Aftermath

Star Wars: Aftermath #1

by Chuck Wendig

Mentre l'Impero cerca di riprendersi dalla sconfitta subita nella Battaglia di Endor, l'Alleanza Ribelle - ora chiamata Nuova Repubblica - è impegnata in una caccia spietata alle forze nemiche sparpagliate per la galassia, per evitare che possano radunarsi e contrattaccare. Comunque, sul lontano pianeta di Akiva il nemico si sta già riorganizzando. Durante una missione di ricognizione, il pilota Wedge Antilles scopre che gli Star Destroyer imperiali si stanno radunando, ma viene catturato prima di riuscire a informare i capi della Nuova Repubblica. Nel frattempo, l'ex pilota ribelle Norra Wexley è tornata su Akiva, suo pianeta natale, stremata dalla guerra e pronta a rivedere suo figlio per ricominciare a vivere lontana da ogni battaglia. Una volta intercettata la richiesta di soccorso di Wedge Antilles, però, Norra capisce che la sua lotta per la libertà non è ancora finita. Quello che non sa, tuttavia, è che il nemico è più vicino di quanto immagini... e che la sua nuova missione sarà tanto pericolosa quanto decisiva. Insieme al suo geniale figlio, a un cacciatore di taglie zabrak e a uno spietato traditore dell'Impero, toccherà a lei fare tutto il possibile per porre fine, una volta per tutte, all'opprimente minaccia imperiale.

Genres: Star Wars, Science Fiction, Fiction, Fantasy, Audiobook, Space Opera, Science Fiction Fantasy

369 pages, Hardcover

First published September 4, 2015

About the author

Chuck Wendig is a novelist, a screenwriter, and a freelance penmonkey.
He has contributed over two million words to the roleplaying game industry, and was the developer of the popular Hunter: The Vigil game line (White Wolf Game Studios / CCP).

He, along with writing partner Lance Weiler, is a fellow of the Sundance Film Festival Screenwriter's Lab (2010). Their short film, Pandemic, will show at the Sundance Film Festival 2011, and their feature film HiM is in development with producer Ted Hope.

Chuck's novel Double Dead will be out in November, 2011.

He's written too much. He should probably stop. Give him a wide berth, as he might be drunk and untrustworthy. He currently lives in the wilds of Pennsyltucky with a wonderful wife and two very stupid dogs. He is represented by Stacia Decker of the Donald Maass Literary Agency.

You can find him at his website, terribleminds.com.

Reviews

[Nehemiah Lacayo · Rating 1 out of 5]

"The TIE wibbles and wobbles through the air, careening drunkenly across the Myrrann rooftops - it zigzags herkily-jerkily out of sight."

And that was the moment when my eyes started bleeding. This was when I realized the Disney canon is absolute garbage.

Numerous other reviewers have noted the poor writing style of Chuck Wendig. Those other reviewers are correct. This book is horribly written, with a jarring present-tense narrative. The characters are dull and formulaic... the tech genius teenager and his estranged mother, the regretful drunken ex-Imperial, the hard-as-nails bounty hunter. As I read, I found myself not caring what happened to any of them. Whether they lived or died made no difference to me, and that's a bad sign.

The descriptions of the environment and the action reminded me of the narrative of a game master describing something to his players in a role-playing game. "It's a spare, severe room - red walls lined with manacles. In the middle, a desk whose surface is made from some Sullustian frozen in corbonite. On that desk is a blaster, a collection of quills in a cup, a bottle of ink. The room features only one other piece of furniture: a tall black cabinet, sealed tight with a maglock." (p. 142) I half expected Wendig to add "So, what do your characters do? Roll a perception check."

What really depressed me about the whole mess was that there were moments I enjoyed, moments I wanted to see more of... only for the book to go back to the boring main story line about the cliched-band-of-motley-rebels-coming-together-reluctantly-to-stop-the-Empire. The interludes, which had nothing to do with the main plot, showed the effect of the Empire's fall on planets across the galaxy. While they weren't written any better than the rest of the book, they showed the reactions of people to the collapse of Imperial rule. A family dinner gone awry as siblings argue. Bounty hunters realizing they may not have much of a future. Politicians arguing the course of the future government. I found myself wanting them to continue, to see what might happen only for the chapter to end and the interlude characters never to be mentioned again.

The only other exception was Admiral Rae Sloane, first introduced in "A New Dawn." I wanted to see more of her... an intelligent, reasonable (but loyal) Imperial who wasn't a stock character like the others. I'd like to see a novel about her, something written from the Imperial side as things fall apart.

This is not a good start to Disney's new Star Wars post-RotJ universe. The company needs to hire a new writer who will write stories about characters and events that people actually care about. One with writing talent would be preferred.

[Alejandro · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fair reading but I found its lack of excitement disturbing.


NEW CANON EXPANDED FUTURE

No Sith remain,... ...and the lone Jedi that exists, the son of Anakin Skywalker, possesses an untouchable soul. At least for now.

I was expecting something different from this novel, Aftermath, since it’s supposed to be the first book in a trilogy setting the new ambiance in the Star Wars universe after the events of Star Wars: Episode VI – The Return of the Jedi erasing the previously expanded universe (now considered “Legends”).

I don’t support the concept of taking away the canon status to all the previous written novels, it’s not fair for all the readers that invested money and time reading all those novels, but playing Devil’s Advocate for a moment, I can understand the appealing about to simplify an already big expanded prose universe to set a fresh new storyline where to work for the incoming Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens.

However, I can’t feel that I got a fresh and/or more simple expanded universe to follow.

Aftermath barely touches the socio-political changes around the galaxy in the “Interlude” sections of the prose, but instead of making an easier development to follow, it’s presented as too many isolated events where if Chuck Wendig, the author, and/or the Star Wars Story Group are expecting the readers to follow ALL those incidents in future books, well, it’s just too much, too soon, in just one book.


TO REBEL IS ONE THING, TO GOVERN IS ANOTHER

However, to be fair and honest, I do like the general seed planted in all those interludes. Since the message is clear. The Empire is far to be completely beaten and the so-called New Republic is barely still just a cool name without any real power or resources to take the place that the former Galactic Empire was managing.

To destroy Stormtrooper Garrisons is easy, to keep up running basic services (electric power, water supply, street-sweeping, police patrolling) is hard. Now many “liberated” worlds, from the Empire’s fist, are starving and now they are easy targets for pirates.

The Galactic Empire wasn’t only about oppression, they were supplying also civilian order, public security and basic services to major cities and towns, in many developed worlds, around the galaxy. Tiranny or not, they were the government, and if the Rebel Alliance, now the so-called New Republic, really wanted to take down the Galactic Empire, they should realize that that implied to have the capacity to take over the public administration of countless of planets.

The New Republic is resurrecting the Senate, but that it will take time, too many time, meanwhile the common people is starving, having lost public services and falling prey to criminals and pirates.


CRUEL TEASING

Another bad thing about those interludes, is that some of them weren’t about the current socio-political downfall around the galaxy, but about certain cool events such as the discovery of a particular weapon thought to be lost and the planning to free a very popular world, but it’s like cruel teasing, since you read about those awesome developments... without developing them.

It’s just that, a glimpse and later you are dragged again to the main story that honestly isn’t nearly as cool as those teasers.


NEW FACES IN A TEDIOUS ADVENTURE

If you thought that you will be reunited again with your old familiar Star Wars heroes...

...you thought wrong!

Apart from the appearance of the known character of Wedge Antilles (but relegated to a very minor role), this book is about new characters. Don’t get me wrong, many of those new characters have a lot of potential, however the main plot in the novel is kinda tedious and lacking of all excitement.

