Just finished Outbound Flight again and loved it! I think all the prequel stuff is handled really well and the prequel characters don't get much time and in the short time we spend with them in the book, Anakin and Obi-Wan are actually turned into fairly likeable characters. There are also some debates about testing children for Force sensitivity and not a single mention of midichlorians in the whole book. I think Zahn just wanted to tell his own prequel story (as in prequel to his own books) and had to make due with the canon established by GL.