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Star Wars Legends: Novels
Star Wars: Tatooine Ghost
SPECIAL BONUS INSIDE—the exclusive story "A Forest Apart," previously available in e-book format only!
Han and Leia struggle to keep the Empire at bay as stunning revelations from the past threaten to eclipse the future of the New Republic. . . .
The deaths of Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine by no means spelled the end of the Empire. In the aftermath, the New Republic has faced a constant struggle to survive. Now a new threat looms: a masterpiece of Alderaanian art—lost after the planet’s destruction—has resurfaced on the black market. It conceals a vital secret—the code used to communicate with New Republic agents undercover within the Empire. Discovery by Imperial forces would spell disaster. The only option is recovery—and Han, Leia, Chewbacca, and C-3PO have been dispatched to Tatooine to infiltrate the auction.
When a dispute at the auction erupts into violence, the painting vanishes in the chaos. Han and Leia are thrust into a desperate race to reclaim it. As they battle against marauding TIE fighters, encroaching stormtroopers, and Tatooine’s savage Tusken Raiders, Leia’s emotional struggle over the specter of her infamous father culminates in the discovery of an extraordinary link to the past. And as long-buried secrets at last emerge, she faces a moment of reckoning that will forever alter her destiny . . . and that of the New Republic.
Han and Leia struggle to keep the Empire at bay as stunning revelations from the past threaten to eclipse the future of the New Republic. . . .
The deaths of Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine by no means spelled the end of the Empire. In the aftermath, the New Republic has faced a constant struggle to survive. Now a new threat looms: a masterpiece of Alderaanian art—lost after the planet’s destruction—has resurfaced on the black market. It conceals a vital secret—the code used to communicate with New Republic agents undercover within the Empire. Discovery by Imperial forces would spell disaster. The only option is recovery—and Han, Leia, Chewbacca, and C-3PO have been dispatched to Tatooine to infiltrate the auction.
When a dispute at the auction erupts into violence, the painting vanishes in the chaos. Han and Leia are thrust into a desperate race to reclaim it. As they battle against marauding TIE fighters, encroaching stormtroopers, and Tatooine’s savage Tusken Raiders, Leia’s emotional struggle over the specter of her infamous father culminates in the discovery of an extraordinary link to the past. And as long-buried secrets at last emerge, she faces a moment of reckoning that will forever alter her destiny . . . and that of the New Republic.
456 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published March 4, 2003
127 people are currently reading
2885 people want to read
About the author
Troy Denning
185 books662 followersAlso known as Richard Awlinson.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troy_Den...
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troy_Den...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 232 reviews
January 7, 2020
I love Leia with my whole heart
October 26, 2025
This book was way better than it was expected to be. Troy Denning was able to combine some great prequel era worldbuilding with a fun, small original trilogy era story, all while tying the book into the greater Expanded Universe. 9 out of 10.
February 16, 2023
4.0 Stars
I love how this book ties together the original trilogy with the prequels. I particularly enjoyed learning more about Anakin's mother as Leia tries to reconcile her feelings about her father.
I love how this book ties together the original trilogy with the prequels. I particularly enjoyed learning more about Anakin's mother as Leia tries to reconcile her feelings about her father.
November 7, 2012
I loved this one. The writing was decent--no distracting uses of "mellifluous" or repeated instances of "he realized"--and the plot solid. I picked it as my next Star Wars conquest because of Leia's emotional arc. To put it in interwebs terms, it was full of feels. As a kid, I never realized why Leia was so distraught when Luke informed her of her parentage (perhaps because I was more thrilled about Luke being her brother...). Only recently did I fully realize Leia was tortured by Darth Vader. She watched Darth Vader blow up her homeworld. He frose the love of her life in carbonite. He tried to kill her brother. Her father? It is pretty horrifying. So to watch her discover Anakin Skywalker before he was Darth Vader (and through the eyes of his mother! So beautiful!) was wonderful. Another issue she faced was a fear of bearing Force-sensitive children. By getting a glimpse of Shmi's love for Anakin, she came to terms with loving a child in spite of the potential for evil. I read this knowing that in thirty years her family would be devastated, and her decision to have children and love them would end with intense pain for her, Han, and Luke.
Augh. The feels.
Augh. The feels.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 11, 2010
Mr. and Mrs. Solo on Tatooine...
This novel, I tried to start some years ago but couldn’t quite get in the mood for. Now, hearing from many how good it was, I thought I’d find out for myself.
Plot:
Han Solo and Leia Organa Solo, recently married, travel to Tatooine with Chewbacca and C-3PO to recover Killik Twilight, an Alderaanian painting that contains the Shadowcast code. This code has been used to contact undercover agents for years and if found by the Imperials will spell doom for many agents. Things turn amok when the painting is stolen at an auction by Kitster Banai, Anakin Skywalker’s former friend. Now, Han and Leia must rush across Tatooine and retrieve the painting before the Imperials do.
Good:
It is difficult to replicate the intricate, multi-dimensional chemistry between Han and Leia, our favorite smuggler and princess couple. However, Troy Denning has been able to capture this and portray it in a format that is compatible with the on-screen performances of our favorite characters. Han Solo is still dashing, reckless, and madly in love with Leia; Leia is done much, much better than in most Star Wars books (I should know as I have read all but the most recent dozen or so books) as the headstrong, freedom-loving princess who isn’t afraid to use a gun when necessary.
Further, Troy Denning was given the assignment of molding Leia from Courtship of Princess Leia to Heir to the Empire, which means having her come to grips with her father and her Force abilities. Her transformation was fairly convincing (more on this later), and I liked how Leia learned about how her father wasn’t always bad. Plus, it is nice seeing little tid-bits from the prequels in the post-Return of the Jedi era.
Troy has done a good job with his new aliens, the Squibs (perfectly annoying) and portraying Kitster Banai and Wald later in life. Also, kudos to Troy for finally including normal families (i.e. families that have been through divorce) in a Star Wars book! His action sequences, for the most part, keep you on the edge of your seat, particularly Han’s speeder bike race and the end battle (which crashes to a halt before your very eyes!).
Bad:
Number one dumb thing about this book: the plot. Han and Leia must go to Tatooine to pick up a painting that contains a code the Rebellion used to contact undercover agents. Stupid! Why would the Rebel Alliance put such a sensitive code in a rare painting like this? Did Bail want to keep this for the memories? Because, how in the heck are people supposed to access this code anyway if it is in one person’s painting? It seems to me the whole idea of putting the code in the painting is a big headline that says, “Steal me!” Not to mention, how many times do we have to get drug through the “Imperials are one step from taking over the galaxy” plot?
And why are Han and Leia—famous Rebels with bounties on their heads so huge that anyone who sniffed them would probably sell them immediately to the Imperials—sent anyway? They only succeed in bollixing the whole thing anyway, from their agreement with the Squibs to their attempt at destroying the painting to their repeated failures at recapturing the painting and getting caught in a sand storm. This is such a stupid mission in the first place that almost anyone could have accomplished it better and faster than they did.
The obvious reason this book was written was not to detail a mission (especially the stupid one concocted here), but to show how Leia evolved to want kids (something Troy vehemently says time and again she doesn’t want, which I was rather surprised about as she didn’t seem anti-children anywhere else) and use the Force as in Heir to the Empire. Troy does a so-so job with this. In my opinion, he should have dumped the stupid “the painting has a key-code that will spell disaster if the Imperials get it” and focused solely on Leia’s discovery of her past.
Number two dumb thing: Shmi’s diary entries. Gag me! I swear, these, which should have been the best parts of the book, were the absolute worst parts of the book. Hearing on and on and on and on about how proud she was of Anakin, how Anakin won the Boonta Eve podrace (including a brief screenplay of The Phantom Menace), about how Shmi tried to find out how he was doing, about how everyone was so happy about Anakin’s success, how Anakin’s success influenced everyone else to dream big, and so forth made me want to gag! I sincerely doubt a mother would write something like this to a son! I would hope my mom would spend more time on the present—what was happening in the neighborhood, with my friends, family, etc.—and less on my one great achievement in life!
And Shmi, who has, up until now, been portrayed as our respectable, honest, sensible mother, turns into a giggly, love-struck, rattle-brained twelve year old at the first sight of Cliegg Lars. These are her words directly from the book: “He looked directly at me and my knees went weak, the way Amee says hers do whenever she sees Roc or Jerm or nearly any boy…Before I knew it, I had admitted the truth: that I had done it because I had found [Cliegg:] so handsome”. If that doesn’t make you gag, nothing will.
Weird things about this book:
1.Why do authors feel like they have to drag their characters through a space battle at the very beginning of the book? I was so distracted and disgusted at Han and Leia’s Tatooine approach, I was half-tempted to drop the book completely! All it does is let Han and Leia know that the Imperials are there. D’oh! The auction could have told them that.
2.Isn’t it odd that practically every single person—from Dama at Anchorhead to Kitster Banai, who stole the painting, to the Tusken Raiders at the very end—is from or related to someone who is from the prequels? I understand this is Mos Espa, but come on! That’s a little bit convenient.
3.Why the heck did Qui-Gon give Shmi the Tobal lens? I never got that part at all! It seems like an insensitive gift—or a really foresighted gift.
4.Chewbacca and C-3PO are really in the way throughout the entire book. They serve stupid menial parts, contrived to make the audience feel they were important to the plot (which they weren’t—on numerous occasions, Troy leaves them elsewhere so that Leia and Han can focus their efforts elsewhere). I wish Troy would have felt comfortable enough just leaving them out completely.