The Empire is without a leader. The Emperor died in the Battle of Endor, along with the fearsome Darth Vader. Therefore, the Empire is now full of too many high officials, civilian and military, with fair claims to rule what remains of it. So, to avoid an inner war between Imperial Forces, it’s settled a meeting in Akiva, an Outer Rim world, to consider options, even the scenario of an Imperial Council.

Something that I was delighted was to find Rae Sloane in the novel, she is a character created in the book, A New Dawn (an introductory novel for the Star Wars: Rebels CGI animated TV series), where she was an Imperial Star Destroyer Captain there, and now she is an Admiral. (She was easily my favorite character on the mentioned previous novel)

The new heroes end in Akiva for different reasons, having different agendas, but fate and chance (it isn’t like that always?) will put them in the middle of that Imperial Summit, which is too dangerous for the still too fragile New Republic.

Sadly, the plot is developed in a slow pace, with some action scenes here and there, but at the end, while it was well written, hardly you can consider that it was an exciting adventure what usually you demand from a tale with the Star Wars title on it.

Also, as I commented at the beginning, that I was expecting a very different kind of book. Since it is sold as the first part of three, that will redefine the universe of Star Wars, explaining how the situation will lead to Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens. However, while the brief interlude may help to the main goal, ironically the “main” plot is just a small slow story that it could be well developed in a couple of chapters and not dedicating the whole book to it.

[Khurram · Rating 4 out of 5]

I quite enjoyed this book. This book is not staring any of the main A listers of the Star Wars universe. They are mentioned, and there are a couple of cameos. The story is really about Disney creating their own characters.

I do like the way that even though Luke, Leia, and Han are the poster guys, the rebellion is bigger than they are. There are billions of beings with minor to major contributions to the success of going from Rebels to the New Republic. This is the sorry of one such pilot in the alliance, though she did not fire the killing shot of the second Death Star she was instrumental in setting up Wedge and Lando. Now that her war is over, she decides to return home to see try and make a mend with her son. However, what this book is about the war is not over. The story deals with how the fall of the top-level Imperial leader ship affects different beings. From former slaves to people on the side lines, Imperials wondering what to do next to the power grabbers. This book is set in the very early days of the New Republic. In fact, the New Republic is not even accepted as of yet. They also add one something never seen in the SW universe before the inclusion of gay characters (C3PO notwithstanding).

However, one of the main flaws in this book is the way it is advertised as taking as a companion to the new movie. If anyone only reason for reading the book is to get a better insight into the Force Awakens movie, then they are in for a disappointment, and you will not learn anything new from this book. Another flaw is they this book seems to be setting a lot of things into motion, which are not resolved in this book. It has over 10 interludes (mini stories) of goings on in the Star Wars many of these are self-contained but there is one with a special appearance from Han and Chewie witch is not resolved, but looking at the tile of the next book it is more than likely to be the main story of that book. All in all, it's a good book, but if you are looking for star power and revelations, this is not a book for you.

[Jessica ❁ ➳ Silverbow ➳ ❁ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reviewed by: Rabid Reads

Before we get started:

1. I am not an expert on the subject of STAR WARS novels.

This is in fact my first STAR WARS novel, so on the subject of canon, I got nuthin’. #blankslate

2. I am not a Chuck Wendig expert.

This is in fact my first Chuck Wendig novel (that I finished).

I mention these things b/c if you scan the reviews on Goodreads, most of the reviewers are one or both of those things, and many of them did not love AFTERMATH.

I did. A lot.

The only thing I can say in reference to Chuck Wendig’s other books is that I tried to read BLACKBIRDS, but it was too dark, too crass, and I called it quits a few chapters in.

So if you had a similar experience, this one is a whole different animal.

A Wookie-freeing, “singing, dancing murder bot”-introducing, makes your heart grow three sizes, wonderful animal.

In the trilogy meant to be the bridge between the original films and THE FORCE AWAKENS, we meet a new cast of characters while still getting a healthy dose of our longtime favorites.

As is typical in a first installment, AFTERMATH lays a lot of groundwork. The majority of the book is spent in alternate viewpoints, winding ever closer toward each other, which is not my favorite, but Wendig kept the POVs entertaining enough that I didn’t mind too much. And in any case, by the time we finally hit the gang’s-all-here portion, I was wholly invested.

Now I want to talk about Sinjir.

I’ve followed Wendig’s blog since Dragon Con 2015 when he made me laugh so hard in a storytelling improv panel that I thought I was going to puke, so I knew about the controversy going into it. I didn’t know which character had caused the fuss, but I knew there was one.

You: Wut controversy?

Me: Longtime STAR WARS readers got their panties in a twist b/c one of the new MCs is . . . *gasp* . . . GAY.

You: Da fuq?

Me: I know, right?

My newsfeed is currently spitting out all kinds of stuff about Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, most of it fluff, but some of it is . . . Upsetting. Like the one that quoted a tweet from THE DAILY MAIL promoting a story on Markle that read, “from slaves to royalty.”

NBC News called this a “quiet brand of racism.”

Umm . . . How is that quiet?

Similarly, the majority of the SW fandom claims not to have an issue with homosexuality, they just object to needless gayness: if you’re going to have a gay character, it needs to fulfill some greater purpose. Just throwing gay people in willy nilly is unnecessary, or worse, political.

In other words, don’t use STAR WARS canon to soapbox your cause, sir.

*flares nostrils*

NEWSFLASH: gay people are people too. You don’t need some specific reason to make a couple gay anymore than you need a specific reason to make a couple straight. THEY JUST ARE. #dealwithit

And personally, Sinjir was my favorite character. B/c hilarious combination of narcissism and snark.

So there’s that.

There’s also a True Believer for a villain, a self-serving bounty hunter who might not be as hardcore as she thinks she is, and a teenager who programmed his soldier droid using combat training and dance festivals.

Sound good to you? Then check it out for yourself. B/c AWESOME.

[Scott Lyson · Rating 1 out of 5]

We live in an age in which mediocrity reigns supreme. That's fine for the masses. We can prop up mediocre movies like Avengers and Jurassic World and overlook their flaws, the audience has lost its taste. That's the way of things, fine, just don't expect me to blindly follow. Aftermath is guilty of committing far too many amateurish crimes that I simply cannot forgive. If I had submitted the dialogue to a film professor, I would've failed. If I would've submitted the action scenes to an English professor, I would've failed. The author doesn't write dialogue specific to their characters. If any character could say a line, then it's not good dialogue. In this vast universe, with seemingly infinite species, all of the characters curse in the same manner and, are constantly referencing the stars. Is that why the Force needs to be awakened? The action scenes are littered with groan-worthy similies that constantly take the reader out of the story to look at the author saying, hey, look what I'm adding to this universe. Just within these pages, we also have out of character moments. The writing is also overflowing with excessive punctuation. Scenes end before a beginning, middle, and end, to jump back to another unfinished scene, no pace or flow to it. Has the author ever read Dracula? Ever watched The Godfather Pt. II or Touch Of Evil?

At my Barnes and Noble, there are almost as many shelves of Louis L'Amour books as there are shelves for Star Wars. L'Amour's books have clearly stood the test of time. Will Aftermath? People may enjoy it in the present. It does offer a glimpse at a post-ROTJ world. What else does it have to offer? Will people pick this book up 50 years from now and be filled with a sense of wonder, will it excite their imagination, will they form strong emotional attachments with the characters? They will probably laugh at the horrendous writing and chuck it.

