Inferno Squad by Christie Golden

Set in the aftermath of Rogue One- A Star Wars Story, this action-packed prequel to Battlefront II introduces the Empire's elite force- Inferno Squad. The Rebellion may have heroes like Jyn Erso and Luke Skywalker. But the Empire has Inferno Squad. After the humiliating theft of the Death Star plans and the resulting destruction of the battle station, the Empire is on the defensive. In response to this stunning defeat, the Imperial Navy has authorized the formation of an elite team of soldiers, known as Inferno Squad. Their mission- infiltrate and eliminate the remnants of Saw Gerrera's Partisans. Following the death of their leader, the Partisans have carried on his extremist legacy, determined to thwart the Empire-no matter what the cost. Now, Inferno Squad must prove their status as the best of the best and take down the Partisans from within. But as the danger intensifies and the threat of discovery grows, how far will Inferno Squad go to ensure the safety of the Empire? In this thrilling prequel to Battlefront II, the Empire's handpicked team will be forged in fire.

This is a good book, with a different way of telling a story in the Star Wars Universe. I felt it progressed slowly at the beginning, but by the end, I almost forgot I was reading about the Imperials taking out the rebel groups.

I love team stories, and I especially love stories about morally ambigious people, as from our point of view, they're straight up evil, but they believe they're the good guys.

Inferno Squad is a team that was assembled after the destruction of the first Death Star (and may be an answer to the Rebels' Twilight Company in a way). The book is also a prequel to the Battlefront II single player campaign, which also features a few of this book's characters, mainly Iden Versio. I didn't closely look at the character list of the game, so I wasn't sure whether all the characters would surive in the end or not, which kept things exciting on that front.

I loved the rest of it too. I wasn't too sure about Iden at first as a character, but I was totally into it by the end. The rest of the team grew on me much easier.

Story wise, most of the time in the book is spent as an undercover mission with a Rebel team that have connections to Saw Gerrera's partisans. In there, there are a few connections to the Clone Wars series and the Rebel Rising book about Jyn's youth. Especially the latter might be good reading before getting to this, because there's a few character crossovers and for simply getting a bit of context when it comes to the state of the Rebels at that point.

Even if I'd just be judging it on whether it made me more excited for Battlefront II or not... Hell yeah!