Dialogue/Sexual Situations/Violence:
Restricted to h***, d*** and made-up Star Wars lingo. It is alluded that Han and Leia sleep with each other in a hotel. Other sexual allusions made (particularly to scantily dressed Twi’leks). Violence is typical Star Wars.
Overall:
Certainly not as good as I expected, but not the worst I have ever read from the galaxy far, far away. It does convincingly explain Leia’s transformation, have its share of Star Wars action, and is pretty intriguing. As for the part I was most anticipating—Shmi’s diary—this was hugely disappointing. A few other minor points make this book hard to enjoy thoroughly. Definitely interesting, but not paramount for continuity.
NOTE: Included in the mass market paperback version is a kinda cute short story, “A Forest Apart” about Chewbacca and his family. Although a little trite and overdone (Imperials steal a datapad from Leia’s home in an attempt to usurp the New Republic), it is neat to see Chewbacca’s family and how he interacts with his son and wife.
This novel, I tried to start some years ago but couldn’t quite get in the mood for. Now, hearing from many how good it was, I thought I’d find out for myself.
Plot:
Han Solo and Leia Organa Solo, recently married, travel to Tatooine with Chewbacca and C-3PO to recover Killik Twilight, an Alderaanian painting that contains the Shadowcast code. This code has been used to contact undercover agents for years and if found by the Imperials will spell doom for many agents. Things turn amok when the painting is stolen at an auction by Kitster Banai, Anakin Skywalker’s former friend. Now, Han and Leia must rush across Tatooine and retrieve the painting before the Imperials do.
Good:
It is difficult to replicate the intricate, multi-dimensional chemistry between Han and Leia, our favorite smuggler and princess couple. However, Troy Denning has been able to capture this and portray it in a format that is compatible with the on-screen performances of our favorite characters. Han Solo is still dashing, reckless, and madly in love with Leia; Leia is done much, much better than in most Star Wars books (I should know as I have read all but the most recent dozen or so books) as the headstrong, freedom-loving princess who isn’t afraid to use a gun when necessary.
Further, Troy Denning was given the assignment of molding Leia from Courtship of Princess Leia to Heir to the Empire, which means having her come to grips with her father and her Force abilities. Her transformation was fairly convincing (more on this later), and I liked how Leia learned about how her father wasn’t always bad. Plus, it is nice seeing little tid-bits from the prequels in the post-Return of the Jedi era.
Troy has done a good job with his new aliens, the Squibs (perfectly annoying) and portraying Kitster Banai and Wald later in life. Also, kudos to Troy for finally including normal families (i.e. families that have been through divorce) in a Star Wars book! His action sequences, for the most part, keep you on the edge of your seat, particularly Han’s speeder bike race and the end battle (which crashes to a halt before your very eyes!).
Bad:
Number one dumb thing about this book: the plot. Han and Leia must go to Tatooine to pick up a painting that contains a code the Rebellion used to contact undercover agents. Stupid! Why would the Rebel Alliance put such a sensitive code in a rare painting like this? Did Bail want to keep this for the memories? Because, how in the heck are people supposed to access this code anyway if it is in one person’s painting? It seems to me the whole idea of putting the code in the painting is a big headline that says, “Steal me!” Not to mention, how many times do we have to get drug through the “Imperials are one step from taking over the galaxy” plot?
And why are Han and Leia—famous Rebels with bounties on their heads so huge that anyone who sniffed them would probably sell them immediately to the Imperials—sent anyway? They only succeed in bollixing the whole thing anyway, from their agreement with the Squibs to their attempt at destroying the painting to their repeated failures at recapturing the painting and getting caught in a sand storm. This is such a stupid mission in the first place that almost anyone could have accomplished it better and faster than they did.
The obvious reason this book was written was not to detail a mission (especially the stupid one concocted here), but to show how Leia evolved to want kids (something Troy vehemently says time and again she doesn’t want, which I was rather surprised about as she didn’t seem anti-children anywhere else) and use the Force as in Heir to the Empire. Troy does a so-so job with this. In my opinion, he should have dumped the stupid “the painting has a key-code that will spell disaster if the Imperials get it” and focused solely on Leia’s discovery of her past.
Number two dumb thing: Shmi’s diary entries. Gag me! I swear, these, which should have been the best parts of the book, were the absolute worst parts of the book. Hearing on and on and on and on about how proud she was of Anakin, how Anakin won the Boonta Eve podrace (including a brief screenplay of The Phantom Menace), about how Shmi tried to find out how he was doing, about how everyone was so happy about Anakin’s success, how Anakin’s success influenced everyone else to dream big, and so forth made me want to gag! I sincerely doubt a mother would write something like this to a son! I would hope my mom would spend more time on the present—what was happening in the neighborhood, with my friends, family, etc.—and less on my one great achievement in life!
And Shmi, who has, up until now, been portrayed as our respectable, honest, sensible mother, turns into a giggly, love-struck, rattle-brained twelve year old at the first sight of Cliegg Lars. These are her words directly from the book: “He looked directly at me and my knees went weak, the way Amee says hers do whenever she sees Roc or Jerm or nearly any boy…Before I knew it, I had admitted the truth: that I had done it because I had found [Cliegg:] so handsome”. If that doesn’t make you gag, nothing will.
Weird things about this book:
1.Why do authors feel like they have to drag their characters through a space battle at the very beginning of the book? I was so distracted and disgusted at Han and Leia’s Tatooine approach, I was half-tempted to drop the book completely! All it does is let Han and Leia know that the Imperials are there. D’oh! The auction could have told them that.
2.Isn’t it odd that practically every single person—from Dama at Anchorhead to Kitster Banai, who stole the painting, to the Tusken Raiders at the very end—is from or related to someone who is from the prequels? I understand this is Mos Espa, but come on! That’s a little bit convenient.
3.Why the heck did Qui-Gon give Shmi the Tobal lens? I never got that part at all! It seems like an insensitive gift—or a really foresighted gift.
4.Chewbacca and C-3PO are really in the way throughout the entire book. They serve stupid menial parts, contrived to make the audience feel they were important to the plot (which they weren’t—on numerous occasions, Troy leaves them elsewhere so that Leia and Han can focus their efforts elsewhere). I wish Troy would have felt comfortable enough just leaving them out completely.
Dialogue/Sexual Situations/Violence:
Restricted to h***, d*** and made-up Star Wars lingo. It is alluded that Han and Leia sleep with each other in a hotel. Other sexual allusions made (particularly to scantily dressed Twi’leks). Violence is typical Star Wars.
Overall:
Certainly not as good as I expected, but not the worst I have ever read from the galaxy far, far away. It does convincingly explain Leia’s transformation, have its share of Star Wars action, and is pretty intriguing. As for the part I was most anticipating—Shmi’s diary—this was hugely disappointing. A few other minor points make this book hard to enjoy thoroughly. Definitely interesting, but not paramount for continuity.
NOTE: Included in the mass market paperback version is a kinda cute short story, “A Forest Apart” about Chewbacca and his family. Although a little trite and overdone (Imperials steal a datapad from Leia’s home in an attempt to usurp the New Republic), it is neat to see Chewbacca’s family and how he interacts with his son and wife.
February 16, 2013
I love, love, love this book! It’s so nice to see the Solos in their happier times. You know, before the New Jedi Order and the Legacy of the Force series. I feel so bad for them; they were carefree (as much as they can be anyway) in this book. They have no idea what’s in store for them in the future… Now that I think of it, I really wish Luke, Han and Leia would get their happy ending. It seems that as the series continues, their lives gets worse every time : (
Anyway, I love Han and Leia! They are my favourite characters from the saga so it was freaking awesome to have a whole book about them. Troy Denning did a fantastic job portraying Han, Leia, Chewbacca and C-3PO.
Han Solo is still the lovable scoundrel we all know and love. We see more of his soft side which I thought made him so much cuter! Gah! I just love him so much :P You are one lucky woman, Leia. As for Leia Organa Solo, she is still one of my favourite female characters ever! She is amazing. Her strong personality we see in the movies are portrayed here. We also get to see more of her soft side as well. I loved her struggles with understanding the Force and her Skywalker heritage. I’d always wanted to know how Leia took the news that Darth Vader was her father. It was nice to see the Force leading her to different places so that she could discover her father’s past before he became Darth Vader. I loved the connections between the characters from the Prequels and the characters from the Classics. I really liked how Leia’s opinions regarding the Force, Tatooine and her father changed as the book progresses. It was cool to see Leia become more opened to the Force and to her Skywalker heritage.
Chewbacca and C-3PO were awesome as always! They both added the right amount of humour to the tense moments. It was nice to see the gang (minus Luke and R2-D2) together again, fighting what’s left of the Empire. The other supporting characters were great as well. I love the Squibs! They were freaking hilarious.
As for the plot, it was very good! I loved how there were two plotlines intertwined together: the mission to get the Killik Twilight and Leia’s journey to understand the Force and her father. These two plotlines worked very well together. I also liked how it took place on Tatooine, the place where everything began: Anakin’s path to become a Jedi as well as his son’s Luke’s journey. The book also explored Han and Leia’s relationship after six months of marriage. I understood both of their arguments regards having children. It was so sad (and ironic) to know that Leia’s fear will actually come true. However, there were really sweet and adoring moments between them. I loved every moment that they had. They were really meant to be together.