If you think this a good work. That's great, I hope you enjoy it. However, you will never be able to convince me it isn't objectively awful. I also don't understand why you would give the impression that it's fantastic, that you're being treated to a five course meal, when it's a gas station snack. Do you not want the work to be as good as it could possibly be? Do not want the level of quality to be the absolute best? Are you willing to let characters act out of character because you have an undeniable attachment to the franchise? If you don't demand quality, you're going to be fed gas station snacks. Fine in the moment, but instantly disposable. Time is the greatest judge. If you don't know what makes something able to withstand the test of time, study the Masters. Read Sir Joshua Reynolds. Aftermath is absolute rubbish, and time will not treat her gently.

[Kemper · Rating 3 out of 5]

Probably all self-proclaimed nerds have dipped their toes into the pool of tie-in books for a franchise they like at one point or another, and I'm no exception. However, I mostly gave up on the concept years ago because reading a Star Wars book when what you really want is a new Star Wars* movie is about as satisfying as eating Hamburger Helper when what you're really craving is filet mignon.

* Feel free to insert your own prequel joke here.

Yet, the idea of Chuck Wendig doing a book as part of the new post-Lucas official canon that was going to bridge the gap between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens..... Well, that’s the same kind of siren call that lured Darth Vader to the dark side.

The results are mixed. Wendig does a decent job of creating a new cast of characters and giving them a worthy adventure set immediately after the end of Jedi. This runs into the problem of trying to introduce new characters to a franchise like Star Wars in a tie-in book though. We haven’t seen these people on screen before so there’s just no way that a reader is going to be as invested in them as the ones we know.

Plus, you can tell that Wendig was hobbled by the requirements of writing a book that is set between the last phase of the franchise and the new one. It’s obvious that he couldn’t do anything that would give anything away about the new movie, and that’s frustrating because one of the most interesting parts to me was the tidbits we get about what the remains of the Empire’s forces are planning to do.

This also severely limited him at using any of the major characters. Wendig tries to skirt around that by incorporating Wedge Antilles, but he was a bit player at best in the movies and even here he has little more than a supporting role. This makes the one brief chapter that actually features a couple of the big cheeses seem like a tease in the same way that Samuel L. Jackson popping his head in the door for an episode of Agents of SHIELD isn’t all that much fun.

It’s not a bad Star Wars book, I’ve certainly read worse, but it may have been more satisfying if it was done after the release of the new movie so that Wendig could have told us more rather than dancing around so much of it.

[Jay · Rating 1 out of 5]

Jar Jar Binks' memoir would have been way more entertaining. I read dozens of EU books growing up and am super enthused about Disney's resurrection of Star Wars (the animated TV show Rebels is A+), but this book is boring! It tries too hard to be clever and stylish at the expense of substantive characterization or emotional impact, and the 'clues' into the Force Awakens storyline are shallow and meaningless. Aftermath feels like it was written by an adderall fiend on a 48 hour binge.

As a fan hugely interested in the new canon/post ROTJ timeline, it is interesting to gain a tiny bit of insight into the political and military climate right after the death of the Emperor. But my mind is boggled by how masterful the failure is here. All I needed from this book was a slice of pizza -- even frozen pizza would have been fine -- but Aftermath is just a bunch of Cheez-its tossed into a cardboard box.

[Sean Barrs · Rating 3 out of 5]

“This isn’t some kind of inspiration story. Some scrappy, ragtag underdog tale, some pugilistic match where we’re the goodhearted gladiator who brings down the oppressive regime that put him in the arena. They get to have that narrative. We are the ones that enslaved whole worlds full of alien inhabitants. We are the ones who built something called a Death Star under the leadership of a decrepit old goblin who believed in the ‘dark side’ of some ancient, insane religion.”



The dark heart of the Empire has been destroyed; the Lords of the Sith are no more. This leaves the snake without a head, without a voice and without any unity. The remnants of the Empire have no common purpose; they are not entirely sure what to do. They call a summit to discuss how they should proceed, but in doing so they undermine themselves. For the Empire does not discuss. It acts with power and unrelenting authority. By politicking, they spell their own doom and usher in the days of the New Republic. The summit was a very bad move. Admiral Ackbar lies in wait.

But.........



The Rebel Alliance- now the New Republic- have caught wind of the summit. A pilot has sent a message to Admiral-it’s a trap- Ackbar. He proceeds with caution and prepares a careful response. But, he’s not the only one aware of the meeting. Locals of the planet Akiva, in which the summit is being held, want the Empire off their world. They’ve been inspired by the destruction of The Death Star II. They’re ready to riot, and all they need is the spark to light the fuse. They don’t fear the Empire anymore because it has lost its leadership; Vader will not be there to come and punish their probable actions. So, why shouldn’t they stand up for themselves?

This comes in the form of two bounty hunters who now have the gal to challenge the once mighty force. They’re assisting a rebel pilot and her young son who have been caught up in the mess. It’s all a thing of circumstance. They attempt to enrage the populace, so they can bring the Imperials down. Admiral Ackbar isn't going to get there any time soon, so they have to act against the Empire. The Imperials in this aren’t exactly evil. They’re confused and vulnerable. But, they’re not defeated. A cornered animal can still strike back and a desperate one even more so. They begin to plan their own trap, one to snare the unassuming General. So, there's a lot of traps going round.

But, it’s all jumbled up!

This is a good addition to the Star Wars cannon. In terms of its plot, this does work. There are, however, some major issues with its structure. There are around ten interlude chapters which really disrupt the main plot. Each one had a new point of view character, and each one added a random tangent to the story. It became a little too much. Most of them were completely forgettable in their pointlessness. All they achieved was convolution of this. There was even a chapter featuring Solo and Chewbacca planning the liberation of Kasykk (the Wookie home world). It was so far away from this book in its redundancy.

This novel seriously needed to focus on the conflict in which it was portraying. The author tried to tell too many stories rather than just focussing on one. The writing itself was fairly good; it was quite sharp and emotive at points. The quote at the top gave me the feels. I appreciated its tone, but the structure needed to be tighter and focused. I’m not entirely sure why the author added “frag” as a curse word. I think he stole that idea form Battlestar Gallactica, which hampered the feel of this novel. It should be reminiscent of Star Wars not another science fiction universe. I will read the next book in the series, and I can only hope that it will be better. I also hope that the author tones down the comic Admiral Ackbar references. Whilst they were funny to begin with, it did start to become a little overkill towards the middle of the book. It was like he lives in constant fear of them, bless him. No one is that paranoid about space traps.

Aftermath Trilogy
1. Aftermath- An overly trapped three stars.

[Renée · Rating 1 out of 5]

It's my fault for not reading the excerpt from a couple months ago. Had I done so, I never would have bought the book.

Horrid writing style and an absolute deal-breaker for me. Present tense? I despise it! Such a shame, as I was really looking forward to this book. I read the first page and was immediately disappointed as I simply cannot and will not read a novel in present tense. Skipped a few pages and then a few more, skimming. Hoping. But no, he really DID write the entire book like that -- and in this choppy, one sentence is a paragraph, incredibly jarring way. Some were not even complete sentences. A few for effect is fine, but throughout a novel? No.

I don't want a screenplay. I want a well-crafted story.

Returned my book to Amazon today.

[Chris Comerford · Rating 4 out of 5]

EDIT: Yes, I have actually read this book cover to cover; it became available at a local bookstore recently. Stayed up most of the night and finished it on my lunch break the next day.

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Review originally posted here at Geek of Oz.

