jenny_librarian's reviews
1176 reviews

I'm not sure how this is supposed to "finish" phase 2, but it was a very good book.

I was glad to see Rooper and Dass again. Sky was also a nice new character, and loved the little tidbit about their body dysphoria. And to see Fel Ix again, and being more developed, was a treat.

The MG and YA novels have definitely been the best of this phase. Now onto phase 3 and back to the real action!

This was such a well-placed comic! It resolved one thread left from Path of Vengeance while still holding up as a good standalone AND making a nice link with one of the side plots from phase 1.

I absolutely loved Sula. Beginning to end, iconic woman.

Why it took so many books to tell this story, I have no idea. This novel alone gave us more than both adult novels and the audiobook. Hell, the last 50-or-so pages were all the info we needed to tie this to phase 1.

Path of Vengeance reads a bit like "here's what Marda was doing during the last two books". It's divided in three parts, and the first one mostly recap stuff stated in Battle of Jedha and the tied comics. To the point that, apart from meeting Matty in the audiobook and comics, it becomes clear you don't really have to read them to understand this book. In fact, it feels even more like a waste of time that I read the other two novels, since Eiram and E'ronoh have absolutely nothing to do with this. They were a side plot.

I still have one comic and one MG novel to read in phase 2, but I feel like most of it wasn't worth the hype. I could've skipped the comics and adult novels and the audiobook, and I don't think I would've missed anything.

On the bright side, I really like Marda's whole storyline and I'm glad she and Yana were centred in this book. If anything, Path of Vengeance is were the meat of Marchion's background story comes from. I really liked it, despite the first third being mostly just a recap of previous stories in phase 2.

The more I read phase 2, the less I like it 🙈 but this one takes the cake.

There is so much going on and no time to care about any of the characters. Contrarily to phase 1, they’re not really fleshed out beyond where they were when this or that happened. Most of the Jedi could be the same person and I wouldn’t even notice.

Xiri and Phan-Tu are interesting, but they’re overshadowed by all the other characters. Axel is downright stupid. Gella isn’t that much better. Binnot was ok as a villain (like we need more of those…) and we barely saw The Mother. The character that shone most in this story was Yaddle. Which is great because she is truly underrated. But also a little disappointing considering the sheer number of Jedi involved in the battle in Dalna.

The writing was also very rough. Multiple times I had to reread sentences to make sense of them. I didn’t mind that the whole second part of the book was one huge battle, but it’s how many POVs there were that made it drag. It might have worked for a TV series or a movie, but definitely not for a book.

I feel like this phase doesn’t add much to phase 1. Most players from Path of Deceit are dead, and the others got only a few scenes. It doesn’t feel as much like a prequel to phase 1 as just another set of events loosely related.

Here’s to hoping the last 2 novels bring something to make me care about…

The twist of the twist of the twist of the twist of the… well, you get it.

I wonder if Voor got her plan idea from Maul’s game plan on Mandalorian 🤔

I liked learning by how Kanan and Hera met. Obviously he was smitten with her from day one, but Hera being Hera means this is not a romance. Like the Rebels TV series, their live is just there, in the background, existing without being central to their relationship.

Vidian was an intriguing character. Not a fan of the ugly=bad trope, and he was a bit too similar to Grievous in some ways, but an interesting villain and a great way to give the readers insight into Empire politics. And Sloane was even better.

As far as Star Wars audio drama scripts go, I much preferred George Mann's Battle of Jedha. Cavan Scott's way of mixing narration and events was more confusing than anything else, and I don't believe I would've fared better with the audio alone.

I'm also not loving the story. Ventress is one of my faves, but this was all over the place and she was barely in there even though she's a main narrator. And the depiction of Dooku didn't tract with what we see in the shows and movies, imo. Not to mention the whole Jedi Council thing. I know Filoni does what Filoni wants, and he probably discarded this book when making Tales of the Jedi, but even without that there's no member of the Council from the prequels ever mentioned in this book, other than Yoda. In fact, most of the Jedi important here never even appear in other SW media. I don't get why we couldn't even get a glimpse of Mace Windu, Ki-Adi-Mundi, or even Yaddle.

The whole thing left me more confused as to Dooku's backstory and characterization than anything else. And, what's worse, we didn't even get a scene about the clone thing. Sifo-Dyas is in half the book and all we got was some side vision for a page or two.

I usually love Cavan Scott's writing, but this one left me disappointed... 

I didn’t like this nearly as much as the Jedi book. However, it is well thought out and hints at the movies, Rebels animated series, novels, and the 2015 Star Wars comics run.

A nice little bit of extra for fans of the original trilogy era.