Star Wars: Aftermath - Chuck Wendig

Alright, so I've been on a Star Wars kick recently. Here we are again. As I may have mentioned before, a surprising amount of my misspent youth was spent reading Star Wars novels in the then-extended-universe, filled with excellent characters, like Mara Jade, less excellent characters, like...clone "Lu-uke", standout stories like the X-Wing series, and...other...stories like The Crystal Star. All washed away now, post-Disney, and replaced with something a little more directed and a little more polished, for better or worse. Aftermath was one of the first of these, and takes place right after Return of the Jedi. I went in without knowing much about where it was going to go, and to cut to the chase - yes, it was a fun pulp adventure, and a nice antidote to the rather grimmer The Mask of Fear I'd read previously. It has some characters you can stand behind and cheer on, and some villains who aren't exactly moustache-twirling, but certainly don't read like they're on the correct side of history. And it all has that ineffable Star Wars feel to it, which ensured that I'd be happy to go on to read the sequel.

That's the short version. It's a good time, doesn't take itself too seriously, but has enough stakes, emotional and otherwise to make it a page-turning read. 

The slightly longer version? 

Norra Wexley is a one-time rebel pilot, now determined to settle back down in her old home and rekindle her relationship with the son she left behind. Unfortunately for Norra, she gets into a bit of trouble on the way home, trying to avoid Imperial entanglements, and her son is...less than keen to rebuild their relationship. I have a lot of time for Norra, a woman trying to build a life on the back of decisions she made a long time ago, as the cooling ashes of Rebellion turn into the more pragmatic needs of a governing Republic. She's a mother coming home from a war, a war she chose to fight while not expecting to win...and she has to live with the consequences of that. But she has a fierce love for her family (even the bits she doesn't really get on with) and especially for the son she left behind. Watching her struggle to decide on what she wants to be, whether she can leave behind her old-new-life and settle down again, or whether the spirt of the Rebellion is going to ignite again in her...well, it feels very grounded, very real, much like Norra herself. Her life is not made less complex when she picks up a distress call from Wedge Antilles (famed as "that other guy in an X-Wing by Luke Skywalker" in Star Wars). But it does serve as a catalyst for her to start making some increasingly desperate choices, which are entertaining and definitely not going to end badly and/or explosively.

She's assisted in her terrible decision making by Sinjir Velus, one time Imperial troubleshooter slash internal security, now hiding out on Norra's home planet in order to stay out of the way of both the Republic (who probably want a few quiet words) and the ex-Imperials he thinks are taking things more than a little too far (and who also want a few quiet words of their own). Sinjir is about 50% neat alcohol and 50% cynicism, and he's a lovely counterbalance to the more idealistic Norra. I think he'd perhaps be a bit much by himself in a story at this level of pulp-adventure, but as a foil for her heroism, his more pragmatic ruthlessness works perfectly. Also he has a nice turn in wordplay, and occasionally does that one thing that cuts through the moralising Gordian Knot that the ex-Rebels are rather fond of making for themselves. Whether he's a genuine defector or not is a question that gets asked occasionally through the story, and I shan't spoil it here - but whatever he is, Sinjir is an entertaining read, a self-centred rogue who may or may not be on the way to redemption, possibly depending on the relevant rates of pay. 

Then there's Jas Emari, the bounty hunter, who works for whoever happens to be paying, at least notionally. She's smart, thoughtful, and teetering on the grey edges of a universe that has a little more tolerance for grey edges than it did before the second Death Star exploded. She's focused on getting that one big score, on getting in and out, trying for that One Last Job that would set her up for life. Unfortunately for her, that puts her in the crosshairs of various powerful interests - Imperial and otherwise - and she swiftly finds herself entangled with Sinjir and Norra, all trying to stay one jump ahead. 

And then there's Temmin, Norra's son. Grown now, resentful of a mother he thinks abandoned him when he needed her most. A boy who now skirts on more than a few edges himself, with a sideline in technical sabotage, murder-droid construction and long-odds gambling, the last of which has a penchant for getting him into trouble. Temmin talks a good game as a young man on the boundaries of heroism and selfishness, and where he ultimately falls may be decided in this book, or the next, but in the meanwhile his internal conflicts, his refusal to see himself as less than a competent individual, and refusal to abdicate agency to his mother, mean that they clash often, even as they try and reshape their relationship in a world with no need for a Rebellion, but which might have a need for Rebels, still. 

They're a motley crew, and by the end of the book, I was thoroughly invested in them all, and in their weird and wonderful group dynamic. 