Other 'Journey to Star Wars: The Force Awakens' reviews:
Star Wars: Lost Stars

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When it comes to Star Wars, I'm a massive fan of the books. In addition to all the Old Republic and Prequel Trilogy stories like Outbound Flight and The Rise of Darth Vader, I bought a lot of the old post-Return of the Jedi Expanded Universe novels back in the day. More than I'd care to admit, actually. Had I spent that money on other things, I could possibly own an Omega watch, or perhaps a secondhand car.

But back in the days of Timothy Zahn, James Luceno, Matt Stover, Karen Traviss and, yes, even Kevin J. Anderson (shut up, Darksaber was a great novel), I bought those novels because they were excellent. As with any pop culture property they did, of course, have their low points - the less said about Planet of Twilight and The Crystal Star, the better - but were ultimately an excellent continuation building off the ending of Return of the Jedi. I even enjoyed The New Jedi Order, where the Star Wars universe went toe-to-toe with the crab-wearing, Force-nullifying alien empire of the Yuuzhan Vong.

Given my fondness for what is now termed the Legends canon - being all the stuff wiped from continuity to make way for JJ Abrams's new stories - I experienced a lot of trepidation before diving into Aftermath. It's billed as the first of a new trilogy bridging the gap between Jedi and The Force Awakens, meant to explain events between Eps VI and VII. It's the first post-Jedi text of the new canon released since all the Legends stuff got kicked out. It's replacing aspects of books I've been reading since I was in single-digit ages. To say I was concerned that Aftermath was going to purely be a marketing and hype exercise rather than a novel in its own right is putting it very mildly.

Colour me pleasantly shocked, then, that Aftermath is not a bad book at all.

Set almost immediately after Return of the Jedi, the book follows less a single plot thread than it does several that are triggered by an instigating incident. Wedge Antilles, Rebel pilot responsible in part
for the destruction of both Death Stars, is on a reconnaissance gig for the Rebellion - now known as the New Republic. He stumbles upon a high-level Imperial meeting ground on the backwater jungle world of Akiva, and is soon captured by Admiral Rae Sloane, one of the last surviving commanders of the Empire and a woman hellbent of reforming the Imperial Order from the ground up.

Wedge's distress call shortly before capture gets the attention of Norra Wexley, another Rebel pilot who's arrived at Akiva looking for her son, Temmin. They both attract the attention of Sinjir Rath Velus, a former Imperial Loyalty Officer with a smarmy tone and an alcoholic streak, and Jas Emari, a Zabrak bounty hunter out to kill Sloane and her cohorts. Together, the four of them must unite to rescue Wedge, take down Sloane, liberate Akiva and stop the new Empire's formation in its crib.

Whew.

So there's a lot of plot going on here, and that's not even getting into the brief interludes that show different planets - such as Tattooine, Naboo, Coruscant and Jakku, the desert planet from the Awakens trailers - recovering from the defeat of the Emperor and the new galactic order. Rather than focusing exclusively on the events at Akiva, Aftermath also goes for little snapshots of life in the galaxy as a whole during the twilight of the Empire. Those bits are nice, and some are quite interesting, even if most of them are pretty blatantly sequel hooks for either the rest of this novel trilogy or the upcoming movies themselves. Other bits, such as the opening scene that recontexualises the ending scene in Jedi where the Emperor's statue gets pulled down on Coruscant, can get a little grim at times.

The central plot on Akiva doesn't disappoint. There's more than enough character development of our main quartet and villains, woven nicely around the greater narrative movements. Every character - including a few you'd be familiar with from the movies - gets a good chance to shine and has some nice backstory included, and the group dynamic of the protagonist foursome is quite well-balanced. Some characters come through clearly - especially Sinjir, who I imagine played by a constantly half-drunk Michael Fassbender - and the plot was engaging enough that I never felt bored. It also felt a little like a harkening back to A New Hope with the switching between the main plot with the heroes and the villainous Empire-building with Sloane, which felt like a good balance. There's also quite a bit of the Legends universe's DNA in characters and plotting for this story; Sloane manages at times to channel the more competent aspects of Admirals Daala and Isard, while Temmin sometimes plays up the more irritating qualities of characters like Anakin Solo. I also found what may have been - and what I sincerely hope was - an oblique allusion to a very well-known Legends antagonist, but we'll have to wait for the next books to see if that pans out.

If I have one overwhelming problem with Aftermath, it goes thusly: the book needs to be read one of two certain ways. It's either a bridge between Jedi and Awakens, or it's a good post-Jedi novel in the new canon. Personally, I prefer the latter reading, because those going for the former are going to be disappointed. As I said, there are plenty of sequel hooks used throughout that will pay off either in this Aftermath trilogy or in Eps VII, VIII and IX, and there are quite clearly seeds of Awakens planted in several key scenes across the galaxy, but it's not really a transitional text the way it was advertised. On its own, Aftermath seems much more concerned with telling a story that just happens to be coming on the heels of Jedi, rather than being a specific bridge between film eras. That might change when the other two books of the trilogy are released, but for now it's just a nice stone in the path that is the journey to The Force Awakens.

As a post-Jedi novel, it's still damn good. Pretty high up there with a lot of other Star Wars books, actually. It's not on the level of Zahn, Luceno and the like, but it's still a nice little story all of its own. The closest existing comparison I'd have would be the contemplative tones present in Matt Stover's Revenge of the Sith and Traitor books; while it doesn't hit exactly the same grace notes as Stover, writer Chuck Wendig still has a similar kind of introspective, see-through-their-eyes style in his present-tense writing. I felt very much on the ground with the protagonists, in the halls of the Akiva palace with Sloane and her cohort, and in the shoes of the various one-off characters in those interludes. It was definitely engaging prose, and I'd be keen to see more.

Some of the emotional beats may not land as strongly as they could've, and the pile-up of sequel hooks as opposed to actual information can get a little tedious. But overall, I really enjoyed Aftermath. As the first post-Jedi book following the creation of Legends, there was onus on Aftermath to show diehard and casual fans that the Lucasfilm story group, tasked to create the new Expanded Universe, knew what they were doing. If Aftermath is indicative of their style going forward, they're off to a good start.

[Christopher Coughlin · Rating 1 out of 5]

IGN'S REVIEW:
"A hundred pages into the last prominent post-Endor Star Wars story, Heir to the Empire, I couldn’t wait to find out more about Grand Admiral Thrawn, Talon Karrde, Mara Jade, and Joruus C’Baoth. At the end of Aftermath, I’d met almost no one I cared about. The lack of compelling character development highlights a larger problem with Aftermath: everything that’s happening feels so small, so at odds with the more interesting story you feel might be taking place somewhere off-camera."

"Ultimately, Aftermath is like a series of stained glass windows, a skillfully-crafted tale rendered in still scenes, a story artfully told in brief snippets and glimpses. But there’s no sun behind the glass, no bathing light or warmth of substance streaming through the panes. In the end, our first big look at a new galaxy far, far away feels muted, fragmented, and incomplete."

MY REVIEW:
It's like watching Episode I all over again.

I haven't read a book that disappointed me this much since... well, I've never read a book that disappointed me this much. My emotional reaction was a little like watching Episode I. It was something I wanted to love so badly, and it just couldn't deliver. The story and characters are not bad, they're just not good. None of them are particularly engaging and I was left not really caring about any of them.

That may be because the book is SO BADLY WRITTEN.

One of the Amazon reviews calls it "an experiment in hazardous punctuation" and I agree. Wendig ends subordinate clauses in question marks only to go on to write partial clauses as complete sentences. He uses periods for emphasis rather than to end thoughts. He uses colons in the strangest way I've ever seen and does so frequently. It's reads like a tween is texting the book to you. I think there may actually be 4 to 5 complete sentences per page. It's unreadable. If you are contemplating buying this book, download the free chapter and read that, knowing the whole book is written that poorly. If you read the book out loud, there are not infrequent moments when it sounds like you're having a seizure.

