Gabriel

This is another wet-dream book for me.

Luke and Mara the whole way through! What more could I want?

Married couple Luke and Mara are amazing to read together. Their chemistry is at its best and they are so good for eachother. They are an amazing team, and I love their interactions and how they work together well in this book.

Finally uncovering the mystery of Outbound Flight in this novel was absolutely thrilling, and we also finally get educated about the unknown regions, something I am excited to learn more about in the New Jedi Order, hopefully!

This novel has a plethora of great characters, as any Zahn novel does, including the suspicious but incredibly talented empire from Nirauan (which includes the 501st!).

The Vagaari are brilliant villains, extremely evil, but without the knowledge they need, they truly struggle against Luke and Mara as they wipe the floor with them repeatedly.

Mara is especially badass in this novel - in one particular moment, the Vagaari attack with their wolvkils which seem invincible as they have no knowledge of the lightsabers, and Mara effortlessly kills one in a single swing.

This novel truly understands Luke, as he tries his best to avoid killing the wolvkils, at one moment using the force to make them unconscious.

A beautiful line describes his character perfectly, “Even as the years had grown and matured and hardened him, the inner core of idealism and mercy he'd brought with him out of that moisture farm on Tatooine had never faltered.”

I love Luke!

Dean Jinzler is a really good character, who starts off mysterious, but gets better as we learn more about him. He has a really good, emotional arc that actually made me feel something!

The survivor's of Outbound Flight are an interesting set of characters, and it's cool to see how a society could form and live in the remnants of the flight.

Although we learn a lot about what happened, most of the major details are still lost to time, which makes me excited to read the novel ‘Outbound Flight!'

There is an unnerving suggestion from Mara that Luke agrees to, which makes perfect sense, as everything goes according to plan almost unnaturally well for the Empire from Nirauan, as they suggest that maybe Thrawn is helping them, that maybe the clone didn't die, or that Thrawn has other clones.

But either way, Thrawn is on their side. For now...

Overall, a fantastic standalone novel that bridges the gap between the Bantam era of New Republic novels and the New Jedi Order, further developing Luke and Mara's married relationship, which is intensely fun to read for me!

It's quite possible that the disappointing nature of the last book helped make this one feel like such a breath of fresh air. But this might be a divisive review, as I've seen much negativity for this book, whilst I absolutely loved it.

It has some vital moments to the overall story so far, develops the characters quite a lot, finishes off some of the leftover plot threads from the last novel, sets up some really important stuff that I can tell will be vital later, has some fantastic action, and a thankful little amount of space fighting stuff!

It finally brings the focus back to the main characters, and is a little more personal than the last few books, focusing truly on the “MAIN” characters, Luke, Mara, Han, Leia, Jacen, Jaina, and Anakin. Which is a godsend after the last book decided to barely feature any of them!

Firstly, quite shockingly, Mara is pregnant! As her and Luke are my favourite characters, this makes me very, very happy, and I love how it is changing their characters already.

Mara herself has some exceptional moments in this novel, fighting Yuuzhan Vong in disguise on Coruscant, wearing a glamorous disguise to confront Nom Anor, lots of brilliant dialogue with Luke, I loved her having such a large focus.

Leia was exceptional here, and had one of the sickest moments of the novels so far. I always cringe saying the word, but she had a frankly badass moment with the Warmaster ‘Tsavong Lah' and Nom Anor, where she questioned their religion, enraging them, and preaching that life, not death, is the highest truth. It leads to her being critically injured, but I adore her bravery, and love how she preaches her views on life and the universe. She is written magnificently.

Han and Leia finally heal, getting some fantastic war time-like moments as they finally make up whilst helping refugees. I love their relationship and their love together.

Kathy Tyres seems to just get love, writing romance brilliantly between Luke and Mara, and between Han and Leia that I really find to be lacking with a lot of other writers. Just the general banter and moment-to-moment little romantics conversations and thoughts you have with or about your partner.

There were so many moments that come to mind for me, like Mara admiring Luke whilst slightly dishevelled, Han thinking about Leia still being gorgeous even without her hair, little stuff that you think about your partner, or do or say with them in general life and conversation, stuff that, like I said, tends to be missing from these novels!

I also found her writing style really easy to read. The description, my God, so clear, so concise, never feeling like it dragged, never getting down in the dirt about unimportant stuff I don't care about, even making the ship fighting action simple and easy to read and keep track of almost all of the time, even managing to make most of this action a bit more personal, something I usually find to be missing from these battles.

So generally, I really enjoyed her writing. It has made me consider giving ‘The Truce At Bakura' another chance one day. Not for a long while though.

I do love seeing the Yuuzhan-Vong's side of things, but I often find their chapters a bit complex and less interesting, as Stackpole and Luceno tried to craft more Yuuzhan-Vong characters for us to follow. But none have matched Nom Anor, and I've really loved how Kathy Tyres has treated the warmaster Tsavong Lah.

They are both excellent, and their chapters have been an easy read, good even. Easier to follow than usual, cool, fun insights on their society and beliefs, and two just really fun characters throughout the story. Loved their moments and never dreaded their chapters or found myself desperate to get back to the heroes.

I constantly flip between liking and hating Jacen's conflict, deciding whether or not to abandon the Force, and I do get it. He's a conflicted kid. But I am not wanting it to go on much longer, and I'm happy that it seems to be done for. It was interesting while it lasted, and I get how it came from his worry. Sometimes he was very frustrating, but I'm glad he seems to have come around now.

Jaina was much better in this book, possibly the best she has been since ‘Vector Prime' finally getting a bit more of a focus, and I loved Kathy taking sections of this book to heal the relationship between her and Leia.

Anakin was still very good, he's so mature and such a powerful Jedi for his age, he's still probably my favourite Solo kid. But he hasn't been treated as well by a writer as Stackpole since Dark Tide. But he was much better here than he was with Luceno.

Generally, I loved this book. I've heard a lot of mixed things, but I found it to be a blast to read. I read it over three days, took my time, but still read quite a bit whenever I was reading it, and I loved it.

Kathy Tyres' writing style is perfect for me, and I love her treatment of the characters, and focus on relationships, trauma, and healing, whilst doing a better job of refugee commentary than Luceno with the last book.

I almost don't want to hear what people don't like about this so it doesn't spoil it for me!

Wow this was just perfect. All Out WAR against Negan and the Saviours, always a bit I loved in the show but found a touch lacking in execution was perfect here. Far better pacing, much better writing on the whole. And the Whisperers here are SO GOOD. And we've still got Rick! I love it. Shaping up to be everything I wish the show was during this period and more!

Good first issue.

Fun, easy to read, awesome action, wonderful art, I'm a sucker for Charles Soule.

Now this was fantastic. Goes over possibly my favourite period of the show, from on the road after the destruction of the prison, the cannibals, and Alexandria, it's such a fun period. With the cast thinned a little, and a bunch of great new characters introduced, it feels a lot tighter and more enjoyable. I really love the relationships and characters here, the story told is phenomenal, emotional and epic at times, the stakes are still high and the Walkers don't feel like they aren't a threat anymore despite the great feats we see from the survivors against them, and the artwork continues to be exceptional. 10/10!