Books A/V The original Star Wars novelization by ADF - 40th anniversary thoughts

Yes, I know I missed the actual 40th anniversary of this book by a month. The idea for the thread only occurred to me today. Sorry about that!



With the 40th anniversary of the release of Star Wars Episode IV coming soon, I thought it might be fun to take a 40th anniversary look at the very first Star Wars novel, Star Wars by "George Lucas" (aka Alan Dean Foster), the novelization of what we now know as Episode IV: A New Hope. Star Wars was released a solid six months before the movie opened (amazing to think that sort of thing used to happen!) as part of the campaign to generate early interest in a film that a lot of people at Lucasfilm and 20th Century Fox were fearing might end up a flop. This is where we first learned that there were dogs on Tatooine, that Luke doesn't know what a duck is, and about the Five Fire Rings of Fornax.

Star Wars, the novel, had an enormous effect on me when I was a kid. I was born in 1974, and became a Star Wars fan early enough in life that I don't remember exactly how it happened (it wasn't a result of actually seeing the movie - that didn't happen until the re-release in 1981). But I know my cousin had a copy of the novelization, and when I think back to my earliest memories of Star Wars, it is always this photo that I think of:



For some reason I was entranced by that iconic photo as a child, and I'm sure that the mystery of it is what first beckoned me to a galaxy far, far away. At some point I actually read the novel instead of just looked at the photo insert, loved it, and have read it many times since then. I think it still holds up well as a piece of science fiction literature unto itself, entirely independent of the movie or anything else that came after.

Anyone have any back-in-the-day memories or comments to share about this first ever piece of Star Wars literature? Has anyone only recently discovered it, and if so what did you think?

 

Are there reprints out there? Sounds like I'd like it.

 

In the UK at least there are sort of omnibus editions called The Star Wars Trilogy and SW: The Prequel Trilogy, or similar, collecting the various movie novelizations. I imagine these should be fairly widely available still.

 

It never went out of print. I believe it's now published with the 2004 ANH DVD/soundtrack cover and as part of trilogy collections.

 

I haven't read it in years, but from what I remember, the actual destruction of Alderaan is not shown in the novel. There's no superlaser firing scene. It's obviously mentioned that Death Star has the power to destroy planets, but it's not stated how exactly it does that. I always found this interesting.

 

This was the very first SW item I owned and I read it many times! So I got it signed by Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher.

 

They are in the US for sure - Amazon and Barnes & Noble have the omnibus collections readily available in paperback under the "Star Wars Trilogy" title. B&N also has the omnibus available in a nice leatherbound hardcover volume, with at least three different cover designs to choose from that I know of (Vader, R2, 3PO).

 

This was the copy I had for a long time, and had read through as a kid. (Funny story, when I went to Disney World for the first time, I bought 2 souvenirs - this book, and the Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade Soundtrack on Cassette!)

 

I love when people have nostalgic stories about stuff like this!


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I have a copy of this somewhere in storage with a gold cover, I believe it's from a very early printing because it's just called "Star Wars" IIRC.

EDIT: YES. Here it is -

 

The gold-cover paperback is the one I had growing up. Later on I had the omnibus Taalcon posted above; today I have this hardcover version, which I believe was a sci-fi book club edition:

 

The one I first read was in high school - Iooked like this as I recall:

 

So many cool editions!


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Mine looked like this:


Yep. That book was way older than me when I first read it.

 

What's wrong with Luke's face?!

 

He looked down a few seconds ago, and is still shellshocked from the abs he found there.

 

"A buddy of mine saw Luke Skywalker take his shirt off in the shower, and he said that Luke Skywalker had an eight-pack...that Luke Skywalker was shredded."

 

Marvel Star Wars series also tended to depict Luke this way.

 

To be fair, this is typical of that era's promotional artwork.

 

LOL yes -- I used to joke that Hasbro's initial series of mid-90s POTF figures were based on Carmine Infantino's artwork from Marvel's pre-ESB run.

Then there's this hilariously Rambo-inspired take on Very Buff Luke from issue #107:

 

Here's my copy. The inside says it's the 42nd printing, from June 1992.

 

I had the omnibus edition, but by the time it came around to me, I don't think it had a cover anymore. So I missed out on all these fun and games.

Anyway, the main thing that stuck out to me about the novel itself, when I first read it as a child, is the violence involved in the opening battle. Talk of "bits of flesh and bone" and stuff like that is a bit atypical for later Wars novels. Maybe an anticipation of Troy Denning?

 

I have the novel in the form of an Original Trilogy omnibus as well, but interestingly I can't find an image of the cover sleeve that was on my copy. I remember that I got it from Science Fiction Book Club, about...2003 or 2004. The cover was basically this poster from the ANH Special Edition (without the "movie poster text" at the bottom). It is interesting I can't find any online image of this version of the book; it's not on Wookieepedia and Google isn't showing me any results, either.

 

That's awesome. I bet the variety of international and exclusive covers (like the sci-fi book club covers) is amazing.

Here's something else about my old gold-cover paperback that takes me straight back to my childhood -- that typeface they used for all the 70s Star Wars novels back in those days. I couldn't find an example actually from the novelization, this one's from Han Solo's Revenge but you'll see what I mean: