the old gundam novels was translated by Fred Schodts for Del Rey Books in 3 books, so far published only once that I know of... it was not that bad, and it was more detailed gruesome than the anime... there is also a brief history of the Gundam series in general, it even talked about how the fans in Japan got so ravenous just for the model kits.
btw, the ending for the original book greatly differs to that of the anime series.
here's what you can expect from the book and not in the anime... sex, violence, gore (not Al Gore), battles and a good read.
now back to Macross..., I too read the book... I gotta admit, it wasn't that bad, atleast it does something good that Robocrap didn't have... "a story", or atleast a sense of cohesiveness that the bastardization of Macross, Southern Cross and Mospeadea 21 lacked.
The three Gundam books were just reprinted. They are all in one book now. The Gundam story in the books is far superior to the show. No boy and his bot BS. Amuro was actually trained to use the Gundam.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detai...=glance&s=books