(no subject)

[skygiants]

While we're all still talking about Star Wars, I read my First Official Star Wars Novel a few weeks ago - Claudia Gray's Bloodline, a political thriller about Leia that takes place a few years before The Force Awakens.

Leia's faction in the Senate is hardline for states' planetary rights; the rival faction are Federalists Centrists who favor a strong executive branch. At the beginning of the book, Leia, who is considering retirement, teams up with a Bright Young Centrist for a Senate investigation into some shady smuggler activity that ends up being potentially More Sinister. They bicker, then bond! It's very cute! BUT ALAS, their hopes for bipartisan coalition are challenged by outside forces and, as one might imagine from the way intergalactic politics stand at the beginning of The Force Awakens, All Does Not End Well.

I was honestly impressed by how well Bloodline manages to ground itself as a political thriller - in which things like political gridlock and reputational damage and grandstanding without compromise are more serious challenges with more long-lasting impact than any individual blaster battle -- while also, you know, still fitting in a solid number of daring escapes and speeder chases and blaster battles.

I was also quite impressed that Claudia Gray managed to actually get me invested in Senator Casterfo, Leia's Centrist buddy, after introducing him as "snotty collector of Imperial Artifacts," a hobby which Leia, rightly, considers gross. And I liked the way that the book deals with political fallout from the Reveal of Leia's Real Parentage, and the fact that it's not her fault but she's also not been dealing with it, and there's nothing that can make it not weird and not a liability, because politics are awful.

Overall the book felt to me honestly a lot like a Clone Wars experience, moreso than a Star Wars film experience -- and as you know I've been enjoying the Clone Wars experience quite a bit. A solid introduction to Star Wars In Text.

Comments

[sovay]

I was also quite impressed that Claudia Gray managed to actually get me invested in Senator Casterfo, Leia's Centrist buddy, after introducing him as "snotty collector of Imperial Artifacts," a hobby which Leia, rightly, considers gross. And I liked the way that the book deals with political fallout from the Reveal of Leia's Real Parentage, and the fact that it's not her fault but she's also not been dealing with it, and there's nothing that can make it not weird and not a liability, because politics are awful.

Apparently I would read this book.

[luzula]

Huh, this sounds interesting and like something that might be up my alley!

Also, I've never actually read any Star Wars tie-in novels. Are there other good ones you can recommend? I mean, I'm sure a lot of them are bad, so one wouldn't want to wade in unwarned.

[sdelmonte]

So Leia comes around and realizes that planets rights only leads to bad things, right? (I have read some things about the background of TFA and TLJ that suggest the reason the First Order is winning is because the New Republic is a very weak government. I find that very depressing.)

[laceblade]

In addition to her two Leia novels, she also wrote Lost Stars, which was frankly amazing.

[aquamirage]

Becca did you ever read the Jedi Apprentice books

[starlady]

Oh man, Star Wars novels.

There are some worth reading from the old EU, post-OT: Zahn's Thrawn trilogy, and if you like Mara Jade you should also read the follow up duology that starts with Specter of the Past. He wrote a few others with Mara Jade that I haven't read--at that point they were trying to match the EU with the prequels canon and things got weird. And though I love Thrawn, I have heard mixed things about the new novel that inserts him back into the canon universe. I have higher expectations for the next one, when he has to team up with Darth Vader.

TBH most of the rest of the now-Legends books were garbage. The exceptions were the Rogue Squadron and Wraith Squadron books, and I also quite liked The Truce at Bakura. If you like Obi-Wan, Kenobi is pretty great, also because it does Star Wars as a Western. It's difficult to recommend most of the prequels-era EU books for a lot of reasons, but most especially because The Clone Wars TV series overwrote most of them.

I liked but did not love the Ahsoka novel, tbh--I felt like Johnston had a really good grasp on Ahsoka herself but everything else in the book was weak. But if you like Ahsoka, it's definitely worth a read.

I've heard good things about From a Certain Point of View and some of the other new canon books, but I haven't read any of them. I should read this one!