The New Jedi Order  

'Agents of Chaos 2 - Jedi Eclipse' by James Luceno  

A Del Rey Book, published 2000 (paperback)  

Set 21 years after RotJ 

 book cover
Story -- the Yuuzhan Vong continue their invasion of the SW galaxy; this time, they decide to attack Gyndine, which happens to be where Leia is helping with the refugee crisis. Wurth Skidder is also on-planet, and is soon up to his ears in trouble. Meanwhile, Han is still trying to help Droma find his kinspeople, and Anakin sets off on a mission to the Corellian system.

Characterisations -- Leia is excellent! A very nice portrayal, and she's in this book a lot. The Han/Droma relationship is continuing, but I feel it is sensitively handled - the author is NOT trying to replace Chewie. The Solo kids are pretty good, although Jacen's righteousness is really beginning to bug me. Not much Luke and Mara, but Karrde puts in an appearance.

New characters -- trip to Hapes, anyone? Yup - Leia's off to meet up with her 'old flame' Prince Isolder (from "The Courtship of Princess Leia"). There's also a whole bunch of Hutts (including Borga), and several other characters you may remember from previous novels (I'm not going to say who, 'cos that would spoil the surprise!) But there's still no Danii Quee, and I for one still find it difficult to 'bond' with the baddies in the way I bonded with the Imperials. I mean, I know some of the the Imps were as thick as two short planks (*cough* Daala *cough*), but at least I had some respect for Thrawn (and a few others). The Yuzzies are just big, scary monsters who we all want to throw into the Maw for flattening Chewie. There's just no subtlety about the bad guys any more.
 
Cover art -- Han's a bit blurry, but the Yuzzy is terrific!

Chicks -- Leia steals the show, although NR Senator Viqi Shesh looks like becoming a very interesting character. It was great to see the return of several chick characters from the Bantam novels, but there wasn't enough detail, IMO.

Any good? -- fetch the dictionary! Yup, it looks like Luceno is on a one-man crusade to improve our vocabularies! 'Crepuscular', 'beleaguered', 'lambent', 'mephitic', 'inveigled',... And that's just the first two pages! Still rather too many mentions of the previous books, although it's not as obvious/irritating as 'Hero's Trial'. Like the second Stackpole NJO novel, this also felt like it was merely bridging the gap between the last book and the next. Several plot threads were started but, for me, finished unsatisfactorily.

Read it? -- hmmm, tough call. I like the way Luceno writes, and it was nice to 'meet' some old friends (even if only briefly). But if I'm totally honest, you could probably skip this one and still be able to follow the next novel ("Balance Point"). Read it only for completeness.

Rating -- 6 out of 10
 

Return to Timeline