Aftermath: Star Wars: Journey to Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Let me throw this out there: I've read every Star Wars book since the Legends decision was handed down, from John Jackson Miller's "A New Dawn" to this one, including several of the young reader books like Jason Fry's superb "Servants of the Empire" series. And let's get one things straight: "Aftermath" isn't the reboot everyone seems to think is it, the canon's been rebooted for some time. Since AND came out, if not before that. That this is the fist major work of the new canon to be set after Return of the Jedi seems to have laden it with rather unreasonably high expectations.No, this isn't the new Heir to the Empire. HttE was a singular work of its time, where Tim Zahn basically got to shape the entire universe of the era as he saw fit, where there were no other works (that he acknowledge anyway) shaping what the future would be or what the intervening time had done to shape the characters. He had a blank slate.Chuck Wendig didn't have that freedom. Characters like Luke, Han and Leia are going to have their adventures told in other books, comics or formats. The ultimate fate of the universe beyond this point is set in the stone that is the fast-approaching film The Force Awakens. There will probably be at least one film set in this time period that's yet to be released, be it the telling of the re-taking of Coruscant by the New Republic or some other turning point where the NR defeated the Empire and scattered its remnants until the events of TFA bring them back together.So what sort of story can Wendig tell? It's a small-scale one, dealing with the fate of a single planet and focused on a small, rag-tag group of unlikely allies, without any big, major battles or wild lightsaber fights or anything like that. But there are stones being thrown in here, stones that might have a ripple effect through the era of Star Wars "history" far beyond one planet.Interspersed through that story are snippets of what life is like elsewhere in the Galaxy Far Far Away, of events and people and stories that are being acted out just out of camera shot, as it were. Things like, what is happening to a farmer family when one son sides with the Empire, and the other with the New Republic. Or how the New Republic's attempt to reestablish the Senate is going. Or something as small as the adoption of a war orphan by a couple on Naboo. It's very World War Z, where we get tastes and bites of the larger universe without having it all spelled out at once.The story itself is good. The characters start out rather bland but gain flesh and dimension as the wringers are put on and they struggle against the Empire and against each other. The unlikely heroes are about as motley a crew as one might expect, with conflict and friction that both illustrates the larger conflict around them, and how the future of the galaxy might be shaping up. The plot has a few twists and turns, but it more of the A New Hope-style rollicking adventure than the Empire Strikes Back of twists and turns. Fitting, actually, for the first part of a trilogy.A word on the prose: It's a different sort of tone and style than most Star Wars books have been in the past. The story is told in present tense rather than past tense, and the tight third-person perspective lends itself to almost stream-of-consciousness writing at times, choppy and irregular. I didn't mind. Having read other books with similar styles in the past (including other books by Wendig himself) meant the transition was not jarring, and I rather enjoyed having a more narrative voice to the story.It's different. Not "juvenile" or "sophomoric" as others have railed. It's not somehow "wrong" or "bad" purely because of some stuffed-up notion that a book's style has to be entirely composed of complete sentences, and has to have a florid, verbose vocabulary where everyone speaks like English professors, and has to be in past-tense to be considered "good", or even more ridiculously "real Star Wars".There is not a Star Wars book in existence that could be considered "good" literature by those sorts of measures. Star Wars is pulp fiction. It's not some great academic work or classic of literature. It's the extension of dime novels from almost a hundred years ago, of visceral, two-fisted adventure tales, of stories that exist so that the reader can have fun.I had fun with this book. It's not perfect, I could tell that there were things being set up for use later in the trilogy, and I wish some of the characters were given more depth. But it's still a fun, fast-paced read that tells its own complete story while still giving us glimpses of how the rest of the GFFA is dealing with the troubled, unsettled times they live in.Five Stars doesn't mean I think it'll be the next classic of the genre. It means that I got my money's worth, I enjoyed it while I read it, and I look forward to the next two installments when they come out.EDIT: I see I need to clarify exactly why I gave this book five stars. Here's my reasoning: numerical and value scoring something so opinion-based as my reaction to a book is bullcrap. Saying that a five-star book has to be an all-time classic of the genre is a false dichotomy, because any reader will wind up with far too many books that with middling scores.I rate books 5 stars when I enjoy them while I'm reading, they tell a good story well, and I want to read them again after I'm done (which, with Aftermath, I do, I'm partway into my second reading now). I've also rated the Servants of the Empire books five stars along with A New Dawn, because they all meet those same criteria.Some people's expectations were obviously different from mine, which is fine. That's their opinion, not mine. For me, I enjoyed this book while I was reading it, don't at all regret doing so, and will read it again in the future. Thus: five stars.