When held up against Lost Stars, it's "Young Adult" contemporary, Aftermath just falls flat. This is by far the worst Star Wars novel of the new canon.

[Jaime K · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars.

I preordered this book because it has Wedge Antilles in it. I had high hopes for such an integral part of the NU canon.
My hopes have been dashed. The story...has potential Yet I had almost no understanding as to why the Imperials have focused on the planet of Akiva. Or even why they are meeting there.

Wendig's writing is juvenile. There are parenthetical thoughts and additions that are incredibly unnecessary. They could be italicized or even just a part of the text. Sentences are choppy and sometimes disjointed. It makes me never want to read another novel from him again. Yes, the editor is supposed to help him fix any errors, but in the end, the writer has the final say.
I completed the book again for a group reading, though I listened to it. It was less irritating to listen to, but I would still consider it to be a 2.5-star book.

Every few chapters there's an interlude. 75% of them are irrelevant. I don't mind interludes as a whole, and in between parts they could really supplement the book. But the large number of them create an even larger cast of characters most of whom even now, after the fact, I care little about. Even those I do like, such as Cobb Vanth, have no real bearing on this story.

I didn't realize until the day before it came out that this is the first in a trilogy. That explains the multitude of characters and even interludes to a point, but a 366-page book is not meant to be a mess of a setup. Fortunately, the main characters aren't difficult to keep up with, even though there are quite a few of them.
And again, Wedge isn't even one of them.

There are actual typos on pages 142 & 157.

Here are some of my thoughts as I read:

- The timeline is so lame. I miss the Legends timeline.
- Sloane is still sharp and a great leader.
- Norra was a Rebel pilot. Now she's home on Akiva and hopes to get her life back into place with her son.
- I love that the term "New Republic" is used.
- Mister Bones is a pretty freaking awesome droid! The voice Marc Thompson uses for him is annoying but as a character, I like him.
- Mothma hopes to demilitarize the government and push for the end of the war.
- Temmin's aunts don't seem to care about being his guardians very much. They irritate me. It doesn't even seem they tried to calm him down from the "I Hate Mom" ledge.
- I love that the idea of people calling themselves Grand Moffs has remained.
- Page 161 mentions something about "being scared of daddy's belt." Really? We're putting such Earth-like thoughts in Star Wars? Give me a break. Oh and later there is the mention of a toilet...a milkshake....a game of chicken. This is all absolutely ridiculous.
- There is a random Operator helping the New Republic too much. It's as shifty as Fulcrum in "Rebels" initially was. It's also stupid, like the NR can't do anything without the help of a secret person.
- Is Imra from the comics? If so, it's nice to know there is that continuity.

The biggest feelings I continue to get from this are 1)Wendig doesn't know the 'verse very well, even in the context of the new (and even though his characters are used later on screen) and 2)he's not a good author.

[Tom Reade · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ugh. what is this mess? I had finally relented to this new Disney Alternate timeline since the movies will be based in it. That decision alone took me 10 months to come to.

But this... why not hire the old authors who know how to do Star Wars?

I had to quit so far about half way through. The characters are horrid and uninteresting thus far.

Please tell me this is some sort of Joke and the real book is coming out soon?

[Mogsy · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 of 5 stars at The BiblioSanctum http://bibliosanctum.com/2015/11/09/r...

This was it, the long-awaited novel in the new Star Wars canon that was marketed as the “bridge” between Return of the Jedi and the new upcoming movie. In retrospect, the publisher might have oversold that just a tad. Well, okay, maybe a lot more than just a tad. Call me cynical though, but I never really expected to see this book provide much detail. In truth, I was more excited to see one of my favorite authors tackle one of my favorite franchises.

I did have my misgivings though. Chuck Wendig’s Blackbirds in my eyes is one of the best books ever. But it is also as far away from a general-audience thing like Star Wars as you can get. I love Wendig’s style for its gritty dark edginess and his brand of dry, sarcastic wit, and I worried that writing for a media tie-in would come with a lot of restrictions, leading him to dial it way back. In the end, I think something like this must have happened, because while I typically adore Wendig’s writing, I somehow found myself struggling with it in Aftermath. Something vital felt missing, which made his normally punchy and enjoyable style feel awkward, choppy, and grating here instead. I even had to switch to the audiobook version midway, which fortunately made getting through the book easier. Wendig is a fantastic writer, but I feel his style is more suited to urban fantasy, and feels a little out of place in the Star Wars universe, especially given his tendency to use many modern colloquialisms in his prose that jolted me out of the story.

And speaking of story, it was decent but not great. The problem was the lack of any compelling characters. Being a fan of expanded universes and tie-ins of all media, not just Star Wars, I have no problems with making the acquaintances of new faces, but in Aftermath there were JUST. SO. MANY. It was impossible to form an attachment to any one character, not even the familiar ones like good old Wedge Antilles or Rae Sloane the Imperial Admiral who was first introduced in A New Dawn. And so like many of the middling Star Wars novels I have read, I had a good enough time enjoying this ride, but never truly felt invested in the fate of the characters or the plot direction.

Furthermore, as I’d alluded to before, this isn’t exactly the “aftermath” I was expecting. It barely has anything to do with the destruction of the Death Star at end of ROTJ, nor does it give us many clues for The Force Awakens. It reads like any other new adventure with new characters; the story doesn’t feel whole, it feels a lot more like an introduction. It’s fun, but it’s fluffy. It lacks weight.

Aside from feeling sad about the loss of a couple great stories, for the most part I’m actually quite happy about the new canon. There was so much bloat in the old EU and I cringe whenever I think about how many years of my life I wasted torturing myself trying to finish series that aren’t even all that great (*cough* New Jedi Order *cough*). Good riddance, I say. I’m actually really optimistic about the wonderful possibilities going forward. So far, the majority of the new books have impressed me. Aftermath was actually a pretty decent read too, and my 3-star rating reflects that. Still, for a book I anticipated so much, it’s hard not to see that as a disappointment. For the first post-ROTJ novel, I admit I’d hoped for something more.

[Chris Evans · Rating 1 out of 5]

Very disappointing. If you were hoping to see what happened to Luke, Leia, and Han don't bother reading this.

If you really want to read a fan fic of what Chuck Wendig's OC's would do after the Battle of Endor, then this is the book still isn't really for you. The book was obviously extremely rushed and heavily controlled by the Disney Corporation. As a result, it seems more like a story by comity, making sure each box is checked with the minimal effort given to the story.

I'll be honest, I wasn't a fan of Wendig's writing before this book either. He's unnecessarily raunchy and has an worrying fixation the crotch region. It's really the kind of writing I'd expect from a 14 year old writing a fan fiction. With so many good authors out there, I'm confused why they give such an important book to this guy.

Who is the target audience for this anyways? Anyone who wanted to continue with Star Wars outside the movies has already read 'Truce At Bakura', the true events that took place just after the Battle of Endor.

I would recommend skipping all this Disney mess that attempts to dump decades of back story in a couple of books, and plaster over superior content that had been crafted over 20+ years. If you skipped the EU books before Disney, just keep skipping and stick to the movies.

[Markus · Rating 3 out of 5]

Aftermath is a quite decent addition to the Star Wars universe, which could pretty easily fit into either of the two now divergent timelines.

