A New Dawn by John Jackson Miller

A New Dawn was the first novel written to be part of the new Star Wars canon, with input from the Lucasfilm Story Group. Its title serves as a nod to the new beginning that the franchise is embarking on, as well as a twist to the familiar title A New Hope. Primarily it is the story of Kanan Jarrus and Hera Syndulla from the TV series Star Wars: Rebels, taking place six years before that show and showing how they met.

This book takes place on and around the Inner Rim planet of Gorse and its habitable moon, Cynda. As a tidal-locked planet, Gorse has one half continually facing the sun and inhospitably hot, the other side covered in cities that experience perpetual humid night. Kanan, a former Jedi who was born with the name Caleb Dume, is now working as a freight pilot in a mining company called Moonglow. Kanan catches a Clone Wars veteran named Skelly in the act of setting a sabotage explosion, with the goal of sending a message to the Empire about the dangers of the operation. The Empire has been gathering an important mineral called thorillide and tasks the cyborg Count Vidian with increasing the speed of production.

Hera, discontented with the Empire's ruthless actions, has come to the Gorse system to find a friend of hers, a Sullustan named Kaluna who assists the Empire with surveillance. Until saving people from Skelly's sabotage, Kanan had been very careful to conceal his Force-assisted abilities ever since the Emperor issued Order 66. Hera, Kanan, Kaluna, and Skelly cross paths, and once they figure out Vidian's nefarious, self-serving plan for the mining planet and moon, they make every attempt to thwart him. Captain Rae Sloane is also introduced in this story, an Imperial officer given temporary control of the Star Destroyer Ultimatum who doesn't exactly help the rebels, but has the common goal of stopping Vidian.

I enjoyed this book for its strong characters, snappy dialogue, and exciting action. That is to say, everything a Star Wars story ideally should have. I really appreciated how streamlined the book was; Miller doesn't try to shoehorn in extraneous characters or needless subplots. Fans of "Rebels" will get a look at Kanan's backstory, but precious little is revealed about Hera besides what her actions in the book say about her. It is hinted that the two share a mutual attraction, but there's not much time for love when the fate of a whole moon is at stake. What we do see is how well they work together and we come to understand why they mutually decided that Kanan should stay aboard Hera's ship the Ghost. I would like to see another story of how they first encountered Sabine and Zeb before the crew finds themselves on Lothal, but maybe this is being saved for future episodes of the show to explore.

For much more about this book and information about how it was written, directly from the author, check out this page. Caution, spoilers aplenty.

Star Wars: Shattered Empire by Greg Rucka

In my review of Aftermath, I cited the lack of familiar characters as a shortcoming, because it seemed off putting to introduce so many new names in a story directly following Return of the Jedi. It turns out that Shattered Empire is the actual continuation I was hoping for, as its first pages directly depict the last moments of the Battle of Endor and the celebration afterward.

This 4-issue story centers around Lieutenant Shara Bey, and for a few moments on her husband Kes Dameron. They are mentioned to have a young son named Poe, who you might know grows up to be Oscar Isaac's character in The Force Awakens. Shara is introduced more naturally than the new characters in Aftermath since she directly assists Han, Leia, and Luke on various missions. She flew in Green Squadron during the Battle of Endor and decides to help push back against the remnants of the Empire before settling down with her family. Kes was on the ground with the Pathfinders, the group who helped Han Solo destroy the Death Star's shield generator.

Soon after Shara and Kes reunite on Endor, Solo brings them on a mission to hit an Imperial base on the other side of the moon. A few weeks later, Shara participates in a battle on the planet Sterdic IV alongside her alien friend L'ulo, then acts as Leia's pilot to Naboo. In the city of Theed, they help the queen in a fight to overtake some Imperial satellites that create severe weather that threatens the entire planet. Then in the final issue, Luke Skywalker gets Shara's help, with her dressed as an ISB agent, to retrieve something stolen by the Empire from the Jedi Temple on Coruscant.