I will put it right out front that I had some reservations about this book, being as it is, one of the first pieces of new canon in the liturgy of The Star Wars Gospel According to Disney. Those reservations had nothing to do with the book itself of course, since they emerged before it was published. Call it loyalty or defensiveness, but the relegation to Legends status that befell many Expanded Universe (EU) fan favorites has been the source of much distress in the Star Wars enthusiast community. Playing, as I do, a Star Wars RPG and enjoying immensely, as I do, Timothy Zahn’s heroic Heir to the Empire series, I have always thought of those EU worlds and characters as being woven inextricably into the Galaxy Far, Far Away. But Lucasfilm, now of Disney, did extricate them, removing them with a surgeon’s skill. So I was nervous about a book set immediately after the events of Return of the Jedi— the same era covered by Heir to the Empire. As I heard another fan put it, I knew I would be reading Wendig’s book with Zahn looking over my shoulder.So how was it?Aftermath keeps a good pace, and is easy reading. Some reviewers lament the jumping around and interludes but I did not find them difficult to navigate. This book contains a long list of characters with different trajectories into the plot and the author stitches their stories together with use of flashbacks and by dedicating a chapter to this character, a chapter to the next, and so on, eventually weaving them together as the book progresses. The deviations from the linear timeline for dream sequences and reminiscing are well-constructed and not confusing. They help fill out backstory and give the reader insight into historical events such as the Battle of Endor and the destruction of the second Deathstar from the perspective of new characters. For example, I read with great interest a bounty hunter’s account of being a hair’s-breadth from fulfilling a contract on Leia at the bunker door on Endor. A chance encounter in the forest between the hunter and an Imperial Loyalty Officer comes to bear years later, where the primary action of the story takes place. These flashbacks connect the events of the films up to now with future events by stamping the past with the new characters.The major players arise from far different backgrounds and yet they each bring something essential to the plot. The author is able to make the reader accept that these people could come together in the ways they do and he does not require any major suspension of disbelief to get through the story. A few people are introduced and then not really explored. I assume they will play larger roles in future works. Wendig handles characters from previous canon carefully and faithfully, coloring in the existing sketches of a few lesser known characters with authentic shades, bringing them to life in a fuller way.I found most of the characters immediately compelling, particularly the pithy and self-interested Sinjr Rath Velus. He has several laugh-out-loud lines that inject the right amount of humor into the story. I was also intrigued by Jas Emari, who is somehow believable as a crafty yet honorable bounty hunter. Wendig gives a scheming Imperial Admiral sufficient depth and shading to keep her from being a cliché. Notice that the Admiral is a woman. Aftermath has several female principals. A strength of the book is that Wendig’s use of female characters does not feel forced. To save spoilers, I will not go over all of the well-developed women characters here, but there are several.The obligatory angsty teenage hero can be a bit tiresome, rather in the same way that young Anakin Skywalker, Luke Skywalker and, to a lesser degree, Ezra Bridger, are sometimes annoying to me. However, this character type is almost a requirement; it seems that the journey-to-manhood saga is something one can not omit from Star Wars lore. Similarly, all Star Wars stories require an adorable droid sidekick. It took some time for the battle droid “Bones” to grow on me. For example, I found his repetition of the phrase “roger roger” a little tedious. That might have been because I did a fair amount of my reading of Aftermath by way of the audiobook version. Perhaps it is less irritating in print. Nonetheless, I felt that Bones’ character was too aimed at children. Meanwhile, there are elements of the book that make it decidedly not for kids– notably when one of the heroes coldly shoots a man in the back, or a subsequent scene in which Akivan citizens are manipulated with fabricated propaganda by our protagonists. Both are dirty dealing, I think.Stylistically, I have very few complaints about the book. The author employs simple, descriptive language and judicious use of metaphor. The constructs of writing– words, punctuation, grammar– are scaffolding for the story. They are tools to create immersion and should never call attention to themselves. I mention this because Wendig’s choice of third person present tense bothers some readers. A good friend of mine who is an English teacher and an avid Star Wars enthusiast had to step away from the book because the tense bothered him so much. Even though it is not inherently wrong, if using present tense is a persistent distraction, it might be best to avoid it. That being said, writing from this point of view gives a feeling of the here and now. As in, these events are unfolding as we speak and the outcome is not yet written. That can potentially lead to a more immersive and active experience for the reader. Screenplays are written in third person present tense, a notable fact. When it comes to literature, ultimately it’s the author’s art and his choice.Sometimes I find the climax of books and movies, well, anticlimactic. It’s often difficult to really cash in on expectations that are made throughout the story’s development with a clean, solid resolution. High-speed pursuits, explosions and that unavoidable mano a mano battle at the end are far too rote at this point. In this case, however, I feel that the climax, while perhaps somewhat expected, dispenses with the more obvious contrivances and delivers a crisp finish. Of course the epilogue opens new questions, but then, it’s part of a trilogy and it’s a movie tie-in so one can hardly complain. Wendig draws us into a Star Wars world full of new people and places. He skillfully gives us enough familiar context so that we are sufficiently comfortable to relax and believe. Then he shows us into the lives of some new characters that did not exist until he made them breathe. And in the final analysis, these rich new characters do not threaten the corners of my heart occupied by Mara Jade and Grand Admiral Thrawn. Not at all. They light up new corners of my heart and imagination. The book has humor and excitement, moral and philosophical conflict and a little good old-fashioned space combat.Don't let angry people steal a chance from you to experience this slice of Star Wars for yourself. I recommend the book for young adults and adult readers.

Gran novela para continuar con la historia de la trilogía original, un poco lento en ciertos momentos, pero es entendible ya que presenta un nuevo grupo de personajes, q al final quedarás feliz con el resultado

Great packaging and quality of the book.

All good!

Traz um bom pontapé para o que ocorreu após a Batalha de Endor, mas a narrativa é confusa, o timing das alternâncias entre tramas não ajuda, e a história demora bastante a engatar. Fica uma dificuldade de passar as nuances dos personagens, para que nos importemos com eles. Muitas vezes dá a impressão de que foi um livro escrito às pressas. Por isso, até penso em ler a sequência na trilogia, mas está no final da fila

A must read for all the fans of Star Wars saga. I loved the characters portraied and their adventures. Lot of action.