Overall, Tatooine Ghost was a wonderful read! I loved the two short stories at the beginning and at the end of the book. I mean, what could be better than to start the book with Han and Leia’s honeymoon? ‘Corphelion Interlude’ was the perfect portrayal of their honeymoon. It was so Han and Leia. Oh Han, can you get any sweeter than this? We also get to see Leia’s romantic side which we don’t get to see very often. I was sighing dreamily and aww-ing throughout the story. As for ‘A Forest Apart’ Chewbacca’s story, I enjoyed it as well. I already adore our ‘walking carpet’ so it was really cool to see him in action with his family. It’s great to see Chewie’s interactions with his family. They are so cute.
Anyway, I love Han and Leia! They are my favourite characters from the saga so it was freaking awesome to have a whole book about them. Troy Denning did a fantastic job portraying Han, Leia, Chewbacca and C-3PO.
Han Solo is still the lovable scoundrel we all know and love. We see more of his soft side which I thought made him so much cuter! Gah! I just love him so much :P You are one lucky woman, Leia. As for Leia Organa Solo, she is still one of my favourite female characters ever! She is amazing. Her strong personality we see in the movies are portrayed here. We also get to see more of her soft side as well. I loved her struggles with understanding the Force and her Skywalker heritage. I’d always wanted to know how Leia took the news that Darth Vader was her father. It was nice to see the Force leading her to different places so that she could discover her father’s past before he became Darth Vader. I loved the connections between the characters from the Prequels and the characters from the Classics. I really liked how Leia’s opinions regarding the Force, Tatooine and her father changed as the book progresses. It was cool to see Leia become more opened to the Force and to her Skywalker heritage.
Chewbacca and C-3PO were awesome as always! They both added the right amount of humour to the tense moments. It was nice to see the gang (minus Luke and R2-D2) together again, fighting what’s left of the Empire. The other supporting characters were great as well. I love the Squibs! They were freaking hilarious.
As for the plot, it was very good! I loved how there were two plotlines intertwined together: the mission to get the Killik Twilight and Leia’s journey to understand the Force and her father. These two plotlines worked very well together. I also liked how it took place on Tatooine, the place where everything began: Anakin’s path to become a Jedi as well as his son’s Luke’s journey. The book also explored Han and Leia’s relationship after six months of marriage. I understood both of their arguments regards having children. It was so sad (and ironic) to know that Leia’s fear will actually come true. However, there were really sweet and adoring moments between them. I loved every moment that they had. They were really meant to be together.
Overall, Tatooine Ghost was a wonderful read! I loved the two short stories at the beginning and at the end of the book. I mean, what could be better than to start the book with Han and Leia’s honeymoon? ‘Corphelion Interlude’ was the perfect portrayal of their honeymoon. It was so Han and Leia. Oh Han, can you get any sweeter than this? We also get to see Leia’s romantic side which we don’t get to see very often. I was sighing dreamily and aww-ing throughout the story. As for ‘A Forest Apart’ Chewbacca’s story, I enjoyed it as well. I already adore our ‘walking carpet’ so it was really cool to see him in action with his family. It’s great to see Chewie’s interactions with his family. They are so cute.
July 24, 2021
Excellent book, wonderfully written, a great insight into Leia's character and her grappling with the legacy of her birth father.
April 19, 2022
3.5 stars
For 2022, I decided to go back in time and reread all the Prequels Era novels published between 1999 and 2005, plus a smidgen of other novels (like Survivor's Quest and the Dark Nest trilogy) released during that time frame. This shakes out to 21 novels, four eBook novellas, and at least thirteen short stories.
This week’s focus: a Han/Leia story set prior to the Thrawn trilogy: Tatooine Ghost by Troy Denning
SOME HISTORY:
The Bantam-era Star Wars novels released between 1991 and 1999 barely touched on events before A New Hope, but with the release of the Prequel Trilogy between 1999 and 2005, authors were given opportunities to go back to that era and incorporate new understandings from the Prequels. So Tatooine Ghost by Troy Denning is the first of those bridge novels that ties together both the Prequels and the Original Trilogy. Denning himself described the book as “an accident-adventure driven by the complex relationships between characters from two different eras.” Tatooine Ghost by Troy Denning made it to number eight on the New York Times bestseller list for the week of March 23, 2003, and was on the NYT list for two weeks.
MY RECOLLECTION OF THE BOOK:
Along with its sister novel, Survivor's Quest by Timothy Zahn, I have owned the hardcover of Tatooine Ghost for a long time. But I hadn't reread it in years, so it was interesting to revisit it and see how much I remembered—which was mostly Leia's emotional journey to reconcile the Skywalker part of her heritage—as well as the bits I didn't.
A BRIEF SUMMARY:
When a masterpiece of Alderaanian art, lost in transit after the planet's destruction, resurfaces on the black market, Han, Leia, Chewbacca, and C-3PO are dispatched to Tatooine to infiltrate the auction and retrieve a Rebellion-era code hidden within the painting. But trouble is waiting when they arrive, as the Imperials are led by an efficient, mysterious new Admiral, and the long-buried secrets of Skywalkers past are waiting to be uncovered…
A BRIEF TIMELINE DISCLAIMER:
In addition to bridging the gap between the Prequels and the Original Trilogy, Tatooine Ghost is also set in between The Courtship of Princess Leia by Dave Wolverton and the Thrawn trilogy by Timothy Zahn. Tatooine Ghost is set about six months after Courtship, and Han and Leia refer back to the Hapan affair multiple times here. (If you’re interested in this book, read Courtship first!)
THE SETUP:
Supposedly, Leia and co. are headed to Tatooine because Killik Twilight is up for auction, and Leia has a lot of really good feelings associated with it (it used to hang in the Alderaanian royal palace). But as I hinted in the summary, there’s another reason they’ve been dispatched to acquire it: there’s a keycard with a Shadowcast code hidden within the moss painting—briefly, Shadowcast is a method of sending out messages embedded within the Holonet, and if the Imperials crack the code then many Rebel agents are at risk.
But Killik Twilight is a priceless painting—one of the only surviving moss paintings by its Alderaanian artist—and if you’ve read the Thrawn trilogy, you know that there is a certain Imperial officer who is very interested in art. So the Imperials are bidding against Han and Leia’s agents at the auction, but when it looks like the Imperials will win, Han and Leia try to destroy the painting rather than let the Imperials get their hands on it. And that causes most of the trouble in this book! The mysterious Imperial Admiral knows that there has to be some secret involved, or New Republic operatives wouldn’t try to blow it up. Most of the plot involves Han and Leia chasing after the person who saved the painting, and the Imperials in turn chasing everyone.
THE CHARACTERS:
Since this is a bridge novel, various prequel characters are brought into the post-Return of the Jedi-era. The painting’s savior is Kitster Banai, one of Anakin Skywalker's friends when he was a young boy enslaved on Tatooine. While chasing Kitster, we run into Wald, the young Rodian who was another one of Snakin's enslaved friends. We meet Dama, the younger sister of Aunt Beru, and Leia acquires a piece of technology that further elucidates her Skywalker relatives—specifically, her grandmother Shmi.
I felt like some of these prequel connections were shoe-horned into the story (especially Kitster’s importance here), but I also enjoyed getting to meet characters like Dama…so perhaps it all evened out in the end.
Han's emotional journey is deciding that he wants to side with the New Republic again. During the events of The Courtship of Princess Leia, he resigned his commission in the New Republic Navy, and as the story opens, he doesn't want anything to do with Mon Mothma or the rest of the Provisional Council. But Han is not willing to let NR agents die over a grudge, and as the story progresses he comes to an acceptance of what the New Republic is doing. He doesn’t want to be a general anymore, but he’s fine with Leia’s role within the New Republic government. And while he may not believe in all of their leadership, he still believes in their cause.
Chewbacca and C-3PO are here mainly because they're integral parts of the Organa Solo family. In an interview with Troy Denning, he said that Chewie originally played a larger role in the book, but he cut a lot out—and that was the impetus for him to write the ebook novella A Forest Apart. Threepio is a whiner, and gets on Han and Leia’s nerves, but he also comes out with important information at various points which perhaps justifies his presence on this trip.
Of course, Leia is the one really going through an emotional journey here. In The Truce at Bakura by Kathy Tyers, Leia was visited by the Force ghost of Anakin Skywalker shortly after the Battle of Endor…and she wanted nothing to do with him. But by the time we get to the Thrawn trilogy, she’s training with her brother and willing to use a lightsaber, and in the Dark Empire comic she names her youngest son Anakin. Tatooine Ghost serves to bridge that gap, and show us how we got from a Leia unwilling to acknowledge that Anakin Skywalker was her father, to a Leia who’s learning about her Force potential and honoring her father’s legacy. Leia has a lot of understandable, inherent anger towards Darth Vader, yet she's not willing to see that he once was someone else, or to figure out what could have led him to that point until the events in this story.
So in learning about her grandmother, and learning about her father's life on Tatooine before he left to become a Jedi, Leia gains a deeper understanding of her Jedi heritage. She needs to forgive her father—or at least come to a better understanding of him—or she might follow him down the same path. She’s filled with grief and bitterness and anger, and that's not what the Force wants from her.
She's also completely opposed to biological children, which was an interesting development. I had forgotten that, and I’m not sure how well it fit with the books that came before. (Han asks if Isolder and the Hapans knew about this, and Leia says she would have told them eventually!) It makes sense to me that since she was raised by loving adoptive parents, she views them as her true family and not her biological parents. And she’s also worried about Darth Vader’s heritage, and whether that would affect anyone who came after her. (We will not think about how that’s a logical concern, especially in the post-NJO era…) I did wish that Han wasn’t quite so pushy on the “children issue,” especially as he was also raised by an adoptive mother—Dewlanna the Wookiee. I would have rather that this was an issue Leia worked through on her own, rather than it being introduced because Han is sort of prodding her about it.