The story...well, honestly it's too full of twists and turns to really do justice to here. But it is, at its heart, a story where good triumphs over evil, where day to day heroism stands up against the boot of oppression, and where people justifying the poor choices they make may be said, occasionally, to get their comeuppance. That said, it works hard to make (some of) the villains of the piece more than cardboard cutouts. Rae Sloane, for example, an Imperial Admiral who I'm sure I've seen turn up in a few other places, is a competent, conscientious officer, not one keen to serve another cackling maniac, but also unwilling to relinquish power and control in a galaxy she sees as teetering into chaos. Sloane is political, ruthless, deadly, and definitely making some pretty horrible choices - but inside her own paradigm, she's not the villain . Sloane is a villain, make no mistake, but if she turned 45 degrees, she'd be the heroine of her own story, warped as it may be. 

In the end, this is Star Wars. Exotic locations. Adventure! Excitement! Really wild things! And in the heart of it, a story of found family, of love and sacrifice, defeat and heroism and unexpected victory. It's a story, to steal from Rogue One, a story built on hope. And one I hope you enjoy reading as much as I did. 

Star Wars: Reign of the Empire: The Mask of Fear - Alexander Freed

In my younger days, I was a massive fan of Star Wars (still am, actually). But before the prequels, we had something like fifteen years between the end of the original Trilogy with Return of the Jedi and the start of the prequel series with The Phantom Menace. Fortunately for me, George Lucas let that gap be filled with what I guess is now known as the Expanded Universe, eventually putting out a seemingly endless cavalcade of novels, comics and weird ephemera. All of these things were, kindly, of variable quality. Some were genuine blockbusters on the page, and other were...well, a limp noodle, but in the page. But I didn't care, because I was young and there were no other options, so I devoured it all whole. Eventually, the Expanded Universe was retconned out of existence when Lucas was bought out by Disney, and I haven't really thought about Star Wars outside of TV for a decade or so. This is the book I came back for, and I have to say, it really does deliver. 

Apart, perhaps, from having too many colons in its title, The Mask of Fear has a lot going for it. Set shortly after the collapse of the Galactic Republic and the formation of the Empire by the deeply malevolent Emperor Palpatine, the book follows a couple of Senators as they try, in their own ways, to figure out what they can do to navigate the new world they inhabit and mitigate the damage being done to institutions and people they hold dear. It explores the crisis of effective governance under totalitarianism, and the means by which those governments control the people in and out of power, be that through popular movements, secret police, or the quiet word in the right ear and the occasional disappearance. 

One of the protagonists here is Mon Mothma, who has a small role in the original Star Wars films, but was an absolute standout in the recent Andor as a woman of principle - albeit principle laced with pragmatism - struggling to figure out what she could do to stop a plunge into absolutism. While the Mothma of Andor has some extremely dodgy political connections indeed, the one in this book is still taking her first steps toward rebellion, still working inside the system, trading for votes and trying to understand why people don't seem to care quite as much as she does. Mothma is considered, thoughtful, occasionally afraid, willing to bridge gaps with those she personally despises in order to get the job done. Whether that's a good thing in a government being led by a megalomaniacal psychopath who can shoot lightning out of his hands has been left as something on which the reader can draw their own conclusions. That said, riding around on Mothma's shoulder demonstrates that she's trying her best, and doing what she thinks is right, and doing it well - and while she thinks the rise of more ideologically driven members of the senate is preventing them from getting their own demands met, she has her sympathies and her friends, on both sides of the aisle. Mothma's is a wolrd of backroom deals, of quiet conversations in secluded hallways, and, very occasionally, meeting informants and political partners in out of the way places which are also often horrifically dangerous. 

By contrast, there's Bail Organa from Alderaan, whose daughter, Leia, is of soooome importance in the Star Wars universe. But Bail, here, is relatively young and headstrong and determined to get things done, and he isn't at all willing to let stuff go, or compromise his principles in the name of pragmatism. He is, in fact, a giant noisy cricket in the Empire's eye, and himself readily admits that he hasn't been slapped down by now because he's just...not very effective. But Organa is doggedly persistent, and has a charisma and easy charm that Mothma thinks she lacks, and he's absolutely determined to dig into what happened to all of those Jedi that the Emperor says were traitors, because he doesn't believe a word of it. Of course, he's also being tailed by an agent of one of the many Imperial security bureaus, because he's...well, not good at this. Organa and Mothma, each in their own way, show us the best of people trying to work under an autocratic rule and find a way out, and at the same time they show us the weaknesses and humanity that make clinging to one position as the only answer untenable. Organa is too ideological to survive if he ever got hold of anything he could use, and Mothma is too much of a pragmatist to embrace the sort of violent rupture that unseating a nascent Empire would require. At least, right now. Both of them have a lot of learning and growth throughout the book. 

