Star Wars: X-Wing: Wedge's Gamble (1996) Book Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. I'm back for another Star Wars Legends book review. This week I'm discussing the second novel in the X-Wing series, Wedge's Gamble. Like with my Rogue Squadron review, there will be spoilers in this review, so if you've never read this book before, or if you haven't read it in a really long time, then, if you're interested, please do so before reading this review. Let's get into it.

Before I get into the book itself, I wanna talk about the era of Star Wars that this book was published in. I kind of touched on it a little bit in my Rogue Squadron review, but only to the extent of which other novels had been published before Rogue Squadron came out. This time I want to talk about the novels of this era as a whole, where Star Wars was as a franchise in May of 1996 in general, as well as what novels were published immediately before this, and immediately after this.

May 1996 was an interesting period of time for Star Wars. We were about seven months away from the theatrical release of The Star Wars Trilogy: Special Edition, which was starting in January 1997, George Lucas was still developing The Phantom Menace at this point, and they'd just launched the franchise's first multi-media campaign with Shadows of the Empire, which encompassed books, comics, video games, toys, and a soundtrack. This multi-media campaign would only be done two more times in the franchise's history with the Clone Wars multi-media campaign in the early to mid 2000s, and the High Republic multi-media campaign starting in 2021, and will be ending in 2025, which is most likely when the Disney+ series, The Acolyte, comes out. If it doesn't come out next year that is.

Before Wedge's Gamble, the four novels that came out were book 1 in the Black Fleet Crisis trilogy by Michael P. Kube-McDowell, Before the Storm, book 4 in the Young Jedi Knights YA series by Kevin J. Anderson and Rebecca Moesta, Lightsabers, book 3 in the Junior Jedi Knights Young Readers series by Nancy Richardson, Promises, and Shadows of the Empire by Steve Perry. In fact, Shadows of the Empire came out the day before Wedge's Gamble did. The four books that came out after Wedge's Gamble were book 5 in the Young Jedi Knights series, Darkest Knight, book 2 in the Black Fleet Crisis trilogy, Shield of Lies, book 6 in the Young Jedi Knights series, Jedi Under Siege, and the next book in the X-Wing series, The Krytos Trap, which I'll be reviewing next time.

In the '90s almost every Star Wars novel was written and published in a prequel vacuum. And by that I mean that the prequels wouldn't start coming out until 1999 and George kept an extremely tight lid on plotpoints, characters, ships etc. In fact, George even refused to allow the novels and comics to be set during the prequel era, because all of it would be overwritten by the movies themselves. Tales of the Jedi was allowed to happen because the comic book series was set thousands of years before Episode I, so none of those stories would interfere with the story George was telling in the movies. In fact, the only Star Wars novels to be published after The Phantom Menace was released was the ninth book in the X-Wing series, Starfighters of Adumar, and the last short story compilation, Tales of the New Republic. Everything else was published before the prequels came out. In the case of Wedge's Gamble, and pretty much every novel published before Return of the Jedi: The Special Edition was released in theatres in March 1997, Coruscant is described pretty differently than how it would be shown in the movies and everything going forward.

Wedge's Gamble begins a month after the ending of Rogue Squadron. The Rogues are assigned to Borleias, Bror Jace has been killed, and the Alliance is preparing to take Coruscant from the Empire. The liberation of Coruscant was something hinted at in Rogue Squadron, but it probably surprised people that this is only the second book in the series, and the Alliance is already preparing to take Coruscant. I know it actually surprised me a little bit when I first read this book when I was only eleven, almost twelve. What also surprised me is that Wedge's Gamble isn't just the same space battle scenarios that Rogue Squadron was. Because Ackbar had wanted Wedge to include pilots who had other skills, such as covert operations experience, Rogue Squadron was in the perfect position to go to Coruscant and gather intel on the planet for the Alliance so they could mount their attack on the planet. So the majority of this book takes place on Noquivzor, which is an Alliance base that Rogue Squadron operated out of during the operation on Borleias, and Coruscant, along with a quick trip to Kessel to pick up Black Sun operatives to be used as a distraction for the Imperials on Coruscant.

We actually have a bunch of new characters that we're introduced to in this book. Aril Nunb, a Sullustan pilot who is basically Wedge's second in command given Tycho's situation, Pash Cracken, the son of the head of Alliance Intelligence, Airen Cracken, Asyr Sei'lar, who is a Bothan, Inyri Forge, the sister of Lujayne Forge, one of Rogue Squadron's pilots who was killed in Rogue Squadron, Zekka Thyne, a criminal who is a personal nemesis of Corran Horn, Iella Wessiri, Corran's former partner in CorSec, Fliry Vorru, a former Black Sun executive who was exiled to Kessel by Prince Xizor sometime prior to his death in Shadows of the Empire, and Lieutenant Virar Needa, the cousin of the late Captain Needa, the officer Vader killed in The Empire Strikes Back. We also meet Lujayne and Inyri's parents on Kessel, but they're only in that one chapter.

