Reviews Books The JC Lit Reviews Special: DARK LORD: THE RISE OF DARTH VADER (spoilers)

Got it last night. Full review later. I have to say Vader and Sidious had a point about the Jedi, however it's subverted by Palpatine's bigotry and cruelty. And that's the problem with the Sith. Enlightened dictatorships are only as enlightened as they dictator, and in this case that's impossible. Oppression isn't peace. I can see why Palpatine needed Vader. Vader's slave mindset is perfect for this progression. Might makes right, and that is what Anakin learned at knee high. Those with the power makes the rules. It's all very simple on the surface. He likes making people feel the way he felt. He wants everyone to feel as bad as he does. His metntal problems are at full hilt in this book.

The Jedi problem is that they ceased to be thinking participants in their own destinies. The council thought for them, or not. They are just automatons at this point, and they were replaced by more easily controlled ones.

I don't like Palps giving himself credit for Anakin and Padme's relationship. It was established, in many ways, when they first met. He too is delusional, but insightful enough to have it not matter in the daily operations of things.

 

7/10

ok I enjoyed Obiwan and Quigon

 

My review will be up later today.

Mas, where's your review? You are usually one of the first to post.

 

The book was too light on the Vader. It reminded me a bit of Shadow Hunter in that respect. Kashyyyk and well written OCs saved it from mediocracy. 7/10

I'll try to write a full review sometime.

 

8/10

Great book! Highly entertaining. Just goes to show how deep Vader's psychoses really are. Loved seeing what a tourtured soul he really has become. The juxtaposition of Vader and Palpatine was also highly intriguing. At times I just felt like good ol' Palpy wanted to smack Vader upside the head. The Jedi were also pretty good but I wished we had more POVs from some of them other than Shryne and Starstone. And Kashyyyk? Those poor Wookies! I really felt for them. But still, it was great getting proof that the Empire was willingly enslaving entire races. That "No slaves and no slavery in the Empire" stance always made me laugh. Only complaint? Seemed a little too rushed at times and short for a novel that was to introduce the genesis of one of the greatest villians in galactic history.

 

No one has mentioned the obese prose yet. Was it prevalent as all Lucenoan books are? How was the excitement of knowing Vader would live by the end?

And start reviewing more, yes, Mastadge. We can't all do the work. You're risking mutiny from the conscripts. What if someone tallied the next score before you?

 

Counting 20 ratings: 163.15/20 = 8.16

Don't worry, guys. I haven't finished the book yet, but my review will be coming tomorrow or Tuesday. And worry not, Excellence -- the prose will be mentioned.

 

In brief: Good but the least succesful of the four Luceno hardcovers.

I'm huge Luceno fan, I've loved each of his books, this one included. However, there's no way that I can put this one up with LoE, TUF and CoD. There's too much of the original characters and not enough of the events on Coruscant and in the Senate which is what I would have liked. Luceno does get Vader right, though. There's a beautiful chapter where Vader criticizes his suit and himself that really brought him to life.

The two main OCs were very well written but they weren't around any exciting events. I felt that I should've seen the darkness on Coruscant or, at the least, something that showed me how the galaxy was changing.

The ending with Obi-Wan stood out for me because Luceno grasped his character so well and I wished there had been more of him even if it was just him getting drunk.

In the end a good, well written novel that should have been more.

8.5/10

 

I'm in the middle of my first re-read of the book right now. This time, so far, what really struck me was Chapter 19, the first major confrontational scene between Vader and Palpatine. Someone above made the comment that it seemed like Palpatine wanted to smack Vader upside the head; that certainly comes out loud and clear in this chapter.

I found myself really wishing I could hear Ian McDarmid and James Earl Jones reading the dialogue for this chapter...wouldn't that be awesome?!!

