novel DOC SIDHE; that's for Baen Books. After that, I do MONGOOSE AMONG COBRAS, which is military science fiction set in my own universe; it follows the military actions and investigations of the crew of a small mercenary spacecraft carrier. It will be similar in tone to the X-Wing novels. It's for Bantam, the publisher of the X-Wing series.