One of the best things the Disney-owned Lucasfilm has done with the Star Wars franchise is to add more female characters, whose gender has been sorely underrepresented in the six films to date. Norra Wexley from Aftermath and Shara Bey from Shattered Empire both happen to be mothers, though that doesn't stop them from pulling off badass maneuvers in dogfights. Then there's Ciena Ree from Lost Stars, who may be on the side of the Empire but has a strength of will unmatched by many. The trade paperback of Shattered Empire includes the first issue of the Princess Leia comic, in which the rebellious royal is assisted by Evaan Verlaine, a fellow Alderaanian who is equally as admirable. Added to the fact that Daisy Ridley's character Rey appears to be the lead of The Force Awakens, the galaxy's gender imbalance may soon be less egregious.

I liked that this miniseries touched on the larger story of the Rebel Alliance's efforts to maintain their status after the Endor victory alongside the more personal story of Shara and her husband yearning to be done with the war and have a life at home. Any fan would do well to pick up this volume. Along with the aforementioned preview of Princess Leia, it also includes the first issue of Marvel's original comic adaptation of Star Wars, published July 1, 1977. The most interesting aspect of that is that it restores parts of the screenplay that didn't make it into the movie, like a deleted conversation between Luke and Biggs Darklighter about the latter joining the Rebellion, and Vader referring to the Force with the added adjective "Cosmic".

You may be interested to read this interview with the writer of Shattered Empire, Greg Rucka.

Star Wars: Aftermath by Chuck Wendig

As you might guess from the cover, Aftermath takes place soon after Return of the Jedi. The "quite operational" second Death Star has been destroyed with the Emperor and Lord Vader on board, but the fledgling New Republic still has Imperial loyalists to deal with. Being part of the new canon, this timeline will not continue with a Truce at Bakura.

I feel like part of the problem with this book is that hardly any of the characters from the movies are important players in this story. Wedge Antilles is held prisoner for most of it, and Han and Chewie only get a short cameo in an interlude. There are scenes that include Admiral Ackbar and Mon Mothma, but they barely affect anything. One would think that those primarily responsible for the end of the Empire would get more of the spotlight in events that directly follow. Instead, Aftermath takes place entirely on the planet of Akiva, not counting the scattered short-story-like interludes, and introduces an entirely new group of characters.

Young scavenger Temmin Wexley* and his mother Norra have been estranged ever since she joined the Rebellion and Temmin's father was arrested by the Empire. Norra happened to be the Y-Wing pilot who flew into the second Death Star, and now she wants to rescue Wedge Antilles from the Star Destroyer Vigilance when she hears his distress call. The Wexleys are joined by defected Imperial loyalty officer Sinjir Velus, and bounty hunter Jas Emari. The group learns that there is to be a meeting of top Imperials in Myrra, the capital of Akiva, and they plan to gain intel from it.

As far as antagonists, we have a gangster named Surat,  plus the usual assortment of generic Imperial officers, the most memorable being Admiral Rae Sloane. Sloane was created for the earlier novel A New Dawn by John Jackson Miller, so Wendig doesn't even get credit for making her well-rounded. Only Norra, Temmin, and Sinjir get adequate character development.

It put me off that the author chose to write in present tense, a technique which just doesn't fit a novel set "a long time ago." He also uses sentence fragments. Everywhere. For all descriptions. Creating many pauses. Got on my nerves. A lot.

This book is intended to be the start of a trilogy, so I'll give it the benefit of the doubt that it might seem better in retrospect, but despite a few fun characters, it didn't add up to much of consequence. And as for it being on the "Journey to The Force Awakens", I did not detect any meaningful connections to the new movie. The time after the Empire's fall should have more impactful stories involving familiar characters, and this book didn't scratch that itch.

*It has since come to light that Temmin is the character Greg Grunberg plays in The Force Awakens. Hey, now we know he won't die in the books!

Star Wars: Lost Stars by Claudia Gray

The Star Wars movies usually have sharp divisions between the good and evil sides of the warfare, but in Lost Stars, Claudia Gray presents relatable characters who both start out fighting for the Galactic Empire.

Ciena Ree and Thane Kyrell grew up together on the planet Jelucan, which is a recent addition to the Empire. They practice flying in tandem in Thane's ship and when they're old enough they enroll in the Imperial Academy. As the years pass, Thane becomes disillusioned with the Empire and joins the Rebel Alliance, while Ciena remains loyal to those who trained her.

