Galaxy's Edge: Black Spire Book Review

By: Christian Corah

Descriptives

Page count: Kindle edition, 368 pages

Author: Delilah S Dawson

Timeline: Follows The Last Jedi, precedes The Rise of Skywalker

Main characters: Vi Moradi and Archex (formerly Captain Cardinal)

Brief synopsis: Following a major blow to the Resistance, Vi Moradi takes former enemy Archex to Black Spire to set up a new Resistance outpost.

Gut Feeling

I’m not sure if it was just the fact that my life has gotten busier, but this book took me almost three months to read, which is a long time. But the book certainly started slow. For the first quarter of the book it was rather uneventful. However, it really picked up near the end. This causes me to really have mixed feelings over it. It did some things really well, and others not as much. I was excited to read it after reading Phasma, also by Delilah S Dawson, but this one wasn’t nearly as exciting. That doesn’t mean that it was worse, it was just different. Let’s get into the details.

Characters (9/10 pts)

Oddly enough, I’d actually classify this book as being character led. This surpises me because the “Prequel” to this book, Phasma, was not character led. Not to say the book had bad characters, it was just led by one exciting adventure after another. The same is not said for Black Spire. While it did have good adventure, it was lead by the development of characters. I’ll get to Archex and Vi in a moment, but the characters that joined the Resistance all had their own unique qualities and depth. It is hard to introduce new characters into Star Wars and Dawson did a great job. Now for the best part, the relationship between Archex and Vi. Seeing as Vi was formerly tortured by Archex, the two certainly have an interesting relationship. Watching it develop from one with wavering trust to something more is certainly one of the most compelling parts of the book. I am giving a strong score of 9 points for this section. 

Writing Style (8.25/10 pts)

All Star Wars authors are already well-established authors. Not just anyone is allowed to write a Star Wars novel (unfortunately). Del Rey really does a good job of picking them out. Dawson’s writing style is well-balanced that doesn’t really bring much to my attention. There aren’t many striking strengths, but the strength is that there are no weaknesses that come to mind. The writing wasn’t spectacular, but it was still very good. I am giving 8.25 points.

Plot (8/10 pts)

Like I stated in my Gut Reaction, this book started really slow. That is my biggest problem with the plot. Once Vi made it to Black Spire, she went through seemingly everyday events that I thought weren’t needed in the story. While they all did have some signifiance later in the story, I think it could have been done in a more efficient manner. That being said, the book did eventually get really good. There was a lot on the line regarding the characteres and lives at Black Spire in the climatic parts of the book. They definitely did not dissapoint. The book also reached closure and opened it up for a Sequel, which not all books can accomplish well. So, I didn’t really care for some of the book’s plot and loved other parts. This averages the score out to 8 points.

Intrigue (7/10 pts)

The intrigue I had for this book moved with the quality of the plot. When the plot wasn’t as good, I wasn’t as intererested in the book. When the plot was better, I was more intrigued. This certainly makes sense, but that isn’t all that goes into the book’s intrigue. Because the book was character led it makes it a little less exciting. Character led novels can still be very intriguing, but Black Spire didn’t quite do that for me. While the book was good I wanted to read on, but overall my interest in the book was lower than I expected. This is certainly a factor as to why it took me so long to read. I am giving 7 points.

What does it add? (8/10 pts)

This section certainly surprised me. Because Black Spire has mostly new characters and is set on a new planet, I didn’t really expect the book to add much to the Star Wars universe. While what Black Spire added wasn’t super substantial, it was sigificantly more than what other books siilar to this one have added to Star Wars. Even though there weren’t any Force users in this book, it doen’t mean that the characters couldn’t have experience with the Force. What this book essentially added is that certain people can detect the goodness (or lack thereof) in others through sensing the Force that surrounds them. This may be a kind of Force sensitivity, which expands what we already know about the Force. This a cool addition so I am giving 8 points.

Logic (0 pts)

There is nothing in the novel that added to nor took away from the logic within the Star Wars universe. So I am neither adding nor taking away additional points. 

