Haven't you ever heard of temporal paradoxes? If you change one thing in history, everything else changes as well. The very fact that Jak Daly read Starfist books changed the books that he read from the books that you read. So the Skinks don't appear in the Starfist universe that Jak read about in those books.It's like what happens if you go back in time and kill your grandfather before he meets your grandmother.
I thought this book was breaking the fourth wall. Since Daly is showing his awareness of these Starfist books. Isn't it unless I'm wrong here?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_wall#Breaking_the_fourth_wall