Most aspects of the book are, while nothing memorable, quite solid. I do not really see where the hatred for Wendig's writing style comes from; it was certainly not the best I've seen, but not overly distracting either. Some characters were more interesting than others, and the story doesn't really take any chances.

Some interesting thoughts did come out of it: I had never really considered that nobody in the Empire (except Vader) knew who and what the Emperor actually was. So the revelation that all knowledge about him was mere rumour, was quite intriguing. So was the description of the Imperial commanders who try to gather the remnants of their fleet and fully believe in their cause, but simultaneously recognise the freedom-fighter narrative of the Rebellion and the New Republic.

All in all, this book is like the new movies. Builds some interesting stuff, doesn't really mess up the canon too much and even provides a few hours of decent entertainment, but overall it is very unnecessary.

[Wee Lassie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good exciting book, not quite as engaging as some of the more recent publications - but an excellent start for the Disney Star Wars extended universe.

[ScottIsANerd (GrilledCheeseSamurai) · Rating 1 out of 5]

The present-tense narrative choice for a Star Wars novel was a bold one.

It failed. Miserably.

As did the writing. The writing was horrid!! It felt like grade school fan fiction.

I was so excited to read the NEW continuation of Return Of The Jedi. I was so pumped to see what was so great that the Lucasarts people felt like they could get rid of all the previous Star Wars extended universe material.

Now I'm just confused.

This is the story that is supposed to replace Timothy Zahn's Thrawn trilogy?

Ha.

You know what? I'm sitting here writing these words and I cant even remember a single character name from Aftermath (except for the few that already existed in the Star Wars world)And I just read the damn book!

Pfffft.

Do yourself a favor.

Pass on this one. The force is definitely not strong here.

[Ethan · Rating 3 out of 5]

In what may be my most controversial take in a Goodreads review since I rated Anna Karenina 2.5 stars, I actually mostly enjoyed Aftermath. For those of you who don't know, Aftermath is widely considered to be one of the worst, if not the single worst Star Wars book ever written by fans of the franchise. On this point, I wholeheartedly disagree. Honestly, there are worse Star Wars books than this even in the modern Disney era. Like Last Shot, a book about Han Solo and Lando Calrissian that was so awful and un-Star-Wars-like that I couldn't stand it anymore and DNF'd it. If I could summarize my thoughts on this book in a single sentence, it would be this:

Chuck Wendig can write, and Chuck Wendig really CANNOT write.

What do I mean by this? ...

Story

The story in this book is where Wendig succeeds. To me, this does feel like a Star Wars story. It blends frenetic action sequences with TIE fighters, star destroyers, and a rebel fleet with political backstory. In this way, it felt a lot like Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace to me, which similarly blended action and lightsaber battles against a backdrop of an Imperial blockade (which this book also has). The book also nailed the upbeat tone that Star Wars stories tend to have, and the tendency for something to always be happening and for things never to be boring. In this aspect, the book really shines, and it's the reason I didn't DNF it and generally enjoyed picking it up every time I wanted to read.

Unfortunately, however, this is really where the positives end for Aftermath...

Writing

The writing in this book is objectively awful, and is among the worst I've ever read in my life. Wendig writes in a stunted, edgy way where he omits the first word or two of many of his sentences in an attempt to make the writing more slang-ey and hard-edged, but it just comes across as juvenile. Your high school English teacher would absolutely flog you over the head for writing like this in even a short story for English class, yet somehow this writing made it into the flagship novel of the Disney canon of Star Wars, the book meant to begin to bridge the gap between The Return of the Jedi and the (at the time) upcoming new film, The Force Awakens. It astonishes me that this happened; it's almost like no one edited this book at all, because the writing is truly awful.

And Wendig constantly uses these annoying, goofy, stupid "like" and "as" analogies that are completely ineffectual. He does them at least once per page for the entire 410 pages of this book's length, and sometimes even does them in back-to-back paragraphs. He'll say something stupid like:

"He stepped out into the rain, and soon he was as wet as a Bantha caught in a monsoon."

And more than once he compares something to a "lizard monkey". But the problem with the hundreds of lame, cringe-worthy analogies Wendig makes is that he never explains what any of the things he's comparing something to actually are. Like, a lizard monkey? What does that look like? Which animal's head does it have? Is its body covered in fur, like a monkey? Or does it have smooth, reptilian skin? Because Wendig never explains any of these things, the analogies have no meaning, and when combined with their corny nature, they just end up being stupid. They should have been cut from the novel completely, because they were just empty words and they made the book insufferable to read through at times.

There are also things like swearing (multiple times) and references to sex that never occur in Star Wars and that felt completely out of place. I think with these things, combined with his juvenile/stunted writing style, Wendig was trying to bring a new edginess to the Star Wars universe, but to me they just felt incongruent with what Star Wars has always been, and they made the story slightly worse (in my opinion).

There were also numerous character death fake-outs in this book that I rolled my eyes at as they kept occurring, because you knew Wendig would never kill those characters. So when they magically appeared each time ("they're not dead after all!"), it had no effect and was just cringe-worthy because of how predictable it was. These repetitive character death fake-outs became more and more annoying as they continued to occur throughout the book.

Characters

In addition to the writing, the characters in this book are a serious problem for many reasons. Chief among them: there are way, way too many. There must be at least fifty characters in this book, and after a while it felt like Wendig was just throwing them in to try to break some kind of record for most characters ever in a Star Wars book, because the vast majority of characters in this book are just name dropped, and maybe featured in a single scene on a single page, and then they are never mentioned again for the rest of the book. They were completely ephemeral and unnecessary.

The other main problem is that, of the four or five characters you do follow for any significant amount of time in this book, they are all boring stereotypes of Star Wars characters that bring nothing new to the series: there's the hard-nosed bounty hunter, the boy character with mommy and daddy issues (à la Kylo Ren and Luke Skywalker), the "droid you're supposed to love" (à la C-3PO, R2-D2, and BB-8), the conflicted Imperial who wants to turn to the light side (à la Finn, Darth Vader, Kylo Ren), and the ruthless Imperial evildoer. It's all very formulaic. And on top of that, most of these characters either aren't well-developed or are just terrible.

The drunk Imperial who wants to turn to the light was an arrogant, self-absorbed prick, the droid was one of the battle droids from the Prequel Trilogy who mostly just said stupid things like "Roger-roger!" constantly (thus making himself look more like a cringe-worthy parody of a Star Wars droid than anything else), and the mother character in the book acts completely against everything she says and is extremely self-contradicting (she talks about how her son is the most important thing in her life constantly, but throughout the book she almost gets killed numerous times because she wanted to be a renegade and recklessly put herself in danger, almost orphaning her son several times).

Verdict

For me, Aftermath was largely an enjoyable reading experience because it truly feels like a Star Wars story that could be adapted directly onto the big screen, and its upbeat atmosphere, constant excitement, and clever blend of action and politics are aspects of the Star Wars formula I've seen other authors in the series fail at completely. But the book is also deeply flawed, featuring probably the worst prose I've ever read, far too many and paper thin characters, insufferable/goofy/completely ineffectual/way too many dumb analogies, and aspects of life that just don't belong in Star Wars (swearing, references to sex). If you're looking for a book that feels like Star Wars, or if you're a series completionist, this may be worth checking out, but know that it's deeply flawed and considered one of the worst Star Wars books ever written by much of the Star Wars fandom.

[Christopher Shawn · Rating 1 out of 5]

One of the worst parts of the Star Wars Expanded Universe novels, before the great Disney purge, was that most felt like fan-fiction at best. It is unfortunate that Sci-Fi series can sometimes attract sub-par talent, which in turn diminishes the legacy of the brand. I'm unsure if this is a "lower bidder" kind of thing, or if companies just figure the license can and will sell itself, that they are unwilling to invest in a major talent to produce books for their heaviest hitters.