Han and Leia’s agents during the auction are a trio of Squibs, who are basically sentient rodent individuals. They were a little bit annoying, and they were (IMO) overused in the book—I imagine what happens when an author has favorite characters and wants to use them a lot.
We don't learn much about the mysterious new Imperial Admiral—which is fitting, because going into the Thrawn trilogy the New Republic knows nothing about Thrawn—but what we do see of him is that he is efficient, he is much more effective than past Imperial leaders, and he's going to be a force to be reckoned with.
ISSUES:
One of the reasons I have owned a copy of Tatooine Ghost for lo these many years is because I really like Leia's emotional arc in the story. But during this reread, I noticed more issues with it than I had initially remembered.
The first was that I felt the setup to get Han and Leia on Tatooine so that Leia could find out about her grandmother was a bit…creaky. The maneuverings of the plot were very visible to me and felt somewhat implausible. I can buy Leia and Han going to Tatooine because a famous piece of Alderaanian art is up for auction, and that could have been enough for me. The addition of the Shadowcast code within the painting felt like over-justifying their presence there. In fact, why send Han and Leia in elaborate disguises when you can send the Wraiths or other intelligence officers? The Organa Solos are far too noticeable!
And while I loved Leia getting to learn more about Shmi and her life on Tatooine, I did find some of the scenes with the holojournal a bit hokey. This was like a tone issue, where I liked some of it, but the scenes with Cliegg Lars especially felt a bit cringey. Still, I did still appreciate that Leia got to see Shmi’s face, and hear her voice. That was nice.
Pace-wise, I felt like the first half of the story was more interesting than the second half. By the second half, Han and Leia have settled into this routine of chasing after Kitser then encountering danger, only broken up by holojournal entries. And while I liked how the story concluded, I wish there had been a bit more resolution. She resolved her feelings about kids very quickly, and I’m not sure I bought her reasoning there.
Finally, a timeline problem: in Tatooine Ghost, it seems like everyone is aware that Anakin Skywalker became Darth Vader. Leia constantly brings it up, Denning as the narrator mentions it, Kitster talks about it. But I found this rather confusing, because I didn’t think that the entire galaxy knew his identity until a bit later on?
In The Truce at Bakura, Leia did not want to acknowledge her parentage and so Luke and Leia were keeping their relationship on the down-low. If I remember correctly, by The Courtship of Princess Leia people knew that Luke and Leia were siblings but not the true identity of their father. Most pivotally, in The Last Command, Mara Jade didn’t realize that Darth Vader was Luke’s father until one of the Noghri told her! In I, Jedi set during the Jedi Academy trilogy, Luke shares the story of Darth Vader with his first class of Jedi learners, and by the time we get to Before the Storm, it is public knowledge that Luke and Leia were Darth Vader's children because a senator brings that up as a reason not to trust Leia.
So it's unclear to me when exactly everyone knew their parentage, but at the time of Tatooine Ghost, I don’t think everyone would have known and thus this casual acceptance of Anakin=Vader really threw me for a loop.
IN CONCLUSION:
Tatooine Ghost features a strong emotional arc for Leia’s character: she learns more about the Skywalker side of her heritage through Shmi Skywalker’s holojournal, and she begins to come to terms with her father’s identity. She has to forgive Darth Vader so that she can move on with her life and not follow her father down a similar path. This also ties pretty well into the Thrawn trilogy, giving the reader the first inklings of what Thrawn is capable of. But at the same time, the beginning setup was decidedly clunky, I disliked the Squibs, and I had some questions about the timeframe of the Vader revelations in the post-Return of the Jedi era.
Next up: the first novel in the Clone Wars multimedia project, Shatterpoint by Matthew Stover.
My YouTube review: https://youtu.be/FPPs4DQwI7o
“Troy Denning: Ghost Stories” (March 2003): https://web.archive.org/web/200502041...
For 2022, I decided to go back in time and reread all the Prequels Era novels published between 1999 and 2005, plus a smidgen of other novels (like Survivor's Quest and the Dark Nest trilogy) released during that time frame. This shakes out to 21 novels, four eBook novellas, and at least thirteen short stories.
This week’s focus: a Han/Leia story set prior to the Thrawn trilogy: Tatooine Ghost by Troy Denning
SOME HISTORY:
The Bantam-era Star Wars novels released between 1991 and 1999 barely touched on events before A New Hope, but with the release of the Prequel Trilogy between 1999 and 2005, authors were given opportunities to go back to that era and incorporate new understandings from the Prequels. So Tatooine Ghost by Troy Denning is the first of those bridge novels that ties together both the Prequels and the Original Trilogy. Denning himself described the book as “an accident-adventure driven by the complex relationships between characters from two different eras.” Tatooine Ghost by Troy Denning made it to number eight on the New York Times bestseller list for the week of March 23, 2003, and was on the NYT list for two weeks.
MY RECOLLECTION OF THE BOOK:
Along with its sister novel, Survivor's Quest by Timothy Zahn, I have owned the hardcover of Tatooine Ghost for a long time. But I hadn't reread it in years, so it was interesting to revisit it and see how much I remembered—which was mostly Leia's emotional journey to reconcile the Skywalker part of her heritage—as well as the bits I didn't.
A BRIEF SUMMARY:
When a masterpiece of Alderaanian art, lost in transit after the planet's destruction, resurfaces on the black market, Han, Leia, Chewbacca, and C-3PO are dispatched to Tatooine to infiltrate the auction and retrieve a Rebellion-era code hidden within the painting. But trouble is waiting when they arrive, as the Imperials are led by an efficient, mysterious new Admiral, and the long-buried secrets of Skywalkers past are waiting to be uncovered…
A BRIEF TIMELINE DISCLAIMER:
In addition to bridging the gap between the Prequels and the Original Trilogy, Tatooine Ghost is also set in between The Courtship of Princess Leia by Dave Wolverton and the Thrawn trilogy by Timothy Zahn. Tatooine Ghost is set about six months after Courtship, and Han and Leia refer back to the Hapan affair multiple times here. (If you’re interested in this book, read Courtship first!)
THE SETUP:
Supposedly, Leia and co. are headed to Tatooine because Killik Twilight is up for auction, and Leia has a lot of really good feelings associated with it (it used to hang in the Alderaanian royal palace). But as I hinted in the summary, there’s another reason they’ve been dispatched to acquire it: there’s a keycard with a Shadowcast code hidden within the moss painting—briefly, Shadowcast is a method of sending out messages embedded within the Holonet, and if the Imperials crack the code then many Rebel agents are at risk.
But Killik Twilight is a priceless painting—one of the only surviving moss paintings by its Alderaanian artist—and if you’ve read the Thrawn trilogy, you know that there is a certain Imperial officer who is very interested in art. So the Imperials are bidding against Han and Leia’s agents at the auction, but when it looks like the Imperials will win, Han and Leia try to destroy the painting rather than let the Imperials get their hands on it. And that causes most of the trouble in this book! The mysterious Imperial Admiral knows that there has to be some secret involved, or New Republic operatives wouldn’t try to blow it up. Most of the plot involves Han and Leia chasing after the person who saved the painting, and the Imperials in turn chasing everyone.
THE CHARACTERS:
Since this is a bridge novel, various prequel characters are brought into the post-Return of the Jedi-era. The painting’s savior is Kitster Banai, one of Anakin Skywalker's friends when he was a young boy enslaved on Tatooine. While chasing Kitster, we run into Wald, the young Rodian who was another one of Snakin's enslaved friends. We meet Dama, the younger sister of Aunt Beru, and Leia acquires a piece of technology that further elucidates her Skywalker relatives—specifically, her grandmother Shmi.
I felt like some of these prequel connections were shoe-horned into the story (especially Kitster’s importance here), but I also enjoyed getting to meet characters like Dama…so perhaps it all evened out in the end.
Han's emotional journey is deciding that he wants to side with the New Republic again. During the events of The Courtship of Princess Leia, he resigned his commission in the New Republic Navy, and as the story opens, he doesn't want anything to do with Mon Mothma or the rest of the Provisional Council. But Han is not willing to let NR agents die over a grudge, and as the story progresses he comes to an acceptance of what the New Republic is doing. He doesn’t want to be a general anymore, but he’s fine with Leia’s role within the New Republic government. And while he may not believe in all of their leadership, he still believes in their cause.
Chewbacca and C-3PO are here mainly because they're integral parts of the Organa Solo family. In an interview with Troy Denning, he said that Chewie originally played a larger role in the book, but he cut a lot out—and that was the impetus for him to write the ebook novella A Forest Apart. Threepio is a whiner, and gets on Han and Leia’s nerves, but he also comes out with important information at various points which perhaps justifies his presence on this trip.
Of course, Leia is the one really going through an emotional journey here. In The Truce at Bakura by Kathy Tyers, Leia was visited by the Force ghost of Anakin Skywalker shortly after the Battle of Endor…and she wanted nothing to do with him. But by the time we get to the Thrawn trilogy, she’s training with her brother and willing to use a lightsaber, and in the Dark Empire comic she names her youngest son Anakin. Tatooine Ghost serves to bridge that gap, and show us how we got from a Leia unwilling to acknowledge that Anakin Skywalker was her father, to a Leia who’s learning about her Force potential and honoring her father’s legacy. Leia has a lot of understandable, inherent anger towards Darth Vader, yet she's not willing to see that he once was someone else, or to figure out what could have led him to that point until the events in this story.
