Lit Books Life Day Treasury: Holiday Stories from a GFFA by Cavan Scott & George Mann

via SW.com: Celebrate the Star Wars Galaxy’s Greatest Holiday with Life Day Treasury – Exclusive Reveal

Disney Books description:

Some illustrations by Grant Griffin:

Spoiler

File name "Heart of the Jedi":


File name "The Kroolok":

Also briefly discussed in this edition of This Week! in Star Wars:

 

hopefully we dont get 3 different versions we dont need DLC

 

Text of io9 interview with authors Cavan Scott and George Mann:

Spoiler

James Whitbrook, io9: What were your biggest inspirations in trying to find hooks for these stories?

George Mann: We looked at the archetypes of classic holiday stories, from ghost stories told around a fire to midwinter folklore from various cultures around the world. Of course, we also drew on our own favorite holiday tales from growing up.

Cavan Scott: We wanted to lean into the idea that these are the stories shared around the galaxy, far far away. They are stories that Luke, Leia, Rey, and Ben Solo might have been told when they were young, some of which would be spooky and others heartwarming.

io9: Star Wars is, in many ways, an already kind of magical, fantastical universe—how did you approach trying to create stories evocative of a certain kind of holiday magic in a galaxy filled with it already?

Scott: It was important not just to retell our own familiar stories, swapping out characters such as Ebenezer Scrooge for, say, Jabba the Hutt. The tales in the book had to feel authentic, as if they could have sprung up from the cultures we’ve seen on screen.

Mann: There’s a particular tone found in holiday stories, and I think this fits well within the Star Wars galaxy. Holiday tales tend to contain messages of hope, love, friends, and family—all of which are key elements of the broader Star Wars story.

io9: Life Day, at least what we’ve known of it so far, has always been framed as a Wookiee holiday. What, if any, other species will we see celebrate it in this book, or what other winter holidays have you created for it?

Scott: As we discover in the book, Life Day has spread from the Wookiee’s home planet and is now celebrated on worlds near and far—and yes, we do feature a story set on Kashyyyk with Chewbacca’s family, including his father Attichitcuk, wife Mallatobuck, and son Lumpawaroo.

Mann: We also introduce new midwinter festivals on planets such as Alderaan where they celebrate a feast called Winter’s Heart, and the forest moon of Endor where the Ewoks shelter against the cold as a monster known as the Kroolok stalks the snowy forest around their village.

io9: Interestingly, the cover for the book gives us a certain Jedi in High Republic clothing. What can you tell us about the Jedi Order’s role and view of holiday celebrations like these? Do they have customs of their own, or do they simply observe and recognize holidays from the galaxy’s myriad cultures?

Scott: The Jedi of the High Republic era can be found in outposts on every major planet in the galaxy, but definitely don’t hide away behind their temple walls. They celebrate alongside the people they protect. In the case of Stellan Gios, who features on the cover, he find himself on Coruscant during Solstice Tide when the Jedi Council invite locals into the temple for a great feast.

Mann: One of the other stories features a New Year festival on Jedha, the sacred planet seen in Rogue One. On Reflection Day, people, including the Jedi, travel from all over the galaxy to take their turn peering into the mysterious kyber mirrors beneath the city in search of guidance.

Scott: I think Jedi all over the galaxy view these festivals as an interpretation of the Force, with that central message that George talked about earlier, the hope of light in the darkest of days.

(I like the idea behind "Reflection Day"!)

Front and back cover art, both by Grant Griffin:

Spoiler

 

Oh that back cover art is gorgeous, holy crap. O _ o

 

While the art style looks great...the back cover makes my Holiday Special PTSD act up...

 

I need this book... and a follow up about New Years Fete Week and each days individual importance... heck I need GFFA holidays around the entire year.

Btw, if Life Day is a winter celebration, and winter is not the same time on different worlds, do they still celebrate it same day galaxywide or planetary befitting different? I mean... Alderaan and Kashyyyk do not share a winter season, do they?