Lost Stars spans a pretty long time period, from a few years after Revenge of the Sith to a year after Return of the Jedi. A short summary of the book might lead one to compare Ciena and Thane to Romeo and Juliet since they're lovers on opposite sides of a conflict, but a more accurate comparison might be to Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, since the pair are involved in major events just along the periphery of more well-known characters.

Ciena is aboard Darth Vader's flagship Devastator when Leia is captured above Tatooine, then she's on the Death Star when it destroys Alderaan. She is distraught about the massive loss of life but justifies it to herself as the Emperor's way of preventing further attacks. Back on the Devastator, she is assigned to pick up Darth Vader after he escaped the destruction of the Death Star. This rebel victory is seen by Ciena and other Imperials as an act of terrorism.

By now, Thane has deserted his post and returned to Jelucan. When Ciena finds him she decides to report that Thane committed suicide. The pair has realized they're in love, but their ideological differences make it impossible to pursue a relationship. During analysis of the Rebels tactics in the Battle of Hoth, Ciena recognizes a flight maneuver that could only be performed by her best friend, so she now knows he has joined the side of her enemies.

The author has an unenviable task when it comes to showing why someone like Ciena would continue to support the actions of the Empire after all she has witnessed. It seems to mostly be due to a long standing sense of loyalt, a feeling that she has come too far to abandon the other officers, and not knowing of a different way of life. I won't say she's a completely unsympathetic character, but it does become hard to root for someone who is ignorant when it comes to fundamentally questioning authority.

It does become a little contrived that these two keep barely surviving these massive battles in which either one could have shot down the other, and they happen to reunite multiple times after each assuming they would never see each other again. The coincidences can be chalked up to the machinations of the all-powerful Force, which Thane is pretty skeptical about, but of course in the Star Wars universe, the Force just as good an explanation as any. And their interactions are all told skillfully enough that you just want the couple to be on the same side and make it work, gosh darnit.

Now for a little bit of spoiler territory. As part of Del Rey's "Journey to Star Wars: The Force Awakens" line, this book contains self-proclaimed "clues" about the upcoming movie. I don't think anything important is given away but in case you want to go in to the theater totally clear of knowledge, skip the next paragraph.

The last few chapters deal with the Battle of Jakku, which takes place a year after the Battle of Endor. Ciena has become the commander of her own Star Destroyer called the Inflictor and Thane is in charge of taking the massive ship for the Alliance. When Thane's team disables the Inflictor's self-destruct, Ciena chooses to crash it into the surface of Jakku, hoping to simultaneously end her life and her time with the Empire. After a fight, Thane manages to get both of them to an escape pod, and the Star Destroyer is the very one that we have seen on the planet's surface in the trailers for The Force Awakens.
 
This book does a good job of presenting a new point of view on events that all Star Wars fans are familiar with, with the backbone being a tragic love story. It may be labeled as a young adult book but it is actually a pretty sophisticated story and even at over 500 pages it was a quick read. Focusing on two major characters with moral choices gives it some emotional weight, though a little more humor would have been welcome.

Star Wars: Darth Vader, Volume 1: Vader, by Kieron Gillen

The redundantly titled Star Wars: Darth Vader: Vader contains issues 1-6 of the first ongoing comic book starring everyone's favorite Sith Lord. It takes place right alongside the main Star Wars comics series so some of the events overlap with Skywalker Strikes.

In this volume we get a fresh look at the iconic villain, such as how he acts when nobody's looking, but that never dilutes how menacing he comes across. Since this is right after the destruction of the Death Star and the Cymoon 1 weapons factory, Vader gets scolded by Emperor Palpatine and later finds out that his master had been ready to replace him. We get to see more of his meeting with Jabba the Hutt from Skywalker Strikes and his hiring of bounty hunters Boba Fett and Black Krrsantan. In a plot point that is barely worth mentioning, Vader is assigned an adjutant who quickly betrays him and whom Vader kills for the trouble.

