Fury (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force, Book 7) by Aaron Allston
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Book Reviews of Fury (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force, Book 7)
Book Review: Allston steps up
Summary: 3 Stars
Book 7 of the series has Caedus, formerly Jacen Solo, kidnapping his daughter to force Tenel Ka to commit the Hapan fleet to Caedus' cause of ending the war. A minorly promising turn but all for naught as the girl is rescued by the end of the story. Allston's turn also sees the return of Tycho Chelcu, Wedge and his daughter Syal Antilles mainly because Allston likes using these characters, otherwise they served no real purpose. Jaina realizes she must begin her training again and in a different manner as Jagged Fel teaches her a lesson in fighting dirty. She has taken it upon herself to fulfill some new prophecy declaring her as the Sword of the Jedi and she expects to fight Jacen as Jedi. Jag disrupts this whole concept with the point of Jacen's dementia will prevent him from fighting honorably. For any other developments... well 1) no one still knows Jacen has rechristened himself Darth Caedus and claims to be a Sith; 2) Alema Rar is finally seemingly dealt with; 3) Centerpoint Station is irretrievably finished {thank goodness}; and 4) the secret is out as to Jacen being Allana's father. Otherwise, as others have mentioned, this book is a small circle, everyone is back where they began at the start of the book with no advancement of the story.
I will say, however, as for this nine part storyarc, this is by far Allston's best contribution. He actually had me wanting to read more at certain points but then big scene changes drug it to a halt. As for a follow up book to Inferno, the effort was rather wasted as already mentioned, everyone is back in the same situation as when this episode started. Big problem for me was the discussion between Ben and Luke over Luke's role and grieving of Mara Jade. Ben asks when Luke will get back to being the Jedi leader instead of director and suddenly Luke 'centers' himself with the Force and all is better as he shrugs of the loss of his wife to resume his duties. Otherwise, again this book reminds me more of the whole story being a retelling of the fall of Anakin Skywalker. As Darth Vader, he captures his daughter Leia (unbeknownst to Vader and all of us at the time), holds her captive, and then she's rescued by a band of opposers. Hmmm Caedus kidnaps his daughter, holds her captive, and she's rescued by opposing forces. Oh that and the superweapon of the story is destroyed when it is on the verge of wiping out the enemy. Now if only we could get rid of the stupendously idiotic and ridiculous 'Force Phantoms', man what a dumb idea based presumably upon the Dagobah tree-cave.
I'll give Allston three stars for this entry as he did manage to get me interested in the story at certain points but it's a borderline two stars because it served little purpose to the overall story but was still better than his previous two entries. As others have stated, you could skip this one and not miss much of anything.
Book Review: Fury signifying nothing
Summary: 3 Stars
After two volumes filled with major events, The Legacy of the Force series returns to form in this seventh installment. For the most part, you could skip it and not miss much.
While author Aaron Allston delivers a well-plotted and fast-paced finale, the ending leaves the story right where it began, with Jacen politically and militarily isolated and seemingly finished. The promise of a helping hand from Korriban, hinted at the end of the previous volume, turns out to be a feint, and no one has yet figured out Jacen is a Sith or Mara's killer.
Neither have they figured out that he's lost all sense of proportion. In order to bring the Hapans back into the war for the Galactic Alliance, Jacen kidnaps his own daughter. The Hapans instead withdraw from any outside contact except for a secret mission to the Jedi, who devise a rather improbable mission to plant on Jacen's body a tracer housed in a tiny piece of cloth the same color and texture as his clothing. They can thereby track Jacen's whereabouts and eventually effect a rescue - but only so long as Jacen doesn't change his clothes.
As in Allston's previous volume, Exile, Jacen walks into an obvious trap, this time set up by the Corellians to fry his fleet using Centerpoint Station, implausibly revived after being scrapped by Ben and Jacen in Betrayal (also by Allston). While the as yet unannounced Sith Lord loiters in space waiting for Centerpoint to complete its firing sequence, he allows his mother to come aboard "to talk." Instead of throwing her in the brig, the pair chat away the minutes while the Corellians take aim and the stowaways on Leia's craft pilfer data from Jacen's computers. The entire sequence comprises a long list of contrivances that make you want to give up on the book altogether.
Meantime, in an asteroid field far away, Jaina, Jag and Zekk prepare for a final showdown with Alema Rar, who is also being hunted by a Sith from Korriban eager to retrieve purloined Sith artifacts. Among them is Ship, which in the ensuing chaos flees to the Sith homeworld of Ziost, the Korriban agent in pursuit.
