Introduction
BEFORE Star Wars graced the silver screens of packed movie houses, its story was presented to an eager public via the printed word. A tie-in novel based on the screenplay of Star Wars arrived in bookstores over five months prior to the film’s debut on May 25, 1977, helping to spread awareness of the movie to come in a pre-digital, word-of-mouth age. As such, the very first Star Wars fans were readers.
It was soon evident that Star Wars would surpass the bounds of summer entertainment to become much more than just a movie. The faraway galaxy became a setting for legends. As production promptly began on a sequel to the first film, creator George Lucas opened up his universe to exploration by other storytellers. Comic book tales came first and proved to be a medium that would be integral to the genesis of the Star Wars universe. Within a year of the film’s release, Alan Dean Foster’s follow-up novel, Splinter of the Mind’s Eye, became a bestseller.
Since that time, over 145 full-length novels have expanded the Star Wars story. More than one hundred juvenile novels helped open the door for young readers into a lifetime of reading. Over 170 short stories added to the saga. It can be a very daunting task to navigate among these works. The Essential Reader’s Companion hopes to guide you through these rich stories.
The Essential Reader’s Companion is a summary of Star Wars fiction for Star Wars readers of any level. The novice reader, unsure of where to start, may find guidance by browsing through the curated summaries. It is also meant for the intermediate Star Wars reader who has sampled some works, but never realized how immense the library is. And, for the experts, it’s a fresh look at what they may already know, hopefully with some new surprises thrown in—not to mention all-new illustrations of characters and scenes previously only imagined.
WHAT’S NOT IN THIS BOOK
The Essential Reader’s Companion focuses on prose fiction. Graphic novels, every bit as essential to the Expanded Universe, are beyond the scope of this book, though where relevant mentions of certain stories are given in the text. The younger end of children’s literature—the illustrated storybooks, chapter books, and beginner books—is also excluded, though works for young adults (ages twelve and up) are included. Stories with variable plots—Solitaire Adventures, Choose Your Own Adventure, Decide Your Destiny, and similar works—are also not included.
Stories of videogames, which often form important chapters in the lives of Star Wars characters, are not covered unless they’ve been adapted into a book. Sometimes game books—such as roleplaying game supplements and videogame strategy guides—include fictional sidebars or a fictional story that frames the rules and game information. These, too, are not in the Companion.
WHAT’S IN THIS BOOK
Most of this book consists of summaries of novels, whether for adults or young adults. In some cases, multibook stories that flow into one another are collected in a single entry. Short stories published in official Star Wars periodicals or online are afforded their own entries or are described in sidebars when they directly connect to a larger story.
Each entry includes the cover art—in some cases, multiple examples if more than one version of the cover exists. It is important to note that in the case of multiple entries from the same source, the Companion will show the cover only for the first entry from that source. An entry credits the author(s) and cover artist(s), then lists the work’s publication history—format and release date. A note about release dates: For consistency’s sake, the Companion uses the date as recorded in the indicia of the publication, though the dates books were actually available for purchase may vary by weeks.
Where the story fits into the Star Wars time line follows, with a year annotated as BBY (for events before the Battle of Yavin, as seen in the movie Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope) and ABY (for events after the Battle of Yavin). For those interested in galactic cartography, a roster of the planets visited in the story is given, complete with grid coordinates for use with the maps found in Star Wars: The Essential Atlas. The Companion next identifies the main characters in a story, summarizes its events, and in some cases offers “behind-the-scenes” information about a story’s creation or impact.
READING ORDER
The Companion presents Star Wars fiction in a recommended reading order that follows a chronological flow within the Expanded Universe. However, the order presented prioritizes reading experience over rigid adherence to chronology. For example, the Jedi Academy Trilogy and the novel I, Jedi occur at the same time, often covering the same events. A rigid adherence to chronology would recommend reading alternate parts of each work. Instead, the Companion recommends reading the Jedi Academy Trilogy first; it was the first work published, and I, Jedi was written with the expectation that it likely would be the second work read. If a book covers large spans of time, it’s often where the story ends that determines its chronological placement, not where it begins.
CANON AND CONTINUITY
Common questions are: How “real” are these stories? Do they count? Did they really happen?
The most definitive canon of the Star Wars universe is encompassed by the feature films and television productions in which George Lucas is directly involved. The movies and the Clone Wars television series are what he and his handpicked writers reference when adding cinematic adventures to the Star Wars oeuvre.
But Lucas allows for an Expanded Universe that exists parallel to the one he directly oversees. In many cases, the stewards of the Expanded Universe—editors within the licensing division of Lucasfilm Ltd. who work with authors and publishers—will ask for his input or blessing on projects. Though these stories may get his stamp of approval, they don’t enter his canon unless they are depicted cinematically in one of his projects.
That said, unless something occurs in a canon project to directly contradict a published source, it can reliably be said to have occurred. Extensive records track the growth of the Expanded Universe, cataloging planets, characters, technology, and events, to allow for a sprawling, believable continuity connecting the published works of the Star Wars universe. It’s not perfect—when errors occur, the Companion does sometimes call them out. This is not to diminish these tales in any way, but rather to illustrate that the Star Wars Expanded Universe is a living document that grows and evolves over time.
The Reader’s Companion is not meant as a replacement for the experience of reading these works firsthand. Those truly interested in the stories are strongly encouraged to read them whole. No matter how detailed, a summary is no substitute for experiencing a story as the author intended.
Copyright © 2012 by Pablo Hidalgo. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