In the meat of the story, Lord Vader enlists a rogue archaeologist named Doctor Aphra (there is a sly wink to an Indiana Jones quote when Aphra is introduced) who has a ship called the Ark Angel. Aphra has just recovered the personality matrix of a protocol droid called 000 or "Triple Zero" who in turn activates an assassin droid disguised as an astromech, known as BT-1. He wants their help in order to steal a droid hive (?) from Geonosis to create his own private army of battle droids. In other words, in a development that a teenage boy would delight in, Vader now has his own murder-happy droid pair and Wookiee (Krrsantan) working for him, like the dark side versions of C-3P0, R2-D2, and Chewie.

The agent Cylo-IV is brought to Vader by Black Krrsantan and then tortured to death by Triple Zero, who learns the location of Cylo's base. This turns out to be where the Emperor has been secretly training and enhancing other apprentices, including a pair of lightsaber-weilding twins, apparently for the purpose of having Vader fight them all and prove his worth. Later, Boba Fett reports that he found the destroyer of the Death Star, but all he got was the boy's name: Skywalker. This gives Darth Vader a flashback to Revenge of the Sith (oh the humanity) and the memory of Padme being pregnant when he killed her, and he realizes he has a son.

I wasn't as impressed with this series as with Jason Aaron's writing in Skywalker Strikes. The problem with centering a series on Vader is he has to be provided more dialogue than we're used to, and sometimes these lines don't seem easy to imagine in James Earl Jones' voice. And some of the plotting seems kind of "ooh wouldn't this look cool" instead of "let's tell a thoughtful story". However it remains pleasing eye candy and the attempt at humanizing Vader is not entirely without merit.

Star Wars, Volume 1: Skywalker Strikes by Jason Aaron

This is the first volume of Star Wars comics published by Marvel in decades; when the franchise was rebooted last year, several ongoing series from Dark Horse were cancelled. Skywalker Strikes contains issues 1-6 of the flagship title and takes place soon after Luke Skywalker destroyed the first Death Star. Everyone's favorite farm boy is on a mission with Han Solo, Chewbacca, Princess Leia, and droids R2-D2 and C3PO. Right away this makes things feel less isolated than the events of Heir to the Jedi. They have a plan to destroy an Imperial weapons factory. Little do they know that Darth Vader happens to be there to thwart them. Later, Han and Leia seek refuge on a planet protected by an electric storm, and Luke feels himself called back to his home planet of Tatooine.

The danger of telling a story in between established movies is that we know that any characters who appear later are never in any mortal danger. None of those named above have any chance of dying, but Jason Aaron still toys with that expectation, effectively changing the question to "how did he survive that?" The writer is able to create situations that feel essential to the larger story, and yet it seems a little contrived when certain characters who rarely or never interacted on screen together come face to face on the page. Darth Vader has a meeting with Jabba the Hutt, and enlists Boba Fett to find the rebel who destroyed his prized superweapon. When Luke arrives at Obi-Wan Kenobi's house he confronts and battles with Fett. Meanwhile, there is also the introduction of Han Solo's heretofore unknown wife, Sana, who tortures a few of Greedo's Rodian pals to find her way to her husband. It remains to be seen whether this new character will serve the story well or feel out of place.

I must say the art in these panels is pretty great. The characters all resemble the actors and costumes that we're used to, and the opening text crawl and scenes set in space are given their cinematic space. It will be interesting to see what kind of stories this creative team comes up with that fit between the movies, and whether they can maintain this level of quality on a monthly basis.

Star Wars: Heir to the Jedi by Kevin Hearne

When Disney bought Lucasfilm and announced the production of new Star Wars movies, they didn't want to feel obligated to fit the new content in between the novels of the Expanded Universe, many of which told stories taking place after Return of the Jedi. To keep the fictional planets, plot points, and characters consistent, from now on the Star Wars story group will consult with authors, screenwriters, and game designers regarding the new canon. One of the first novels included in this reboot is Heir to the Jedi, by fantasy author Kevin Hearne in his first foray into the Star Wars galaxy.