Along the way two major Jedi sustain life-threatening injury, but miraculously live to fight another day. A last-minute method for destroying Centerpoint Station is discovered, and Jacen can manage to kill only a Jedi-newbie and one of his subordinates, proving that he's not such a bad-ass after all and continuing the devolution of his character from a villain who reluctantly took up the dark arts in an effort to save and protect society, to a blinkered madman divorced from any rational view of the universe.
My best guess is that the next volume won't advance the series much further, though we're likely to get some interesting material on Boba Fett.
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Book Review: The downward spiral continues...
Summary: 3 Stars
First of all, allow me to apologize to Troy Denning for my review of the last offering in this series, "Inferno". I was under the impression that the prior book was a momentary lapse in judgment for the direction of the series. Apparently what has happened is that the writers got together and panicked because they had actually written a believable, almost sympathetic character in Jacen Solo in the early books and needed some way to eliminate his humanity so that the reader wouldn't feel remorse when he likely gets bumped off later in the series.
Indeed, those of us living in grown up land realize that the world can sometimes be shades of gray, and the lines of good and evil are not as sharply drawn as we would like. Indeed, this is how Jacen first started on his path as a Sith Lord, hoping to use the teachings of the Sith without being evil. Indeed, the best of intentions and constant desire to do what was necessary - not out of malice or spite - just necessity in doing what was needed for the galaxy to be safe.
Now that Jacen has become Darth NastyEvil, all common sense has been thrown under the writer's feet, and every opportunity is taken for Jacen to come across as a psychopathic schizophrenic emo nut case.
Jacen: "I love my daughter and want to be with her."
** two pages later **
Jacen: "If you don't do what I want I'll kill my daughter!"
** ten pages later **
Jacen: "OH NOES! They are shooting at me and my daughter is with me! I'm so angry at them because I love her!"
The Star Wars that we "know and love" is back, with an out of control dictator using force-choke to kill subordinates, planet-destroying super weapons, and more cliches than you can shake a lightsaber at.
Yep, I must applaud the writers for taking this direction in such an "original" direction and reviving my interest in the EU. What really makes me upset is the potential this series had, and the sharp outline they decided to follow.
I can't wait for the next book by Mrs. Karen "Boba Fett takes up 2/3 of the book even though the other writers barely mention him!" Traviss. The preview at the end of Fury was priceless - Jaina thinks it might be too hard to fight Jacen with a lightsaber so the story of the book follows her having Boba Fett teach her how to hunt Jedi. Way to fit him into a story he doesn't belong in.
I.Am.Not.Kidding.
If you haven't started this series, I'd recommend against it because after book 4 or 5 things start to go downhill.
Book Review: Too Long a Series
Summary: 3 Stars
Well, I agree with much of what has been written by other reviewers before me, but I wan to expand a bit on a point or two. My main problem with the series is that it is simply overly long. I feel like we make very little plot progress in the course of the novels. This NINE part series could have been better done in three or four action packed books. There are entire plotlines I simply don't care a bit about. I don't care about Alema Rar all that much or and the Boba Fett story feels like one writers pet project that should have been a seperate novel rather than rolled into this series. I don't even mind so much that the story is simply the original SW plot rehashed. I liked that plot and enjoy getting a second go around. No, it was not the best choice of direction for the series, but I keep reading them so I must work on some level. However, when I say I "read" them that is only half true. I find myself scaning huge sections and skipping some outright because there is so much unneeded stuff crammed into the books. In the original stroy Anakin never really had a family while Jacen does; that aspect alone is worth exploring. I like reading the parts centered on Jacen and his family, but much of the rest could be cut.Book Review: Pretty Good 3.5 Stars (Minor spoilers)
Summary: 3 Stars
Another month, another Star Wars review... I personally think that Inferno by Denning was the best thus far in the series, so I expected to be slightly let down by this installment. Allston wrote an entertaining read. It's true, I skimmed over certain parts, mostly pertaining to the battles, which have never been my favorite part of the SW Universe, but overall, I enjoyed what this latest installment of LotF.
Ben takes a huge step back for the first part of the story and Luke takes a huge step forward towards the becoming again the old Luke Skywalker we all grew to know and love. Kyp has a larger role in the story, which I found quite nice, and Jag has some great interaction with the Solo clan. Even Boba, who isn't seen in this book, plays a small role in the beginning, which definitely sets things in motion for the final two books.
Obviously I recommend this to anyone who has come this far with the series, why stop now? Even if I'm not a huge Boba Fett fan, I'm looking forward to Traviass book. Every storyline has its good and bad, but honestly, LotF is panning out into a decent addition to the SW timeline.