There are still traces of whiny Anakin in this chapter, which is as it should be, I think, given how young Vader is at this point. This bit of dialogue in particular:

"They eluded me." Vader lifted his scarred face to regard Sidious. "But they wouldn't have if this suit didn't restric me to the point of immobility! If the Star Destroyer you placed at my command was properly equipped! If Sienar had completed work on the starfighter I designed!"

Still shifting blame elsewhere, still essentially the same Anakin.

Anyway, a great chapter. Finally Vader confronts Sidious about his lie about being able to save Padme's life, but, of course, Sidious deflects the question easily. Really, Anakin/Vader may be the most powerful Force user in all known history, but he's not exactly the brightest bulb in the lamp when it comes to his discernment and understanding.

(After watching Ep.VI tonight, what also stood out was how much more likeable a character Luke is, even though in Ep. IV he is a bit whiny also. But I need to find the right thread for that discussion!)

 

I'm glad some one else around here knows how to laugh.

I originaly wasn't going to give the book a 9, but as i wrote the review i realised that i did get a lot of enjoyment of out of it. I didn't have any major complaints.

 

Counting 21 ratings: 171.65/21 = 8.17

 

just finished it. i liked how it tells about vader's feelings about the suit. then the close encounter w/ vader and bail organa was nice. so was the ending w/ obi-wan in the cantina.

i give it a 9.5 bc it was a little short i thought

 

I didn't care for roughly the first two-thirds of this book. During this time, there were basically three things going on:

1) The Shryne/Starstone plot. This is a section where I felt that some more continuity in the Clone Wars fiction would've been good, because it took me more than 150 pages to actually begin to care about either of these characters. If Shryne had had a prominent role in another book, if we'd seen him losing a Padawan and gotten to know him a little so we could have a little invested in him when this story opened, it would've helped a lot. If Starstone had had so much as a cameo in some book or comic, it would've been nice. But instead we're dumped with these new characters. We're given an infodump chapter about Shryne, and of course he's conveniently an "Old Guard" Jedi like Obi-Wan, Qui-Gon, Mace, Dooku, Sifo-Dyas, and that's all we really need to know about him.

2) The Vader chapters, which didn't do much for me because I kept getting a "boo-hoo, poor little Sith Lord's got it bad" vibe and had trouble feeling sympathy for Lord Vader and his delusions.

3) The infodump chapters about the Emperor's misinformation campaign and politics and so forth.

The last third of the book was much better. By that time I had come to know the characters enough to be invested in their troubles. Also, the Battle for Kashyyyk here, unlike in RotS, actually had a point and was not completely gratuitous.

The prose here was functional but rarely more than that (and there were a whole lot of typos -- did this book get rushed through the editorial process?); as so frequently happens in Luceno's books, there's a whole lot of information given, which is nice for the EU fan but doesn't always make for the most engaging story. The main story -- of Shryne and Starstone -- was a decent enough story, but given that this book is called Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader, I have to admit that I was a bit disappointed. All that we learned about Vader, and the understanding of himself he came to, was accomplished in a few brief chapters and could probably have been better handled in a short story.

So this book excels at what Luceno usually excels at: filling in pieces of the puzzle, fitting things together to make the EU work better together. But for the most part it's just not all that engaging a story, and we're given too little to work with to really engage with the characters.

6.5

 

Counting 23 ratings: 187.65/23 = 8.16

 

9.4 out of 10.


The interaction betweem Sidious and Vader was Star Wars gold.

Vader is uber-powerful again. I've been waiting for that.

I read this book really fast because I just had to know more about the inner workings of Vader. He is the main character of the Saga but we hardly have much insight after the suit comes on. This gives that to me and gives it to me proper. (Ok, that sounded weird.)

Agree it would have been nice to have the Jedi referenced in other work. But the galaxy is large and not every Jedi has to be seen everywhere.

 

I enjoyed this book too, including the non-Vader part of the story. I especially liked learning more about Bail--the most unknown of the founders of the Rebellion. I hope there is at least 1 more book about him.

And poor Obi-Wan. He'd been so worried about leaving Anakin to die, he'd not thought of the possibility that Vader had lived.