The fact that this is the first novel told in first person in the voice of Luke Skywalker was enough to get me intrigued. But a little more research into the development of the book made me wary. This was not originally meant to be a standalone story OR to be the start of the new canon, so in a way it belongs to neither era. Heir to the Jedi had been intended to be the capper of the thematic trilogy Empire and Rebellion, the other two installments having been narrated by Leia Organa and Han Solo. This made it more clear why Han is said to be elsewhere at the time of Hearne's book.

Taking place after A New Hope, in this book we find Luke is still getting used to his role as hero of the rebellion and shaken by the recent death of his mentor Obi-Wan Kenobi whose posthumous voice gave Luke advice before the destruction of the Death Star. Soon after Luke borrows the ship of pilot Nakari Kelen, she joins him and becomes a romantic interest. Luke and Nakari are tasked with finding a slicer (hacker) named Drusil who belongs to an alien race known for their prowess with mathematics. I do have to give Hearne credit for introducing two unique female characters in a universe that sorely lacks them, but since Nakari doesn't feature in any of the movies you'd be safe to assume her relationship with Luke isn't meant to last. Fortunately the confidence she gives Luke to practice his Force abilities will sustain his self-teaching until he meets Yoda.

Due to the first-person perspective, the story of Heir to the Jedi is a lot more straightforward than other Star Wars novels I've read. Most of the book consists of the trio hopping through hyperspace between planetary systems, avoiding the Empire and bounty hunters. The plot really isn't much deeper than that. This was not by any means an essential book in the new Star Wars canon, but it's competently written and I enjoyed reading it. When we start getting novels that fill the three decades between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens, I will feel a little more compelled to see what the story group has planned.

For more information about Kevin Hearne and his Iron Druid Chronicles, check out his website. To purchase Heir to the Jedi or other Star Wars books go to... almost any bookseller.

How Star Wars Conquered the Universe by Chris Taylor

When Disney bought Lucasfilm, fans of Star Wars were divided. Would the home of Mickey Mouse and princess culture really be the right home for George Lucas's epic franchise?

In How Star Wars Conquered the Universe, I believe Chris Taylor makes a good case for the galaxy far, far away being far, far better when taken out of the hands of the Creator (as Taylor refers to George Lucas). Star Wars was certainly birthed by Lucas, but it took a village of collaborators to make it into something that has lasted nearly four decades in the public consciousness.

The first several chapters deal with how the first film in the series was thought up and made. The most well known influence was Flash Gordon, including the idea for the scrolling text at the start. What Taylor makes clear is that the commonly assumed influences of Kurosawa films and Joseph Campbell's The Hero With a Thousand Faces has been overstated, seeing as Lucas only became familiar with Campbell's book toward the end of the film's production. There are also distinctions made between the "official Lucasfilm history" and the facts that Taylor uncovered in his research and interviews. It's striking how much Lucas's painful divorce influenced his filmmaking after 1983.

The exploration into Lucas's influences and creative process is alternated with chapters about how fans have taken the franchise as their own. For example the 501st Legion of stormtroopers who made their own costumes, and another group dedicated to building astromech droids (usually R2-D2) from scratch.

The only problem I have with this book is that there wasn't equal time given to The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, which makes it seem as if the author remembered halfway through the manuscript that he had planned to write about the franchise as a whole and not just 1977's A New Hope. It was interesting to read about how Irvin Kershner and Richard Marquand were chosen to direct the sequels, and I would have liked more about how the stories were developed. But I can see why the first film was the most important to discuss. This book puts to rest the naive idea that Lucas had six movies mentally planned from the beginning, and is especially telling when describing how rushed the writing of the prequels actually was.

Yes, the three prequels and their mostly negative response are given due diligence. Taylor has no love lost for those misfires but plays devil's advocate with a fan who defends them. The overall problem was that Lucas insisted on writing and directing those films by himself, while most of the aspects of the original trilogy that worked out best were the result of letting others into the decision making.

This was one of the most interestingly comprehensive non-fiction books I have read in a long time. I thought I had a pretty good knowledge of the Star Wars franchise and wouldn't learn anything new, but I found this book had a number of surprises and debunked common rumors about what happened behind the scenes. Anyone who is a fan, or even a former, disillusioned fan, should read this book and perhaps will be become optimistic that the new movies will be just as lovable as the ones we grew up with. I for one, can't wait for mid-December.