So in learning about her grandmother, and learning about her father's life on Tatooine before he left to become a Jedi, Leia gains a deeper understanding of her Jedi heritage. She needs to forgive her father—or at least come to a better understanding of him—or she might follow him down the same path. She’s filled with grief and bitterness and anger, and that's not what the Force wants from her.
She's also completely opposed to biological children, which was an interesting development. I had forgotten that, and I’m not sure how well it fit with the books that came before. (Han asks if Isolder and the Hapans knew about this, and Leia says she would have told them eventually!) It makes sense to me that since she was raised by loving adoptive parents, she views them as her true family and not her biological parents. And she’s also worried about Darth Vader’s heritage, and whether that would affect anyone who came after her. (We will not think about how that’s a logical concern, especially in the post-NJO era…) I did wish that Han wasn’t quite so pushy on the “children issue,” especially as he was also raised by an adoptive mother—Dewlanna the Wookiee. I would have rather that this was an issue Leia worked through on her own, rather than it being introduced because Han is sort of prodding her about it.
Han and Leia’s agents during the auction are a trio of Squibs, who are basically sentient rodent individuals. They were a little bit annoying, and they were (IMO) overused in the book—I imagine what happens when an author has favorite characters and wants to use them a lot.
We don't learn much about the mysterious new Imperial Admiral—which is fitting, because going into the Thrawn trilogy the New Republic knows nothing about Thrawn—but what we do see of him is that he is efficient, he is much more effective than past Imperial leaders, and he's going to be a force to be reckoned with.
ISSUES:
One of the reasons I have owned a copy of Tatooine Ghost for lo these many years is because I really like Leia's emotional arc in the story. But during this reread, I noticed more issues with it than I had initially remembered.
The first was that I felt the setup to get Han and Leia on Tatooine so that Leia could find out about her grandmother was a bit…creaky. The maneuverings of the plot were very visible to me and felt somewhat implausible. I can buy Leia and Han going to Tatooine because a famous piece of Alderaanian art is up for auction, and that could have been enough for me. The addition of the Shadowcast code within the painting felt like over-justifying their presence there. In fact, why send Han and Leia in elaborate disguises when you can send the Wraiths or other intelligence officers? The Organa Solos are far too noticeable!
And while I loved Leia getting to learn more about Shmi and her life on Tatooine, I did find some of the scenes with the holojournal a bit hokey. This was like a tone issue, where I liked some of it, but the scenes with Cliegg Lars especially felt a bit cringey. Still, I did still appreciate that Leia got to see Shmi’s face, and hear her voice. That was nice.
Pace-wise, I felt like the first half of the story was more interesting than the second half. By the second half, Han and Leia have settled into this routine of chasing after Kitser then encountering danger, only broken up by holojournal entries. And while I liked how the story concluded, I wish there had been a bit more resolution. She resolved her feelings about kids very quickly, and I’m not sure I bought her reasoning there.
Finally, a timeline problem: in Tatooine Ghost, it seems like everyone is aware that Anakin Skywalker became Darth Vader. Leia constantly brings it up, Denning as the narrator mentions it, Kitster talks about it. But I found this rather confusing, because I didn’t think that the entire galaxy knew his identity until a bit later on?
In The Truce at Bakura, Leia did not want to acknowledge her parentage and so Luke and Leia were keeping their relationship on the down-low. If I remember correctly, by The Courtship of Princess Leia people knew that Luke and Leia were siblings but not the true identity of their father. Most pivotally, in The Last Command, Mara Jade didn’t realize that Darth Vader was Luke’s father until one of the Noghri told her! In I, Jedi set during the Jedi Academy trilogy, Luke shares the story of Darth Vader with his first class of Jedi learners, and by the time we get to Before the Storm, it is public knowledge that Luke and Leia were Darth Vader's children because a senator brings that up as a reason not to trust Leia.
So it's unclear to me when exactly everyone knew their parentage, but at the time of Tatooine Ghost, I don’t think everyone would have known and thus this casual acceptance of Anakin=Vader really threw me for a loop.
IN CONCLUSION:
Tatooine Ghost features a strong emotional arc for Leia’s character: she learns more about the Skywalker side of her heritage through Shmi Skywalker’s holojournal, and she begins to come to terms with her father’s identity. She has to forgive Darth Vader so that she can move on with her life and not follow her father down a similar path. This also ties pretty well into the Thrawn trilogy, giving the reader the first inklings of what Thrawn is capable of. But at the same time, the beginning setup was decidedly clunky, I disliked the Squibs, and I had some questions about the timeframe of the Vader revelations in the post-Return of the Jedi era.
Next up: the first novel in the Clone Wars multimedia project, Shatterpoint by Matthew Stover.
My YouTube review: https://youtu.be/FPPs4DQwI7o
“Troy Denning: Ghost Stories” (March 2003): https://web.archive.org/web/200502041...
August 24, 2012
I had heard about this book back in 2005 when I was in the first throes of my Star Wars obsession. After I tried and failed to read Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, I stayed away from the EU and other science fiction books.
Fast forward five years or so, I realized that the books that I just couldn't deal with at the tender age of fifteen now make more sense to me. So I figured why not try the EU again? The first book I read was Star Wars: The Courtship of Princess Leia and while I enjoyed it. I felt that the portrayal of Leia was somewhat...off. She didn't seem to be the same woman from the movie series. I know that with different authors writing the EU, it's a possibility that the characters make act OOC.
But with Tatooine Ghost I felt that Denning had a better grip on Leia and not just Leia but her relationship with Han. The two of them really matched their movie versions. Their banter felt familiar.
I have to admit I was more interested in Leia's feeling about her father more than I was about the recovering the painting. It was very interesting to see Leia contemplate her father's turn to the darkside and all the atrocious things he did. It felt realistic.
I thought the story was wrapped up perfectly with the ending.
Fast forward five years or so, I realized that the books that I just couldn't deal with at the tender age of fifteen now make more sense to me. So I figured why not try the EU again? The first book I read was Star Wars: The Courtship of Princess Leia and while I enjoyed it. I felt that the portrayal of Leia was somewhat...off. She didn't seem to be the same woman from the movie series. I know that with different authors writing the EU, it's a possibility that the characters make act OOC.
But with Tatooine Ghost I felt that Denning had a better grip on Leia and not just Leia but her relationship with Han. The two of them really matched their movie versions. Their banter felt familiar.
I have to admit I was more interested in Leia's feeling about her father more than I was about the recovering the painting. It was very interesting to see Leia contemplate her father's turn to the darkside and all the atrocious things he did. It felt realistic.
I thought the story was wrapped up perfectly with the ending.
December 23, 2015
With a book featuring Han Solo & Princess Leia it's a little surprising that the best parts of the book are when Leia discovers the secret past of her father Darth Vader when he was still a Skywalker. A holo-diary, force visions and just occupying the same Tatooine space give her glimpses into the past that really have good emotional pull. Denning also has fun with some of the non-human species notably the Jawas and the Squibs. Listening to this on audio brought the alien languages to life - love the Jawa stuff. Unfortunately the audio also delivers music and sound effects which is fine in the quiet moments that use pieces like Luke's theme but the battles with action music, weapon fire, explosions and narrative turns into a bloody irritating mess. The plot is a bog standard mcguffin driven one that doesn't interest much but Denning makes up for it with his three Squibs. If you have read some other Denning Star Wars books you might have met them already. They're a lot of fun. The only creatures who could make Jawas look like weekend warriors when it comes to being obsessed with trade deals. Google them if you want to see what they look like (they aren't in the films). I think they were created for some game or other. I shall now inhale some helium and wish you 'ubanya'.
August 30, 2015
This was one of the most enjoyable Star Wars novels i've read. It goes to show that somehow, the desert world of Tatooine has a magical connection to the Star Wars mythos. Taking the macguffin of an Alderaan painting being auctioned on Tatooine after the fall of the Empire, the story allows for Leia (accompanied by Han, Chewie and Threepio) to discover the backstory of her father before he became Vader - the young boy Anakin Skywalker. She encounters characters seen in Episode 1 and their fond memories and inspiration they took from the young pod racer.
I did have one major quibble with the story, however. Although written between the theatrical release of Episode 2 and 3, I was fairly sure that the true identity of Darth Vader was known only to the Emperor, Kenobi, Yoda and (eventually) his son and daughter. In this, though, everyone knew that Anakin became Vader, but they preferred to remember him as their local hero.
I did have one major quibble with the story, however. Although written between the theatrical release of Episode 2 and 3, I was fairly sure that the true identity of Darth Vader was known only to the Emperor, Kenobi, Yoda and (eventually) his son and daughter. In this, though, everyone knew that Anakin became Vader, but they preferred to remember him as their local hero.
April 6, 2021
I'm not entirely sure if this deserves a clean three-star review. Consider this as something between 2,5-3 stars.
Quick recap: Han, Leia, Chewie and C-3PO travel to Tatooine to attempt to recover a painting from the lost world of Alderaan. Said painting contains a secret code used for spy missions, and must not fall into the hands of the Empire. Obviously, their acquisition of said painting does not go smoothly, and manifold SW-related shenanigans ensue.
Ok, so, timeline-wise, "Tatooine Ghost" takes place not too long after "The Courtship of Princess Leia" (see my review of that unmitigated mess here), and, as far as I can gather, shortly before the Thrawn trilogy.
So, what's good and bad about this book?
Let's start with the bad and get that out of the way.
The worst part, and this is a pretty significant failing, is that the set-up for the story itself is very weak.
