My current program is written in VB .NET in VS
Studio .NET.

It opens an excel applications in the background (ugh,
the slowness) and then make it invisible and reads data
from about 20+ workbooks as the data is needed. (Read
Only)

Problem: SLOW...

Any possibilites to shorten load time?

I have minimized the amount of interaction and calling to
Excel to somewhat of a success by using:
Data_Array = WS.Range("A1", WS.Cells.SpecialCells
(XlCellType.xlCellTypeLastCell)).Value
And then reading from the Data_Array that is created
instead of repeatedly asking Excel for data.

Second Problem: Program Crash makes Excel not close

If my program should hit a fatal error (Still in beta,
working those out now) The Excel App does not close and
because it is hidden the only way to close is through the
Task Manager... Anyway to make it close with my program?