Which brings me to Star Wars: Aftermath by Chuck Wendig. I, a professional bookseller with lots of science fiction experience, had never heard of Wendig before this novel. Upon further research, he appears to being a very Internet-savvy kind of guy, and probably grew up with Star Wars, just as I have. Apparently, he used his Twitter account to rally his fans to petition Disney to allow him to write a Star Wars novel. And as we all know, only good things happen when you listen to the Internet.

Star Wars: Aftermath commits the ultimate sin: it is boring as hell. I went from being literally giddy with anticipation for this novel, to slowing forcing myself to finish it over the course of two weeks. So many new characters, planets, spaceships, droids, slang, and whatnot are introduced so frequently, and so poorly fleshed out, that everything jumbles together into one big mess that you won't care about.

Aftermath is the first in a planned trilogy that will establish the new canon of the Star Wars universe following the events of Return of the Jedi. The Empire has been dealt a crushing blow, the Rebels have formed into a new Republic, and everyone is trying to pick up the pieces. It is a damn shame that these themes, which have the potential to be incredibly exciting, are slopped together into a seemingly random jumble of chapters, sentence fragments, and both boring and confusing action sequences. The reader never knows where they are, who the characters are, and what anything has to do with anything else.

Wendig has taken the lazy way out and chosen to place most of the "action" on the remote Outer Rim planet Akiva, which is totally NOT Tatooine, except in the way that it totally is. There's so much possibility in the freshly de-cluttered Star Wars universe, and the author chose the least exciting route. How many times do we need to see a desolate planet, full of scum and villainy, drunk cantina patrons, and junk scavengers?

The inhabitants of these new locals feel like different versions of the same character, and Wendig is never able to break himself out of his own tone enough to establish a personality for any of them. Everyone is witty, in a snarky kind of way, and everyone is deceptively clever and skilled in confrontation with enemies. A kid is a skilled pilot (just like Anakin), his mother is protective yet strong (like Anakin's mom) there's a confrontation in a cantina (just like in A New Hope) and a good guy gets caught in an Imperial ship and has to sneak around the base (just like The Phantom Menace.)

If this series is to truly continue to all three planned parts, serious intervention is needed. A co-writer should be brought in, a new editor assigned, and far more hands-on work from the Star Wars Story Group needs to be applied to whatever skeleton of a plotline this series is supposed to have. Wendig has severely tarnished his reputation with Star Wars fans with this bargain-basement book, and after the release of The Force Awakens this winter, it will be hard to get excited for another book written in this time period again. At least I've heard good things about the YA novel written by Claudia Gray.

[Lyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

The great thing about the Star Wars universe is that a diverse collection of writers can make contributions to the overall canon in their own unique ways.

Author Chuck Wendig, author of the Blackbirds series, adds his two cents into the mix in 2015’s Aftermath, a story set immediately after the death of Palpatine and Vader in the film Return of the Jedi. One of the opening scenes depicts citizens of Coruscant pulling down a statue of the Emperor in a description that could be seen in post war Berlin or Baghdad.

The timeline and setting are similar to Michael Stackpole’s 1996 Rogue Squadron. Also similar to Stackpole’s book is the inclusion of Wedge Antilles and Admiral Ackbar. Wendig also introduces many other new characters and some original story lines to add detail to the great tapestry created by George Lucas. Aftermath displays a time where the Empire is reeling, trying to right itself and the Alliance, likewise, is trying to organize itself to capitalize on successes won. Wendig's story focuses on the blue collar workers and faces, the pluralistic vision rather than of the heroes of the Star Wars films.

The strength of this book is the subversive, underworld quality of Wendig’s writing as compared to some of the hard SF writing of many of the other Star Wars universe contributors who tend towards the crisp, stilted narrative reminiscent of classic Heinlein. Wendig brings a fresh voice to this chorus and Aftermath was fun.

[Amy H. Sturgis · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'll keep this short and free of spoilers. I had hoped for glimpses into the post-Return of the Jedi universe and hints related to The Force Awakens, and this novel delivers both, and so I'm glad I read it. That said, it is far from the best Star Wars novel available. The familiar characters receive little time, the original characters seem two-dimensional and clichéd, and the scattershot narrative -- which is continually interrupted by brief glimpses of post-Battle of Endor conditions in different parts of the universe, all of which prove more compelling than the main storyline -- lacks momentum and proper pacing. Worst of all, Chuck Wendig's writing style (present tense and packed with sentence fragments) distracts and detracts from the tale. I won't deny it's a "must read" for Star Wars fans, but be warned that what should be a joy feels more like work.

[11811 (Eleven) · Rating 1 out of 5]

Fantastic audio book production but the story sucked. I plan to punish myself for finishing it.

[Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

December 2015: I was nervous about reading this book for a couple of reasons:

Firstly, because there was a whole hullabaloo around it involving bigots upset at the reasonable portrayal of a diverse galaxy, and five year olds in the bodies of grown men (mostly) crying about the old Extended Universe being axed, and so they must automatically shun the new canon, as if the people writing those new books didn’t love the old books as much as they did and wouldn’t do their best to preserve as much of it as they could. (Also, what an ineffectual protest. This book was a bestseller almost immediately.) There also seems to be a proliferation of reviews stating Aftermath is poorly written (it’s not); that it wasn’t the book they wanted, many comparing it to Zahn’s original trilogy (you should never put your own expectations on a book, ever–-guaranteed failure right there); and that it was boring. This last complaint I am BAFFLED by. Did we even read the same book?

And secondly, because I’ve never really liked any of the Chuck Wendig books that I’ve read. His style tends to grate on me, and I was worried I wouldn’t be able to overcome that. His prose is very in your face, and his style tends to draw attention to itself by design. (I prefer books that allow you to sink into a story and forget you’re even reading. This is harder to do for me with his writing.) It bears repeating I think that just because you don’t care for an author’s writing style, that does NOT mean it’s “badly written.”

So yeah, it was a bit hard for me to overcome all that baggage when I just wanted to read a book that I could escape into. Thankfully, once I actually picked it up, and spent several pages getting acclimated to the writing style (which is one of the main things working against this book–he really would have been much better served to pick any POV other than third person present tense–added to his already, er, unique writing style, it’s just too much). I also noticed that occasionally, he’d have his characters speak colloquially, and instead of using Star Wars terms, he’d slip in our slang and our way of talking, and it pulled me out every time.

But even with those hurdles, this was overall a fun reading experience. You can tell that Chuck Wendig really fucking loves Star Wars. He has a nice grasp on the spaciness of it all, and the political situation between the Empire and the Rebellion, now the New Republic (that name being one of the many things that is staying the same in the new canon), and I genuinely liked all of his main characters. The story is a simple one. In the wake of the destruction of the second Death Star, a ragtag group of people come together on the Outer Rim planet, Akiva. The Empire has gathered there to decide how to move forward, and everyone’s favorite pilot, Wedge Antilles, has gotten himself captured gathering intel. Rebel pilot Norra Wexley has returned home to Akiva for the first time in three years, and with her fifteen year old prodigy son (he builds robots and stuff), a bounty hunter there to capitalize on the dense concentration of Imperial targets, and a deserter from the Imperial Starfleet--a former loyalty officer nonetheless--she goes about trying to rescue Wedge from the Imperials. Things go haywire of course, but it hits all the right notes and it all builds to an exciting swashbuckling conclusion.