The premise is, as mentioned, that Han and Leia have to recover this famous painting, "Killik Twilight", in order to safeguard a code used with and for NR spies. The idea is that these spies will be in mortal danger if the Empire (who don't yet know about this code), get their hands on it. However, I didn't manage to perceive a single explanation of why they couldn't simply recall these spies using the code, and avoid the entire problem? Conceivably, the NR has been using the code, without having the physical painting, for years. So why should they need it in order to use the code now? Why not just recall the spies, wipe the code, and create a new one?
Unless there is a significant plot point I've missed (and feel free to enlighten me if this is the case), this constitutes a fairly major plot hole.
The adventure itself is still fun, but I wish Denning had worked a little harder on the set-up.
The second, major problem is character development and relationships. Troy Denning is, like so many of his fellow SW authors, not great at this. I'm sorry to keep dragging the men here (and all honour and glory to those, like Matthew Stover and James Luceno, who are awesome at character development), but this is a pervasive problem with male authors, not just in SW, but in fantasy and sci-fi in general.
Now, Denning has an already established relationship to work with, namely that of Leia and Han. This does give him an advantage, as he doesn't have to set up a new relationship, merely continue developing an old one.
However, I feel he does this with somewhat mediocre success. He seems to struggle to find the characters' inner voices, particularly with regard to their feelings for one another, and the first half of the book gives us a lot of awkward interactions and internal musings.
To be fair to Denning, he does have to deal with the fallout from Wolverton's atrocious and aforementioned TCOPL, and that can't have been easy.
However, having characters stop in the middle of intense action sequences to talk about why they do or do not want to have babies is always going to be a bad idea.
Many conversations are also very heavily influenced by dialogue from the original films, clearly in an attempt at nailing the characterisations. For instance, I lost count of how many times Leia calls Han a nerf-herder during the course of this book.
The trouble is, of course, that referencing the original material is only going to get you so far if you can't also capture the essence of the characters. And, as mentioned, Denning does a mediocre job here. He could have done worse, but he also could have done a lot better.
The characterisation does, however, improve as the book moves along.
Now, before moving on to the stuff I liked, I need to address one final plot point that bothered me, namely the whole "having children" issue.
So, having read the Thrawn trilogy, and knowing a bit about what happens later in the EU, I was already aware of the fact that Leia and Han would have children.
Still, it is always a bit problematic when you have a story line that revolves around a woman not wanting to have children and a man pressuring her to have them anyway, particularly when, as is so often the case with these stories, the man wins out in the end and the woman ends up changing her mind.
First of all, it is PERFECTLY OK for women not to want to have children, and I feel that more stories should reflect that.
Secondly, Leia's reasons for hesitating on this score are actually entirely valid. Her fear that she might create another Vader are well founded and logical.
And Denning had an opportunity to let Han be understanding of this, to hear Leia's concerns and appreciate them, but instead he chose to have Han constantly fuss and pester her about it. This not only attempts to invalidate Leia's VALID concerns, but it turns Han into a very negative male stereotype.
Ok, but let's segway into the positive here.
Leia's internal conflict, not just specifically concerning children, but concerning her entire future, her affinity with the Force, and her relationship with her father, and her past, is the best part of this book.
Part of her journey in this book is learning about Anakin Skywalker, getting to know a little bit about the boy, and the young man, he was before becoming Darth Vader.
She starts out with a hatred of him that clouds her own judgment and threatens her relationship not only with Han, but with the Force itself. Her fear of it and the power it can yield threatens to send her down a path as dark as her father took.
Consequently, her character development in this instalment is very important for our understanding of Leia.
Through glimpses of a diary recorded by Shmi Skywalker, Leia gets to learn something of her origins, and bits and pieces she never knew or imagined, fall into place.
Now, if you hate the prequels, you probably won't like this, because there are lots of references here, particularly to TPM.
Full disclosure: I like TPM.
Some truly atrocious acting aside (sorry, Jake Lloyd), it's fun, and it sets up the political tensions and character relationships that will be the driving force of the prequels.
So I found Leia's perusals into this part of her father's past to be rewarding reading.
It was also fun to revisit characters like Kitster Banai and Wald and see what became of Anakin's old friends.
Understanding part of the reason Anakin, initially good, kind, and self-sacrificing, turned to the dark side is also a part of Leia's journey in TG, and as her own affinity with the Force leads her to Anakin's first, powerful turning point, we see how love combined with fear and hatred can be a person's undoing.
In other words, there is a lot of powerful, solid psychological development here, and there are some fun romps o'er the sands of Tatooine chasing down the painting.
Still, this book would have been better had it been, say, 100 pages shorter, and had Denning spent some more time on initial character development and plot details.
So "Tatooine Ghost" is very middle-of-the-line as far as the SW EU goes.
A Forest Apart
1,5 stars
Just a quick note on this little short story.
It felt pointless and was confusingly written. There is an awkward attempt at creating some family bonding between Chewbacca and his extremely irritating son, a plot hatched by a malevolent droid once owned by Ysanne Isard, and a journey to Coruscant's underworld.
Honestly, I'd just skip this if I were you. Unless you're a particularly huge Chewie fan.
Quick recap: Han, Leia, Chewie and C-3PO travel to Tatooine to attempt to recover a painting from the lost world of Alderaan. Said painting contains a secret code used for spy missions, and must not fall into the hands of the Empire. Obviously, their acquisition of said painting does not go smoothly, and manifold SW-related shenanigans ensue.
Ok, so, timeline-wise, "Tatooine Ghost" takes place not too long after "The Courtship of Princess Leia" (see my review of that unmitigated mess here), and, as far as I can gather, shortly before the Thrawn trilogy.
So, what's good and bad about this book?
Let's start with the bad and get that out of the way.
The worst part, and this is a pretty significant failing, is that the set-up for the story itself is very weak.
The premise is, as mentioned, that Han and Leia have to recover this famous painting, "Killik Twilight", in order to safeguard a code used with and for NR spies. The idea is that these spies will be in mortal danger if the Empire (who don't yet know about this code), get their hands on it. However, I didn't manage to perceive a single explanation of why they couldn't simply recall these spies using the code, and avoid the entire problem? Conceivably, the NR has been using the code, without having the physical painting, for years. So why should they need it in order to use the code now? Why not just recall the spies, wipe the code, and create a new one?
Unless there is a significant plot point I've missed (and feel free to enlighten me if this is the case), this constitutes a fairly major plot hole.
The adventure itself is still fun, but I wish Denning had worked a little harder on the set-up.
The second, major problem is character development and relationships. Troy Denning is, like so many of his fellow SW authors, not great at this. I'm sorry to keep dragging the men here (and all honour and glory to those, like Matthew Stover and James Luceno, who are awesome at character development), but this is a pervasive problem with male authors, not just in SW, but in fantasy and sci-fi in general.
Now, Denning has an already established relationship to work with, namely that of Leia and Han. This does give him an advantage, as he doesn't have to set up a new relationship, merely continue developing an old one.
However, I feel he does this with somewhat mediocre success. He seems to struggle to find the characters' inner voices, particularly with regard to their feelings for one another, and the first half of the book gives us a lot of awkward interactions and internal musings.
To be fair to Denning, he does have to deal with the fallout from Wolverton's atrocious and aforementioned TCOPL, and that can't have been easy.
However, having characters stop in the middle of intense action sequences to talk about why they do or do not want to have babies is always going to be a bad idea.
Many conversations are also very heavily influenced by dialogue from the original films, clearly in an attempt at nailing the characterisations. For instance, I lost count of how many times Leia calls Han a nerf-herder during the course of this book.
The trouble is, of course, that referencing the original material is only going to get you so far if you can't also capture the essence of the characters. And, as mentioned, Denning does a mediocre job here. He could have done worse, but he also could have done a lot better.
The characterisation does, however, improve as the book moves along.
Now, before moving on to the stuff I liked, I need to address one final plot point that bothered me, namely the whole "having children" issue.
So, having read the Thrawn trilogy, and knowing a bit about what happens later in the EU, I was already aware of the fact that Leia and Han would have children.
Still, it is always a bit problematic when you have a story line that revolves around a woman not wanting to have children and a man pressuring her to have them anyway, particularly when, as is so often the case with these stories, the man wins out in the end and the woman ends up changing her mind.
First of all, it is PERFECTLY OK for women not to want to have children, and I feel that more stories should reflect that.
Secondly, Leia's reasons for hesitating on this score are actually entirely valid. Her fear that she might create another Vader are well founded and logical.
And Denning had an opportunity to let Han be understanding of this, to hear Leia's concerns and appreciate them, but instead he chose to have Han constantly fuss and pester her about it. This not only attempts to invalidate Leia's VALID concerns, but it turns Han into a very negative male stereotype.
Ok, but let's segway into the positive here.
Leia's internal conflict, not just specifically concerning children, but concerning her entire future, her affinity with the Force, and her relationship with her father, and her past, is the best part of this book.
Part of her journey in this book is learning about Anakin Skywalker, getting to know a little bit about the boy, and the young man, he was before becoming Darth Vader.
She starts out with a hatred of him that clouds her own judgment and threatens her relationship not only with Han, but with the Force itself. Her fear of it and the power it can yield threatens to send her down a path as dark as her father took.
Consequently, her character development in this instalment is very important for our understanding of Leia.
Through glimpses of a diary recorded by Shmi Skywalker, Leia gets to learn something of her origins, and bits and pieces she never knew or imagined, fall into place.
Now, if you hate the prequels, you probably won't like this, because there are lots of references here, particularly to TPM.
Full disclosure: I like TPM.
Some truly atrocious acting aside (sorry, Jake Lloyd), it's fun, and it sets up the political tensions and character relationships that will be the driving force of the prequels.