We also see the Provisional Council including Princess Leia, Mon Mothma, and Borsk Fey'lya. I'll talk more about him when I review the Thrawn Trilogy, but I love Borsk Fey'lya. And by love I mean, I love to hate him. He's like the one politician that has absolutely no reason for being anywhere in the Rebellion other than Bothans died to get the plans for the second Death Star. That's it. And because the Bothans are so smug and prickly when it comes to politics, whenever Borsk shows up it's a toss up whether he's going to piss someone off or get offended by something Leia or Han or Ackbar says. I was actually surprised to find out that Wedge's Gamble is the first appearance of Borsk in the EU since the last book in the Thrawn Trilogy, The Last Command, which was published in 1993. I honestly thought he appeared in Children of the Jedi, Darksaber, and the Corellian Trilogy all published in 1995, but nope he doesn't appear at all. 

We get alot more of Corran's POV in this book since we spend alot more time with him and Erisi than we do Wedge and the rest of the Squadron, due to how they were covertly placed on Coruscant for their original mission of fact finding. While we get more of Wedge in the last few chapters once all the Rogues, along with Asyr, Inyri, Iella, and Mirax, gather for their mission to take down Coruscant's planetary shields. Also, I think we switched to Wedge's POV so that Corran's death isn't seen from Corran's perspective. Well, I say death loosely, because he isn't actually killed. He's captured by Isard when she flees Coruscant to go to her black ops prison facility, Lusankya, which we still don't know very much about at this point. The rest of Rogue Squadron and the Alliance, plus Kirtan Loor, are all led to believe that Corran was killed.

When I first read this back in 1998 I actually didn't pick up on this, but as an adult the way Erisi behaves in this book is actually a clue to her being the Imperial spy in the squadron. I know, that's a spoiler for The Krytos Trap, but it's kinda hard not to mention here, because she acts like an Imperial. Not just on hers and Corran's trip to Coruscant, but even before when Wedge gives them their assignment and she's trying to find out if the rest of the Rogues are going to Coruscant or not. She also tries again with Winter, a character that I'll talk more about in my review of Heir to the Empire, who is Corran and Erisi's contact on Coruscant. There's some of that with Erisi in Rogue Squadron, but the way it's played there it's supposed to be something that both the reader and Mirax dismiss as Erisi just being upset that she can't go with the rest of the squad to Borleias for their final mission there. Here, it's played as weird, but not entirely off-base for Erisi. But having hindsight with having read The Krytos Trap and The Bacta War, and having 25 years to read these books over and over again, it's alot more obvious to me than it was when I first read it back in 1998.

One thing I don't like in this book is Corran's regression by the end of the book. He learns Tycho's backstory in chapter 3 and decides to trust Tycho, even though Wedge is the only one who does fully trust him. Which is fine, but by the end of the book he openly hates Tycho and is ready to reveal him as the spy in Rogue Squadron. And that makes no sense given that, aside from chapter 3, and this part here, Corran and Tycho had absolutely no scenes together, and Wedge's explanation as to why Tycho was on Coruscant when he was declared missing after Warlord Zsinj's attack on Noquivzor, should've been enough to to subdue Corran, even if he thought he'd seen Tycho talking to Loor in a bar on the planet. Corran is usually way more level headed than that. Like, this works as circumstantial evidence against Tycho at the end of the book when he's arrested for murdering Corran, but it doesn't work in relation to Corran himself, given his training as a CorSec officer. 

At some point between 2014 and 2017, Wedge's Gamble was reprinted by Random House. Again, Wookieepedia doesn't give a release date for this edition of the book. I have the original 1996 edition on my shelf, so I can't exactly check it to see when the reprint date is. So I have to assume that it was re-released around the same time as Rogue Squadron. And because I have a few of the Legends reprints of the Bantam era novels of the '90s, and they were published in 2014 or 2015, I think it's safe to say that the re-release of the X-Wing series happened sometime between 2014 and 2015. 

The book was re-published as part of the Essential Legends Collection in 2022. I was actually very surprised to see any books from the X-Wing series get re-published in this line just because, while they're fairly popular among Star Wars fans, I didn't think they were regarded well enough to be included in this line. Especially since the X-Wing series isn't as important, or as relevant, as the Thrawn Trilogy or Kenobi are. I suspect that they were included because of the Rogue Squadron movie that Patty Jenkins was supposed to be making, but with that movie up in the air, it's kind of weird to me to include the series in a collection of essential Legends books.

Overall I love this book. It does suffer from Stackpole's inability to write an ensemble cast properly, but the story is compelling as are the characters we do spend time with here. It's also not my favourite of the four Rogue Squadron books, but I still really enjoy it. Like with Rogue Squadron, I first read this book back in the fall of 1998, when I borrowed it from my friend, Garrett. I was in grade six and about to turn twelve at the time. It still holds up though. And trust me, not every Star Wars novel from this era holds up. 

Alright my friends, that's it for me for today. I'll be back tomorrow for my review of "Encounter at Farpoint", the pilot episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, which debuted 36 years ago yesterday. So until then, have a great rest of your day and I will talk to you all later. Take care.