Star Wars: Crucible (2013) Book Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing okay. I'm back with another Star Wars book review. This time I'm reviewing the book that is, chronologically, the last novel featuring Han, Luke, Leia, and Lando in the Legends timeline, as well as the final novel in the post-Return of the Jedi book run that began with The New Jedi Order: Vector Prime in 1999. Even though this book is nearly a decade old now, I'm going to try to avoid spoilers, just because it does wrap up a bunch of storylines for Star Wars novels that came out before this one. So let's get into it.

Crucible, which was written by Troy Denning, is a Star Wars novel that you shouldn't read unless you've either read everything from The New Jedi Order (1999-2004) to Fate of the Jedi (2009-2012) as there are many callbacks to events shown in those novels. The entire premise of the book is that Han, Luke, and Leia are preparing to retire from public life as members of the New Jedi Order, leaving it in the care of the surviving Young Jedi Knights, Jaina Solo, her husband Jagged Fel, Ben Skywalker, and Tahiri Veila following their most recent confrontation with the Sith. But first, they need to help Lando deal with a Columi crime family who seek revenge on Han for something he didn't actually do.

If you don't know who the Columi are, that's okay, because they haven't shown up in Canon, and had very few appearances in Legends. They're in two other novels besides this one and their other appearances are in supplemental material for Star Wars: The Roleplaying Game starting in 1990. Basically they look like your stereotypical aliens from Mars with big heads and small bodies and use mechanical powerbodies to move around in. They're apparently the smartest beings in the galaxy because of how big their brains are so big and their ability to use logic puts the Vulcans to shame. That's right, these guys outlogic the Vulcans. Which makes them extremely dangerous to our heroes as they're always twenty steps ahead of Han, Luke, and Leia. 

I like this book. It's not the best Star Wars Legends novel ever, but it's a decent ending to Han, Luke, and Leia's story in Legends. This is how I wished their story had concluded in the movies rather than the tragic endings each character had in the sequel movie trilogy. Star Trek: Picard ended better than the Sequel Trilogy did, and that show had a rough start. I'm not a huge fan of Troy Denning's writing mainly because he tends to tell really tragic stories. Case in point, this is the book where Han, Luke, and Leia come the closest to actually dying tragically in Legends and they survived the Yuuzhan Vong War in The New Jedi Order series. I could go into more detail but I promised I wouldn't do spoilers.

While I've read all of The New Jedi Order, I've only read some of the Legacy of the Force series, and haven't read the Dark Nest Trilogy or Fate of the Jedi, so I was a little bit confused since Fate of the Jedi is the series I don't know much about so there are events in those books that I'm not as familiar with. Even though I'm missing some key Legends knowledge from those books, it didn't hinder my enjoyment of this book. The Qrephs, Marvid and Craitheus, the Columi who act as the angtagonists for this book, are decent bad guys. Though nothing stands out about them as their motivation is no different from any other bad guys who have a grudge against Han. 

I also wish Jaina and Jag had more to do in this book. They show up during Luke's first scene and then they don't show up again until the epilogue. Everything they were involved in in this book happened offscreen, which is frustrating as someone who grew up reading Jaina's adventures in the Young Jedi Knights YA series, and The New Jedi Order in the late '90s and early 2000s and enjoyed her growth as a character. The funny thing is is that in this book Jaina is close to being 36 years old, which means she's close to being my age. Which is cool. 

Overall I enjoyed this book. But as I said earlier in this review, you kinda need a working knowledge of Star Wars Legends to really get anything out of this book. Especially all of the books that take place in the era of Legends that the Sequel Trilogy takes place in in Canon. And that's everything from Legacy of the Force to Fate of the Jedi. I was able to get something out of this book because I have that background with Legends, though not as much as I would've had I read everything from this era. I still enjoyed it though and recommend it as a good way to end Han, Luke, and Leia's story in Legends.

Alright my friends that's going to be it for me for today. I'll be back soon with more reviews and posts soon. So until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.