So I found Leia's perusals into this part of her father's past to be rewarding reading.
It was also fun to revisit characters like Kitster Banai and Wald and see what became of Anakin's old friends.
Understanding part of the reason Anakin, initially good, kind, and self-sacrificing, turned to the dark side is also a part of Leia's journey in TG, and as her own affinity with the Force leads her to Anakin's first, powerful turning point, we see how love combined with fear and hatred can be a person's undoing.
In other words, there is a lot of powerful, solid psychological development here, and there are some fun romps o'er the sands of Tatooine chasing down the painting.
Still, this book would have been better had it been, say, 100 pages shorter, and had Denning spent some more time on initial character development and plot details.
So "Tatooine Ghost" is very middle-of-the-line as far as the SW EU goes.
A Forest Apart
1,5 stars
Just a quick note on this little short story.
It felt pointless and was confusingly written. There is an awkward attempt at creating some family bonding between Chewbacca and his extremely irritating son, a plot hatched by a malevolent droid once owned by Ysanne Isard, and a journey to Coruscant's underworld.
Honestly, I'd just skip this if I were you. Unless you're a particularly huge Chewie fan.
March 13, 2024
Full review to follow but I was disappointed in the book overall. The premise of the adventure and general focus of the book was quite dull. However, the bridging parts between Episode 1 and 2 and the timeline kept me reading. Just needed more of that and less of the silly travel / desert trek.
Overall I’d say the book was just ok - I kind of lost interest in the end but since IRL was kicking butt I’m going to say the book could have been better for me perhaps.
Overall I’d say the book was just ok - I kind of lost interest in the end but since IRL was kicking butt I’m going to say the book could have been better for me perhaps.
September 14, 2016
Well, well, well... Tatooine Ghost was good. I loved the characterization, the setting on Tatooine and the way we got to see more of the past while going forward.
I'd say my friend Jess was more than right to recommend it to me ;) Thanks!
Now, the bad is that I only wanted to read the "new canon" (at least for now) and now I kinda want to read more of the old one. Especially because it features more of Luke, Leia and Han, compared to what we have now and I'm curious (about the kids, how Luke rebuilt the Jedi Order and Mara Jade. See I know a few things already!)
Since the novels are grouped in series/time period, I might just pick a few to read along the way.
That being said, Tatooine Ghost is quite early in the timeline (following the movies) and can very well insert itself in the new canon if you want to read it that way. Nothing contradict the info we got (so far) in The Force Awakens so I guess I CAN RECOMMEND IT TO EVERYONE AHAH
Anyone who wants to read about Star Wars, that is. Otherwise, I don't think it's necessarily the best way to jump into the story.
You'll get insight of Leia's character, Han and Chewie. Also cute young Ani (I'll keep that instead of "Annie" though, it looks weird on the page) and even more of his mother, Schmi.
The whole Skywalker fam story, in short and I thought it was well done. Seeing Leia's side of the Force too.
So now I'm all tored up. Should I continue reading this canon or not? I might be tempted, but since it's not by the Dark Side of the Force, I think I'll be alright.
I'd say my friend Jess was more than right to recommend it to me ;) Thanks!
Now, the bad is that I only wanted to read the "new canon" (at least for now) and now I kinda want to read more of the old one. Especially because it features more of Luke, Leia and Han, compared to what we have now and I'm curious (about the kids, how Luke rebuilt the Jedi Order and Mara Jade. See I know a few things already!)
Since the novels are grouped in series/time period, I might just pick a few to read along the way.
That being said, Tatooine Ghost is quite early in the timeline (following the movies) and can very well insert itself in the new canon if you want to read it that way. Nothing contradict the info we got (so far) in The Force Awakens so I guess I CAN RECOMMEND IT TO EVERYONE AHAH
Anyone who wants to read about Star Wars, that is. Otherwise, I don't think it's necessarily the best way to jump into the story.
You'll get insight of Leia's character, Han and Chewie. Also cute young Ani (I'll keep that instead of "Annie" though, it looks weird on the page) and even more of his mother, Schmi.
The whole Skywalker fam story, in short and I thought it was well done. Seeing Leia's side of the Force too.
So now I'm all tored up. Should I continue reading this canon or not? I might be tempted, but since it's not by the Dark Side of the Force, I think I'll be alright.
November 20, 2022
When I found out this was a Han/Leia book, I knew I had to read it. There are some things to be said about the main plot and the many complications that arise, but you can (I could) ignore them and just enjoy the ride; it's a nice adventure anyway.
I liked that it ties in with the Thrawn trilogy, which follows later in the timeline; I did not like that it considers the events of "The Courtship of Princess Leia". Admittedly, I haven't read it; however, the plot seems preposterous just like the bits I've read of it. I just can't reconcile the Han and Leia I see here with the Han and Leia I've glimpsed in what I've found about "The Courtship of Princess Leia". I understand that it was accepted into the EU and therefore it must have felt like a duty to include it here, but no thank you.
I did enjoy that it's linked with the prequels for Leia to discover more about Anakin's past. Shmi leaving a diary seems a bit far-fetched and too convenient, but it's nonetheless a nice excuse for Leia to see her grandmother.
Finally, her relationship with Han--what drew me to read this in the first place--is portrayed brilliantly and I loved everything about it, including the implied sex scene.
I liked that it ties in with the Thrawn trilogy, which follows later in the timeline; I did not like that it considers the events of "The Courtship of Princess Leia". Admittedly, I haven't read it; however, the plot seems preposterous just like the bits I've read of it. I just can't reconcile the Han and Leia I see here with the Han and Leia I've glimpsed in what I've found about "The Courtship of Princess Leia". I understand that it was accepted into the EU and therefore it must have felt like a duty to include it here, but no thank you.
I did enjoy that it's linked with the prequels for Leia to discover more about Anakin's past. Shmi leaving a diary seems a bit far-fetched and too convenient, but it's nonetheless a nice excuse for Leia to see her grandmother.
Finally, her relationship with Han--what drew me to read this in the first place--is portrayed brilliantly and I loved everything about it, including the implied sex scene.
September 19, 2022
There was a lot I liked about this book but it was very long lol. I haven’t read any EU content in a MINUTE and this one was tied to a few dif books while also alluding to a certain infamous admiral which I thought was clever!
Being as this was written in the early 2000s after AOTC, I LOVED the connections from the original characters to the prequels. I don’t LOVE tatooine as a setting but the plot kept chugging along and I loved Leia being a focal point of this book. It’s cool to see how she processes being a part of the skywalker family.
That being said! This book was so long and I think could’ve been shortened a bit. The action sequences were well written but by the end I was skimming them to just get to the conclusion. I’m glad I read this though!
Being as this was written in the early 2000s after AOTC, I LOVED the connections from the original characters to the prequels. I don’t LOVE tatooine as a setting but the plot kept chugging along and I loved Leia being a focal point of this book. It’s cool to see how she processes being a part of the skywalker family.
That being said! This book was so long and I think could’ve been shortened a bit. The action sequences were well written but by the end I was skimming them to just get to the conclusion. I’m glad I read this though!
October 2, 2009
Maybe a 3.4. All the iconic characters in a classic site (Tatooine) with a twist on the attitudes and behaviors of the Imperials, of all people.
Most of the story ping pongs between Han and Leia's point of view. It works.
Flunked high school physics dept.: (page 19-20) "The quad laser cannons fired in diametric sequence . . . . The Falcon was still at maximum range, and the bolts took an eternity to reach their destination." Even allowing that "an eternity" is hyperbole, laser bolts travel at the speed of light. Do you think Leia knew that? Does Denning?
Most of the story ping pongs between Han and Leia's point of view. It works.
Flunked high school physics dept.: (page 19-20) "The quad laser cannons fired in diametric sequence . . . . The Falcon was still at maximum range, and the bolts took an eternity to reach their destination." Even allowing that "an eternity" is hyperbole, laser bolts travel at the speed of light. Do you think Leia knew that? Does Denning?
February 25, 2008
I'm a complete sucker for anything that connects the prequels with the original trilogy, especially with major characters like Luke and Leia finding out more about their parents. It's the only thing that make the Dark Nest series worth wading through for me. This one has Leia 'interacting' with Shmi via Shmi's diary, and it's pretty good. Grand Admiral Thrawn puts in a very brief, vague appearance, and Leia learns a lot about herself and her heritage. I enjoyed this one.
December 4, 2019
Bored
Yeesh this was rough. The overall story was a slog to get through but there were little hints of bridging the prequels and the OT. Other then that you can skip this book
Yeesh this was rough. The overall story was a slog to get through but there were little hints of bridging the prequels and the OT. Other then that you can skip this book
August 27, 2022
Star Wars: Tatooine Ghost takes place 4 years after Return of the Jedi, a few months after Han and Leia’s marriage in A Courtship of Princess Leia, and one year before the Thrawn Trilogy. The basic plotline of this book is that Han and Leia head to Tatooine to recover an Alderaanian painting that has a secret Rebel code hidden in it. On the surface, you wonder how this small plot can carry a 400-page book. But there’s so much more going on in the story than just that, and that’s to this story’s credit. It also released in 2003, so it has both Episodes I and II to pull information from.