 

I don't think Life Day is a winter holiday. It certainly didn't seem wintery on Kashyyyk in the Holiday Special. "Life Day as well as other holidays and winter festivals" is how they say "things are that like Christmas" without actually mentioning Christmas, both because Christmas doesn't exist in Star Wars and also to be politically correct.

 

The marketing texts for the book say Life Day is a winter celebration but not tied to christmas but rather the more ancient winter solstice. Or rather the book features not only life day but other festivities that are winter themed to rhyme with earthly christmas and winter tales.

https://io9.gizmodo.com/how-star-wars-new-anthology-will-explore-holiday-cheer-1846512041

More intel in this interview of Cavan Scott!

 

The legends backstory is surprisingly well filled out. Life Day was originally a Wookiee holiday celebrated only on Kashyyyk, with no mention of winter at all. Over time, the holiday spread and was celebrated by other species around the galaxy on the same couple of days regardless of location.

As the Holiday Special was released in November, many thought Life Day was a winter holiday. The Star Wars Galaxies devs ran with this idea, and had special "Life Day" events in IRL December, which featured snow and wroshyr christmas trees and the like. I don't think they knew/considered/cared that Life Day wasn't a winter holiday specifically, or that the winter season is different on different planets.

 

I hope they know that now we demand such a book for every season... spring, summer and fall upcoming!

 

I think it would be cool if we got Myths and Fables for each genre of tales. We’ve already got the original book, horror stories and Christmas stories—how about fairy tales, spacer tales in the form of nautical or pirate stories, or a contemporary paranormal/UFO set of stories with Vong and Force Apparitions?

 

Take my money, I so need this!

The question is how vague can they keep the stories? Of those we got, even the exclusive ones of Target and GE included, some were very vage and timeless, others rather specific and not that old to fit modern times or characters but were mystified a bit language wise.

They shouldn't just do the little folk tales but also bigger stories that had galactic impact. Kinda one about the Mortis family, if true remains open but that would be something. Or like Legends mystified Xim the Despot, give canon its own Robin Hood, King Arthur and likewise timeless often retold tales with various accounts that do not always align with each other. Like the apostels books of the bible also have differences and contradictions.

Especially love your spacers tales ideas that could pick up on the Angels from Iego, ancient hyperspace travel methods and issues, weird hyperspace effects like we had mentioned in Legends with mishaps. Who is the GFFAs Cpt Nemo? I need SW Jules Verne aplenty!

Journey to the Center of the Galaxy (Luke retraces Yodas journey to the Force World with the Priestesses post ROTJ?)
Twenty Thousand Parsecs below the Rift
Around the Galaxy in 80 Jumps
The Mysterious Planet (Mortis?)
From this Galaxy to the next

As for paranormal or UFO tales... in a galaxy with space wizards this needs to go beyond the average joes pov on those and truly feature mysteries and paranormal even space wizards would doubt and investigate. GFFA Xesh-Files!

 

I personally think one of the weaknesses of the two books we have so far is that a couple of the modern stories don't "need" to be told in the mythical style. "The Predecessor" from Dark Legends immediately comes to mind. I thought that the best stories were those that planted seeds for future stories or gave context for an in-universe myth that we've heard of before. The two Darth Caldoth stories, "The Golden One," and "Sleep of Ages" (my personal favorite) come to mind.

So personally I'd like to see vaguer stories and stories that are both folk tales and epic myths. In fact, you could probably squeeze a few book concepts out of those genres:

• Fairy Tales, such as Ewok stories or tales about Loth-wolves, Killiks, other "extinct" species around the galaxy. Grimmer stories involve Sith Witches kidnapping children, romantic stories involving chivalrous High Republic knights... aesops with talking Loth-wolves and Morai?
• Epic Myths, with Arthurian-style stories starring Xim or ancient Sith Lords? Maybe two stories about an ancient war but from the perspectives of each side, with many conflicting details? And definitely some Mortis-related content, or even a creation myth tale or two?