And I think that's the strength of the story, really. Both of them do grow. Both of them are compelx, flawed characters, working in a system which is becoming increasingly hostile to their existence. They're fighting a fight that we already know (thanks to Star Wars) that they're going to lose. But the face of the enmey, the face of a government led by a tyrant in a cloak of tradition and respectability is one made strange by familiarity. Watching the rise of "pro-Empire" popular movements which are actually astroturfed by Imperial Security, watching Security purge itself of effective members because they won't toe the line or aren't the right species, watching politicians step back from principle in the face of fear of reprisal against those they rep[resent...it's a creeping horror, and a fierce indictment of totalitarianism. This (mostly) isn't lightsabres and lasers - though there's a few in there. But it's a savagely compelling story of Star Wars for the modern era, and one that will leave you flipping pages well into the night. I'm already looking forward to the sequel. 

Dead Hand Rule - Max Gladstone

Dead Hand Rule is the third entry in Max Gladstone's Craft Wars series, itself a sequel of sorts to his larger Craft Sequence novels. I've had a soft spot for Gladstone for years; his blend of fantasy and business-modern, where management consultants gripe about doing TPS reports while using arcane magic and divine will to do things like set up water treatment corporations has always been a delight. The idea that the heads of the largest corporations are, broadly speaking, all powerful undead necromancers...well, that also has its appeal, shall we say. 

So anyway, the Craft Wars. This series drew together protagonists from the previous sequence, then set them up on opposite sides - sort of like Marvel's Civil War only there were fewer superheroes, and more chic business suits. And roughly the same amount of mayhem and world-ending stakes. The close of book two left everything on rather a cliff-hanger, and the question of whether our heroes (on either side) could save the world was...well, quite pressing. Because while they've been fighting each other, there's a larger menace setting itself up to make all of their concerns moot.

The cast is sprawling, probably too much so to get into here. But as always, there's some standouts. Tara Abernathy, who once fell out of the sky, hit the ground, and walked it off, is back. She's struggling with becoming who she thinks she has to be in order to thwart the (possibly problematic?) designs of her one-time protégé, Dawn. Who does Tara think she has to be? Someone harder, sharper, less forgiving, less human than the person she is now, perhaps. Someone a bit more like the skeletal mage-lords on their pyramids, who run the larger magicla firms, and a bit less like Tara, who is sometimes falling in a little bit of love with one of her frienbds. But definitely the same Tara with a tendency to push her friends away, to try and limit them from getting hurt, to try and carry everything on her shoulders in order to spare everyone else. That Tara, and her hang ups and her anxieties, as well as her deep friendships, affections and genuine heroism, is someone struggling with not just who they want to be, but who the situation they're in requires in order for things not to end in total disaster. 

Ironically of course, the same applies to Dawn, once the survivor of a decimated village, then a student of Tara's, and now a part-time goddess with her own incipient hero complex. She's less burdened by the past than Tara is, less a prisoner of her own mistakes - but also less experienced, prone to seeing a straightforward answer where one may not yet exist. Or where it might have rather sharp edges. 

They're joined by, well, everyone. If you've touched a Craft book, there's a good chance your favourite character is in here somewhere, and props to Gladstone for making them all feel entertaining and real and human. Or inhuman, as the case may be. I don't want to talk villains, because some of them are a surprise, but oooooh some of them are deeply loathsome. Well drawn, yes, complex, yes, awful people who made my skin crawl to read whenever they rolled onto the page...oh, my, yes. That's the thing though, this is a story that you can feel is true in your bones. It has the pyramids and the monsters and the magic and that certainly gives it a flavour and a spice that keeps the pages turning, but it's also a deeply human story of loss and learning and friendship and absolutely fucking up and also absolutely trying to fuck up that bad guy over there, possibly with a fireball. Gladstone can make the familiar strange, and have you experience it for the first time all over again, and the emotional weight hits like a truck. This is a book with power, and you may well leave it shaking your head, thinking things through, and knowing you're just a little different to the person who went in. 

This is the end of one part of the story, but it's also, I hope, the start of something even better. And it's also, not to put too fine a point on it, bloody fantastic. Go give it a read.