I will definitely be checking out the second two books in this trilogy, and I’m super glad I didn’t listen to the haters.

March 2015: His wish came true!!! Awwwww.

[James Bojaciuk · Rating 1 out of 5]

I've never been big on Star Wars. It's there; it's fine; the movies are well-made. But one of the people I'm closest to is a huge Star Wars fanatic, and has been slowly introducing me to the rest. So I have the twice-fold unusual perspective: I'm an outsider to Star Wars, and I read this--well, as much of it as I could stomach--while reading Timothy Zahn's Thawn trilogy for the very first time.

On the first count, as an outsider to Star Wars, this book is garbage. Some people have called the writing juvenile--but that's not quite it. It's desperate to always keep the reader enthralled; it's desperate to constantly remind us "HEY, DID YOU KNOW THIS WAS A STAR WARS (TM) BOOK?"; it's desperate to link this to the reader's life (and in the worst way, with real-world slang like "trending" and a godforsaken reference to "space diapers." The writing could possibly have been competent, but the author is juggling so many pointless, unnecessary things that the writing might as well have been filtered through a second grader.The characters are disastrously thin. If you doubt any of this, check out any other review--they're quoting this mess at length.

On the second count, as someone who's just starting to make his way through the Thawn trilogy...why in the name of Walt's mouse ears was this handed to a no-talent hack, instead of letting Zahn recreate the magic he did decades ago? Those are, so far as I've read, legitimately good novels that stand up well against the rules of literature. This is slapdash garbage that disappoints by the standards of tie-in fiction.

In short: Wendig's book is a special kind of garbage, however you look at it. Disney should've hired Timothy Zahn (or anyone else) instead.

[Charles · Rating 1 out of 5]

Some promise, but overall disappointing

The good:
Nice tie ins with Rebels and New Dawn and the original movie trilogy
Diverse cast of characters (people of color and different sexual orientation)

The bad:
Writing style - this has been covered at length by other reviewers
Plot

This review of course is merely my personal opinion.

Like many others I found the author's writing style to be a big miss in this book. I did not enjoy reading the author's prose, but rather found that it distracted from the story.

However, the greatest failure of the book is that it just is not a very good or tightly told story. Character motivations do not drive their actions, rather characters seem to do things for the sole purpose of something happening later. Without going in to spoilers, suffice it to say that all too often a character would do something that didn't seem to make sense, only to have a scene later that hinged on that action, despite it not making sense at the time. So instead of a later scene providing payoff, one is instead left with the feeling that the author did not know how to get there and instead railroaded and sacrificed the story early to have a scene he wanted later.

This is not a good Star Wars story nor is it even a good sci-fi story. I would not recommend this book to either a Star Wars fan or a sci-fi fan.

[Ineke · Rating 1 out of 5]

Well. The writing style was awful. Was there no editor to take out the thousand 'then''s?! It was really quite bad. I can't believe they allowed such a highly anticipated book to be published like this. About halfway through some parts were better, like they were written by another author, but this didn't make up for the bad parts.

Also, the characters were terrible. Two-dimensional and boring. There were too many of them and they all felt identical; I had a hard time telling them apart even halfway through the book. The only exception was the Bones droid, who made me chuckle at times.

The story itself was predictable and dull. There was not a single plot twist I didn't anticipate and the locations and interactions were quite boring. It also didn't feel very 'Star Wars' to me, despite the references (see below). I'm not sure why that was; maybe it's because the writing style left me unable to visualise the worlds and characters as I normally can.

I did like the references to the larger universe and the little interludes. I'm curious which of these will be referenced to in The Force Awakens. I also did like the references to Episodes I-III. I was afraid these movies would be mostly ignored, but they did use the most interesting parts it seems.

[Neil · Rating 2 out of 5]

I love star wars. But star wars novels are usually a big let down.....this is no exception. Bland characters dumb inept empire. ingenious unkillable rebels. a pretty uninspired story leading to a predictable ending. Says it all when the only character of note is a droid.

[Ashley Daviau · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was a little hesitant to pick this up at first, it’s been staring at me from my shelves for over a year. I’m so glad I finally picked it up though because I thoroughly enjoyed it! I think the Star Wars world translates really well into the written word, I was instantly hooked and couldn’t turn the pages fast enough. Wendig really does a phenomenal job of expanding on the Star Wars universe and I’m definitely looking forward to reading the rest of the trilogy. My only very minor complaint is that some parts were a tad long and could have been briefer and I would have enjoyed it much more!

[Jack · Rating 4 out of 5]

Technically 3.5 stars, but I'll bump it up to 4 because, hey, it's Star Wars!

So this is my second "revised canon" Star Wars read following Lords of the Sith, and I definitely enjoyed Aftermath more. It felt more like a legitimate Star Wars tale with the grand adventure, lucky happenstance, and narrow escapes. It also had more point of view characters, which is another Star Wars trait. I personally feel that Star Wars novels work better when painted on a larger canvas, so we can see what's happening around the various parts of this very fleshed out universe.

So yeah, I hadn't read a Chuck Wendig novel before this one, and it took me a little bit to adjust to the writing style. He's very...utilitarian. There's not necessarily a lack of detail, but there's also not an abundance of detail either. He writes in a sparse way that gets the point across, but just barely. All said and done, it works, but I generally want a little more meat on my literary bones. The action scenes are generally handled well, though things can get just a little confusing. The more quiet interpersonal scenes just don't flow as well, sadly. Also, there's a running gag that got a little old, where a chapter (and many subsequent chapters) had a variation on the "I've/we've/you've got a problem" statement. It just went on too long and started to detract from the story.

But while the writing leaves a little bit to be desired, the cast of characters is wonderfully diverse and entertaining. From Norra the former Rebel Y-wing pilot, to Sinjir the ex-Imperial loyalty office, the cast is colorful and all over the map. In addition to Norra and Sinjir, we have Norra's teenage son (complete with abandonment issues and general teen surliness) Temmin, and bounty hunter & assassin & general bad-ass extraordinaire Jas Emari (Bobba Fett could've taken lessons from her). And we definitely cannot forget about Mr. Bones, a repurposed Battle Droid modified by Temmin to be, well, you'll just have to read the book to find out. He's definitely the least fleshed out character of the group, but he's...got serious flair. Mr. Bones is like a bastard mash-up between Wall-E and Mr. Crane from Neal Asher's Polity books (hands down the coolest synthetic killing machine I've ever read about). It's a well rounded group, but one that's far from perfect. They snip, they bicker, they don't necessarily trust each other, but their skills complement each other nicely, and they are truly entertaining.

We've also got a rather diverse group of Imperial villains as well, from a self-centered Moff to a determined female Admiral commanding the last Super Star Destroyer. Only one of the villains really gets a good share of the limelight, the others being relegated to plot devices or just there to play devil's advocate. Much mustache twirling ensues. And come on Stormtroopers...when will you learn to shoot?!

Anywho, aside from the story proper, we also get some interesting interludes that truly help the book live up to its "Aftermath" title. These interludes are rarely more than a few pages long, but they give brief and generally enjoyable glimpses into the ripples that spread across the galaxy in the wake of the Empire's defeat over Endor. What's interesting is that, depending on how you read them, and how well versed you are in Star Wars lore, a few of these interludes just might feature prominent Star Wars characters. But the passages are JUST vague enough that you'd be totally justified in second-guessing who is who.

So it sounds like this is the first book in a trilogy featuring these characters, so I will definitely be checking out the other 2. It was definitely a tasty little morsel to chew on before The Force Awakens opens in theaters this December.