Other than that, we could have:

• Spacer tales! Nihil vikings finding new sectors in No-Space, The Maelstrom reference with spacers flying near a black hole, or awakening asteroid-sized leviathans in Wild Space? Tall tale-style stories too, which could be blatantly dubious
• Paranormal stories could include a reuse of the TCW Vong abduction arc, Jedi padawans being guided by Force ghosts, retro sci-fi Droid stories? Maybe even give the book a framing narrative with paranormal investigators... Tash and Zak Arranda, all grown up?
• War stories could also fill up a whole book! Stuff like old GI comics, everything from clones on bizarre missions to spy tales set during the First Order conflict

Bah, this is all getting away from the book at hand. I just hope to see a lot more books in the style of the first two, because I thought they've had some of the most interesting Star Wars stories from the last few years.

 

https://www.starwars.com/news/life-day-treasury-exclusive-excerpt

Spoiler

The war with the Empire was unceasing.

It had raged across star systems, ravaged entire worlds. It had seen flotillas blasted into nothing, and his home — and all the people he loved — reduced to dust. The void where Alderaan had once been was like the vacant space in his chest where his heart had lived. It had died that day, withered by grief such as the universe had never known, and now Rel was just an empty shell, an echo of the man he had once been.

In the aftermath, he had allowed that void to fill with anger, so hot and fiery that it threatened to burn him up. He hadn’t known what to do, walking around in a daze for days, weeks, hearing nothing but the buzzing in his own ears, seeing nothing but his mother’s smiling face as she called him in from the snow, just as she had when he was a child. Even the work he was doing felt empty, like it wasn’t enough — as if this tiny act of rebellion, helping those disenfranchised by the Empire — was worthless in the face of such overwhelming evil. He’d realized he was searching for a new purpose, a way to make more of a difference.

It was around that time when he had been recruited by a man named Oliphan Dairo, who had seen that anger within Rel and taught him to channel it, to wield it as a force for good. So it was that Rel had taken up with the Rebel Alliance, trained in the use of a weapon, and fought countless campaigns across countless worlds.

Now, on a blasted moon called Shard on the Outer Rim, he was shivering against the frigid cold, pressed up behind a huge block of sheer ice, peering out across the enemy entrenchments.

The battle, like the war, seemed without end. For weeks neither side had gained ground, and as the snowdrifts deepened and the days grew ever shorter, both the stormtroopers and the rebels were digging in. The Imperials had even erected a temporary base, and it was this that Rel and his partner, Fila, had been sent to scout.

Fila had been shot two days earlier by a sniper, and Rel hadn’t even been able to go to her side as she died, cold and alone in the dirty snow. Nevertheless, he still had a mission to complete. Otherwise her sacrifice would be for nothing.

The scuff of a boot alerted him to movement, and he peered carefully around the edge of the ice rock. A stormtrooper, dressed in pristine white armor and carrying a blaster, was patrolling the perimeter of their makeshift base.

Target practice.

Slowly, Rel maneuvered his own blaster into place, sighting along the barrel. His finger brushed against the trigger. He drew a breath, and then . . .

. . . stopped.

The stormtrooper was humming.

Dee-dum-dee do-dee-dum-dee-dee.

Rel’s mouth was suddenly dry. The tune was familiar, seared into his memory. It reminded him of . . . home.

Breathing raggedly, he sank back behind the ice rock. How could it be? A stormtrooper . . . from Alderaan?

The humming continued, growing louder. And then a voice floated out over the frozen wasteland:

“To banish ills and gloom and fear . . . and keep your loved ones close and near. For Winter’s Heart would have us see . . .”

“The true heart of winter . . . is you and me,” sang Rel, unable to stop himself. He rose slowly from his hiding place, lifting his hands above his head.