Final Thoughts

My final score for Black Spire is an 8.05, or a B minus. This is about an average score for books that I have reviewed. Some of you will certaily like this book more than I did and some of you will have little interest in it. I doesn’t really feel that Star Warsy and if you’re ok with that, it shouldn’t be a huge problem. If you are especially interested in the Sequel era, this book does a great job with expanding the limited universe. That may be its biggest strength. Pick it up, give it a shot, and you may really like it.

I hope you enjoyed this book review and if there is a book that you want me to read or review, please let me know at christiancorah@gmail.com. As for now, I will only be doing Canon books (but in the future that might change).

Phasma Book Review

By: Christian Corah

Descriptives

Page count: Kindle edition, 400 pages

Author: Delilah S. Dawson

Intended Audience: Adult

Timeline: Follows Return of the Jedi, precedes The Force Awakens

Main characters: Captain Phasma, Captain Cardinal, Vi Moradi, Siv, General Hux, and others.

Brief synopsis: Obsessed with learning more about Captain Phasma, Captain Cardinal forces Vi Moradi to tell the story of Phasma’s primitive life before joining the First Order.

Gut Feeling

I really didn’t expect to enjoy this book as much as I did. I hadn’t heard many good things about it (although I did hear some good things) and it doesn’t have a high score on Goodreads (3.76). Also, Phasma is pretty underhwelming in the Sequel Trilogy. She is essentially Boba Fett 2.0: looks really cool and doesn’t do anything. However, this book quickly grabbed my attention. Even though I am currently rather busy with school, work, and my book coming out later this year, I devoted a LOT of time to reading this book and finished it quite a bit faster than I expected. It turned Phasma into a ruthless and cunning villain: willing to do whatever it takes to succeed. This was a great book, but it didn’t always feel like a Star Wars story. This can be refreshing for some readers, but it isn’t what every Star Wars reader is looking for. But I’ll get into that later.

Before getting into the details, I will say this though. The book contains a considerable amount of torture and violence and I understand that not everyone will be comfortable with that. So keep that in mind while reading this review. 

Characters (9/10 pts)

This was in no means a character led novel. It was the exciting plot and high stakes that made this book excel. Dawson did not devote much of the time to character development. However, that doesn’t mean that it won’t score well for this section. She did a lot with a little work. The characters were surprisingly well developed and relatable. And my emotional attachments to characters came from characters that I didn’t expect. Phasma came from a broken part of the planet Parnassos. There, she lived with a small tribe called the Scyre and trained a group of highly skilled warriors. Among the group were Siv and Torben. This is where Dawson was able to pull at my heart strings. Because this book is about Phasma, who is a villain, the book didn’t inherently have likeable characters. Phasma is fascinating, but I didn’t really root for her character. This isn’t a bad thing though. She is a villain and a great one at that. But Siv and Torben added a new element to the book because I was worried about what was going to happen to them. This greatly improves the score for this section.

But this doesn’t mean that Dawson did a poor job with Phasma’s character. It is quite the opposite. She is at her best in this book and it isn’t even close. In the movies, there aren’t really any characters that I despise. In Game of Thrones, we easily despise Joffrey and Ramsay Bolton, but Star Wars is lacking in this category. Yes, we hate Palpatine, Thrawn (especially in Rebels), and others, but there aren’t villains that do things that are truly shocking. Phasma, while not as extreme as Joffrey or Ramsay, falls into this category. She is truly one of the best villains in Star Wars and I wish the movies actually came close to portraying that.

This section is getting rather long, but I must dicuss the other main characters: Captain Cardinal and Vi Moradi. Moradi is a Resistance spy who tells the story of Phasma to Cardinal. Their arc is not as pronounced as Phasma’s, but it is still important. Cardinal was especially intersting. He was clearly the villain, but there was something about him that made him relatable. I won’t go into details to avoid spoilers, but it was interesting to have a villain who I wanted to root for.

Obviously, there is a lot going on regarding characters in the book and Dawson did a great job with them. All characters were unique from each others, had their own strengths, great development, and I was never confusing characters for each other. For these reasons, I am giving 9 points.

Writing Style (8.25/10) pts)

This is the first book that I’ve read by Dawson and I’m already a fan of her work. She has a balanced writing style between being easy to read and detailed. It never felt too simple or bogged down in details. It was consistent all the way through. Overall, the best strength of the writing style is that there’s no clear weaknesses. However, there really isn’t a clear strength that I can point to either. But it still felt slighly above the average Star Wars novel. I am giving 8.25 points.