My score is 8.9/10

 

"There are still traces of whiny Anakin in this chapter, which is as it should be, I think, given how young Vader is at this point."

That's the thing that blows me away, whenever I stop to think about it. If all of the commanders, governors, Moffs, etc, had any idea of the age of this new "emissary" they're dealing with, they'd fall on the floor. Vader's only what, 24 or 25 years old at this point? Amazing to think of someone that young with that sort of power, and having to deal with such traumatic experiences to boot. No wonder his psycohoses run so deep.

I'm not sure how I'd rate this one, but I agree with Mastadge's review. As other folks have pointed out, Luceno seems to have a great understanding of the personalities he's dealing with and, for the most part, the way he fleshes out familiar characters jibes perfectly with my own impressions of them. If the newer characters weren't necessary to move the plot along, though, they'd be entirely expendable. Personally, I would have enjoyed less time spent on the Shryne/Jula/Starstone story, and more on the reactions of Obi-Wan and others on finding out what's become of Anakin. Does the general public ever learn that the face behind that black mask was once that of the Hero With No Fear? Perhaps (hopefully) that's yet another story...

 

At the time of the OT it is clear that Darth Vader's actual previous identity is still a secret, although by this time most people "get" that he is a Sith or former Jedi. Remember the conference room scene in Ep. IV with General Motti: "Don't try to frighten us with your sorcerous ways, Lord Vader. Your sad devotion to that ancient religion..." If it were common knowledge that Darth Vader used to be Anakin Skywalker, then Luke wouldn't be so surprised by Vader's revelation in ESB.

In _Shadows of the Empire_, Prince Xizor manages to learn the Skywalker identity (although I don't remember how he learned this--it may occur "offstage"). This takes place between Episodes IV and V. Xizor uses the knowledge for his own benefit, but doesn't disseminate it widely.

One of my biggest quibbles with the otherwise enjoyable _Tatooine Ghost_, where Leia and Han go to Tatooine and learn more about Shmi Skywalker, is that one of the assumptions of the entire book is that Anakin Skywalker's development into Darth Vader is common knowledge on Tatooine. Granted that this is several years after the battle of Endor, but in most of the other books of the EU, Luke and Leia are still being pretty cautious to whom they reveal their parentage. (Although the fact that they are siblings seems fairly common knowledge in many of the book.) Apparently papparazzi is less of a galactic problem in the Star Wars universe than it is here...

 

I've always thought it was common knowledge that Vader was a Sith. Indeed, his very introduction in ANH novel is as "Dark Lord of the Sith".

 

8.5. Good, solid fun, and I liked Shryne and Starstone. Much better than I'd expected. Still don't care for Vader.

 

Counting 26 ratings: 214.45/26 = 8.25

 

I didn't rush to snag a copy because I'm simply not that interested in Vader and his internal angsting, but I was pleasantly surprised to quite enjoy this book. I found it fast-paced and engaging and I like Luceno's style. I especially enjoyed the scenes of Kashyyk and the Wookiees, and of Alderaan and Bail. Plus it was great to see a Jedi librarian doing something other than prissing around with grey hair in a bun.

There were a lot of great moments like Leia shrieking when her father arrives on her adopted homeworld, and the DS being so far behind schedule to explain why it took until ANH to put in operation & why Wookiee slaves were desired. Mentions of Sate Pestage & Armand Isard were cool, too. And Vader throwing his lightsaber like a javelin? Also cool.

I was less happy with the contrivance of Roan & his mother meeting up and with the "weary Master who has lost his faith only to regain it in the end" cliche. But overall, a good read with lots of windows into the GFFA. I agree with the poster above who said it had a real "Star Wars feel".

I give it an 8.5 out of 10.

 

(and there were a whole lot of typos -- did this book get rushed through the editorial process?)

It probably was because this was scheduled for January originally.

 

It took Remnant a whole 150 pages to begin too, Mas. Nearly half the book?