The stormtrooper wheeled on the spot, blaster raised, eyes locked with Rel’s — or at least Rel presumed so, but couldn’t be sure given the black-eyed helmet.

For a moment neither of them moved. Rel closed his eyes and awaited the killing shot. He’d made a terrible mistake. How could he have been so stupid?

“Rel?” The man’s voice was incredulous. “Rel?” Slowly, Rel opened his eyes. The stormtrooper had lowered his blaster. He reached up and removed his helmet.

For the first time in years, the two friends stood facing one another. The battlefield between them felt like a vast gulf that had suddenly opened up and was threatening to swallow them whole. How could it be? Here, of all places.

“Max? Is it really you?”

“It’s me, Rel.” Max emitted a long, low whistle. Rel blinked. “I almost shot you.”

“Glad you didn’t,” said Max.

There. That was the old Max he knew, thought Rel. The cocky smile.

“So. We’re on different sides, then,” said Max.

“Looks like it.” Rel paused. “Are you going to shoot me?”

“What? No . . . not unless you’re going to shoot me.” “Of course not!”

Max glanced from side to side. “Look, you can’t stand there like that with your hands in the air. If someone sees you . . .” His voice trailed off. He didn’t need to say more.

“Then . . . ?”

“Over there,” said Max, waving at the trees. “Come on. It’s getting late. No one will see us.”

They clambered over the no-man’s-land towards the edge of the woodland that flanked the battlefield, their feet crunching in the fresh snow. When they were out of sight of the Imperial base, Max tossed his blaster on the ground and swept Rel into a tight hug. Rel, shaken to see his old friend dressed in the gleaming white armor of the enemy — of which he’d shot dozens — hesitated for a moment, and then, remembering that this was Max, returned the hold. After a moment, they parted.

“It’s been a while,” said Rel.

“Too long. Back on Alderaan, on the skyrail. That’s the last time we saw each other.”

The snow was falling in thick flakes all around them. Rel found the stump of an old tree to sit on. “Alderaan. I can’t believe it’s gone.”

“I know.” Max hung his head.

Rel wanted to rail at him, to ask him how he could stand there, wearing that armor, wielding a blaster forged in an Imperial factory . . . how he could still fight for the people who had destroyed their home. But he didn’t. He could see how much Max was hurting.

“It would have been Winter’s Heart, you know. If Alderaan were still there. We’d be getting ready for the banquet right about now, peeling kebroot tubers for the pot,” said Max. He sat heavily in the snow.

“Nah,” said Rel, “we’d have been larking about while our parents sorted out the food. Off hunting snow grompas and playing croupet in the woods.”

Max looked up. A smile slowly spread across his face. “Now there’s an idea. What do you say?”

“What do you mean?”

“A game of croupet! Just like the old days. We can dig out a few stones, mark up a board in the snow. . . .”

Rel looked at the man like he was insane. “Now?”

Max shrugged. “Why not? It won’t take long. Unless you’ve got somewhere better to be?”

Rel laughed. “You’re crazy.”

“And you probably still believe in snow grompas.” Max shook his head, chuckling. “I can’t believe I let you sneak up on me again.”

“Like you used to say — I’ve always been good at that.” Rel looked at his friend’s pleading expression. “Come on then. Let’s get on with it. But I’m warning you — I won’t go easy on you.”

“Like you ever did!”

Together, the two old friends gathered a handful of pebbles and marked out a board in the snow. “Alderaan rules?” said Max.

“What else?” said Rel. “This is how we mark it. Out here, on the edge of nowhere. This is how we mark Winter’s Heart and remember.”

Max gave a single heartfelt nod.

 

The last story in the book...



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Just got this book in, love it!!!!

 

Just ordered this from Amazon UK (along with some non-SW books) - it only came into stock on Oct 7 here. Should have it Wed.

 

Delivered today from Amazon UK. It's in the reading pile. (Might be Life Day before I get to it..)