Plot (9/10 pts)

This book is certainly led by the plot and the plot for Phasma is rather unique. It follows two different stories. The first follows Vi Moradi and Captain Cardinal, where Moradi tells Cardinal the story of Phasma, which is the second story. At the end, the story lines connect. In this way, it felt similar to the plot of Dooku: Jedi Lost. This plot design has one major advantage. It really keeps the story fresh as it bounces back and forth. As soon as one story might start to get dull (which it didn’t really), it would switch up and stay exciting.

It is fairly normal when a book has two separate story lines for one to be superior over the other. In this case, Phasma’s story was more exciting and made up most of the book. This should be the case, as the book is literally named for her. Her story was full of exciting moment after exciting moment. It was also high stakes for most of the moments, which made the peaks in the story that much more exciting. Even though I essentially knew what would happen for Phasma, I didn’t know the future for the other new characters in the story. This was really important for keeping the plot interesting. Dawson also didn’t pull ANY punches with the story. Shocking events happen and I was HERE FOR IT. My only critique of Phasma’s story is that there were too many peaks and not enough valleys. It jumped from one big event to another and didn’t always allow time for the plot to breathe inbetween.

Even though Phasma’s story was the best of the two, it doesn’t mean that the story of Moradi and Cardinal was not quality. It was often high stakes and compelling and served as a climatic finish to the book. The chapters also allowed Phasma’s story to breathe a little, which did help. Overall the plot was awesome and receives a score of 9 points.

Intrigue (9.5/10 pts)

Intrigue will be the highest scoring section for Phasma and it is mostly because of the plot. I talked about it in the previous section a lot, so I won’t be too repetive here. But most of the events in the plot were high stakes, and this happened basically from the first chapter of the book. These moments really grip the reader because they want to know what is going to happen next. I also really cared about what was going to happen to new characters and didn’t know what their fate would be. Because Dawson holds literally no punches in her storytelling, I never knew what was going to happen next. Also, because the story jumped around so much it always felt fresh. There were hardly any dull moments.The writing syle was also easy to read, which always adds to the intrigue. This all caused me to read this book very quickly (for my standards). I am giving 9.5 points.

What does it add? (6/10 pts)

We’ve had a lot of really great scores so far and this section will certainly not look like the others. It is the book’s greatest weakness: it doesn’t really add anything to the Star Wars universe. Yes, it does get fantastic development for an underused villain in the movies, but that doesn’t really have signifiance for anyone other than Phasma. And it certainly doesn’t matter for any time periods outside of the Sequel Trilogy. This book was written for one purpose: to provide a backstory for Phasma. It did that great, but not much else (although it does create new characters that are explored in Black Spre, also by Dawson, which I am reading now). For much of the story, it didn’t even seem like I was reading a Star Wars novel. It seemed to be from a whole new world. This can be refreshing for Star Wars fans wanting something new (similar to the feel of Thrawn Ascendancy), or it can turn away others. The only thing I can think of, beyond Phasma’s character, is this book provides an interesting new planet with a diverse set of cultures. This is interesting, but not really impactful to Star Wars as a whole. I am only giving 6 points for this section, but that shouldn’t deter you from reading this book. It is a great story, it just doesn’t really add anything to Star Wars lore.

Logic (0 pts)

There is nothing in Phamsa that added to or took away from the logic within the Star Wars universe. So, I am neither adding or taking away extra points.

Final Thoughts

My final score for Phamsa is an 8.35/10, or a B. This scores slightly above average for all books I’ve reviewed. It is actually tied with Leia, Princess of Alderaan by Claudia Gray, so that should tell you that this is a quality book. It was a great story that even non Star War fans can enjoy. I don’t think it is talked about enough and may be one of the more underrated Star Wars novels. However, as the scores show, it didn’t really add anything to Star Wars lore. So if you want a great story, or enjoy Phasma’s character, read this book. If you want new Star Wars lore, or don’t enjoy graphic or torture scens, there are others you can read.

I hope you enjoyed this book review and if there is a book that you want me to read or review, please let me know at christiancorah@gmail.com. As for now, I will only be doing Canon books (but in the future that might change).