Leia receives a datarecorder from the Darklighters, who bought and now live at the Lars’ farm, to give to Luke but is told she also might find it of interest. It contains recordings of her grandmother, Shmi, from just after Anakin leaves with Qui-Gon up to just before her death. These are the best moments of the book. Leia gets to see her father from Shmi’s point of view. It’s just amazing how Leia could never fathom that there was anything more to Anakin Skywalker than Darth Vader. That it was all about the choices he made and not just because he came to know the Force. This is important because Han would like to have children but Leia is completely against it because surely any Force-sensitive children she has will immediately fall to the dark side, just like she would if she learned how to use the Force. Shmi’s recorder forces her to see more to her father and how much hate and fear she has been holding on to, and it is these very feelings that could turn her into exactly what she fears.
I also absolutely loved all the hints and nudges about who the new admiral on the Chimaera could be. And showing that its crew was competent and teaching their new recruits to do things right and not just go around roughing up or killing the population.
Overall, a really good read. Any time Leia is forced to see how wrong she is about something, is just always worth it.
Leia receives a datarecorder from the Darklighters, who bought and now live at the Lars’ farm, to give to Luke but is told she also might find it of interest. It contains recordings of her grandmother, Shmi, from just after Anakin leaves with Qui-Gon up to just before her death. These are the best moments of the book. Leia gets to see her father from Shmi’s point of view. It’s just amazing how Leia could never fathom that there was anything more to Anakin Skywalker than Darth Vader. That it was all about the choices he made and not just because he came to know the Force. This is important because Han would like to have children but Leia is completely against it because surely any Force-sensitive children she has will immediately fall to the dark side, just like she would if she learned how to use the Force. Shmi’s recorder forces her to see more to her father and how much hate and fear she has been holding on to, and it is these very feelings that could turn her into exactly what she fears.
I also absolutely loved all the hints and nudges about who the new admiral on the Chimaera could be. And showing that its crew was competent and teaching their new recruits to do things right and not just go around roughing up or killing the population.
Overall, a really good read. Any time Leia is forced to see how wrong she is about something, is just always worth it.
July 5, 2023
This is a story with many ups and downs, liking and disliking the story throughout. Yet, for me, in the end, the positive outweighed the negative. I can see though how some folks would dislike this story as It leans heavily on The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones. The plot was pretty straight forward - get the painting. However, events unfold in a way that relied on Leia's viewing of the vid-journal that belonged to Shmi.
Troy Denning did a good job stirring up the emotions of Leia, as well as the reader on some occasions. I liked that we got to witness Leia discover a piece of her history, watching her Grandmother on the vid-journal. She experienced conflicting emotions as Shmi spoke of such love for her son - Anakin. Leia, only knowing Anakin as the Darth Vader, the dark lord of the Sith, a torturer, a murder, a destroyer of worlds.
I believe this story feels like a classic adventure with Leia, Han, Chewbacca, and C-3PO. It's got some really cheesy moments, it's got wonderful character interaction and references to other things that took place in the expanded universe. One of my favorite mentions is that of Outbound Flight! I think the flashbacks or journal scenes were my favorite parts of the story. There is a pretty wide section that felt very repetitive.
Overall, I enjoyed the book, like I said earlier, I can see why some readers would not like this story and wouldn't think they were crazy for disliking it. When a book gets me to sit up straight and bring a smile to my face, I'd call it a good book.
Do I recommend you read Star Wars: Tatooine Ghost? Yes, I think this would be a fun one to read immediatly after watching the prequels.
RATING:
I give this expanded universe novel a B.
Troy Denning did a good job stirring up the emotions of Leia, as well as the reader on some occasions. I liked that we got to witness Leia discover a piece of her history, watching her Grandmother on the vid-journal. She experienced conflicting emotions as Shmi spoke of such love for her son - Anakin. Leia, only knowing Anakin as the Darth Vader, the dark lord of the Sith, a torturer, a murder, a destroyer of worlds.
I believe this story feels like a classic adventure with Leia, Han, Chewbacca, and C-3PO. It's got some really cheesy moments, it's got wonderful character interaction and references to other things that took place in the expanded universe. One of my favorite mentions is that of Outbound Flight! I think the flashbacks or journal scenes were my favorite parts of the story. There is a pretty wide section that felt very repetitive.
Overall, I enjoyed the book, like I said earlier, I can see why some readers would not like this story and wouldn't think they were crazy for disliking it. When a book gets me to sit up straight and bring a smile to my face, I'd call it a good book.
Do I recommend you read Star Wars: Tatooine Ghost? Yes, I think this would be a fun one to read immediatly after watching the prequels.
RATING:
I give this expanded universe novel a B.
August 14, 2020
Tattooine Ghost by Troy Denning
Newlyweds, Han and Leia, are on a top secret mission on Tattooine to recover Killik Twilight, an Alderaanian painting that meant a lot to her people before Leia's planet was destroyed. There's a microchip secured within the painting that has a list of all Shadowcast spies that work for the rebels. Once the imperials catch wind how important this painting is to Han and Leia they are after it along with the capture of the Solos.
The first half of this book is extremely fun and exciting. I love all the new characters introduced, especially the greedy little squibs who add a bit of comic relief to an otherwise kind of dry narrative. The second half of the book is fairly boring but has some great parts sprinkled in.
This book is over 400 pages long and suffered for it. There were some parts that could have easily been cut from the book to make it a much more desirable read. One of the main points of this story was Leia being on a pilgrimage in Anakin Skywalker's footsteps and learning that he wasn't always the monster that she met. I really wish there was more focus on that as it was easily the best parts of the novel. Some of Leia's realizations were very emotional.
I give this one a 3 out of 5. I've grown to really love works set on Tatooine but this was clearly lacking when compared to books like Kenobi by John Jackson Miller.
Newlyweds, Han and Leia, are on a top secret mission on Tattooine to recover Killik Twilight, an Alderaanian painting that meant a lot to her people before Leia's planet was destroyed. There's a microchip secured within the painting that has a list of all Shadowcast spies that work for the rebels. Once the imperials catch wind how important this painting is to Han and Leia they are after it along with the capture of the Solos.
The first half of this book is extremely fun and exciting. I love all the new characters introduced, especially the greedy little squibs who add a bit of comic relief to an otherwise kind of dry narrative. The second half of the book is fairly boring but has some great parts sprinkled in.
This book is over 400 pages long and suffered for it. There were some parts that could have easily been cut from the book to make it a much more desirable read. One of the main points of this story was Leia being on a pilgrimage in Anakin Skywalker's footsteps and learning that he wasn't always the monster that she met. I really wish there was more focus on that as it was easily the best parts of the novel. Some of Leia's realizations were very emotional.
I give this one a 3 out of 5. I've grown to really love works set on Tatooine but this was clearly lacking when compared to books like Kenobi by John Jackson Miller.
March 28, 2023
Han is an asshole, and the women are woefully pathetic. It's classic Legends!
This was a fun little shoot-out story, but the tempo is all over the place. The narrative action is confusing. A big bulk of the second act is just Han being lost in a sand storm. The climax is meh. Coincidences abound, and easy-outs rule the day. Middle of the road, for sure, but entertaining and light-hearted enough to keep the pages turning.
This was a fun little shoot-out story, but the tempo is all over the place. The narrative action is confusing. A big bulk of the second act is just Han being lost in a sand storm. The climax is meh. Coincidences abound, and easy-outs rule the day. Middle of the road, for sure, but entertaining and light-hearted enough to keep the pages turning.
May 21, 2025
I really enjoyed this!! Written pre-sequels, it's Leia and Han after the end of the original films, caught up in an adventure on Tatooine and geting to find out all about Anakin's mum and friends and his childhood. I just thought it was great.
May 24, 2020
An odd little story that really plays on the details of Anakins life set out in episode 1.
August 29, 2025
The main adventure is a little meh, but we get to learn about Anakin's mother and a diary she kept for him to see and how much he loved and missed him when he left to become a jedi.
July 10, 2025
One of my very favorites! I loved how Leia-centric it was, and that it was as much about Leia’s emotional journey as it was an action-filled heist gone awry.
December 3, 2015
I would give this book about 2 and a half stars. The book is ultimately about Leia trying reconcile the actions of Darth Vader against with the person of Anakin Skywalker. Leia goes to Tatooine to retrieve an important piece of data that could compromise the New Republic's spy network. While on Tatooine, she meets many people who knew her father. For the people of Tatooine, Anakin was a hero and a kind and caring soul. The people of Tatooine choose to remember Anakin as they knew him. The person they knew could never have done the things that Darth Vader did. Leia has a very hard time with this. I like the ideal of Leia coming to grips with this aspect of her history, and I like that she is beginning to realize her own Force Sensitivity. I was most impressed by the means by which Leia comes to know her grand-mother, Shmi Skywalker. I thought the parts which focused on Shmi were the best portions of the book. Overall, I feel like that book did not really have much action. And while I was not opposed to the means that brought Leia to Tatooine (to retrieve an important piece of data that could compromise the New Republic's spy network), the way in which the data was hidden was not very good. I probably would not recommend this book for Star Wars fans.
February 20, 2012
Really liked this. More then I thought I would. This other does a great job of writing Leia and Han (which, I was shocked because most SW published books massacre them!) and other known characters in addition to introducing new ones and I like how we got a chance to delve into the backstory of Leia's father and grandmother. It did a really good job of tying in the prequels with the original trilogy. I think this book helped diminished my SW need for the moment but if I ever feel the need to read more, I know which author to choose!
January 31, 2013
An interesting addition to the post-star wars saga that shows the changing emotions on how Leia feels about her father. Very interesting to see that the friends that Anikan had grown up with on Tatooine are still alive and protective of their memories of Anikan than what Leia has told them. Leia is also shown her grandmother and the love between her and Anikan.
Recommend it for all geeks like me.
Recommend it for all geeks like me.
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