Heirs of Force (School & Library Binding)

Heirs of the Force the introductory novella to this 14 book long series is as mundaine, contrived, and poorly thought out as the rest of the Young Jedi Knights series. It may be required reading, seeing as how it sets up many of the main characters in the New Jedi Order series, but that doesnt make these stories entertaining.

Heirs of the Force introduces us to the teenage characters of Jacen and Jania solo as they begin their training as jedi's. Jacen is fascinated by animals and has a hideously poor sense of humor, jania is the mechanic and pilot with a no nonsense attitude. They are joined in their training by future hapan queen mother tenel ka, who by this point prefer's her dathomir witch pedigree, and force sensitive wookie Lowbacca who is the nephew of chewbacca. This novel covers their adventure as they stumble accross a crashed tie fighter in the rain forests of the pre-vong terra formed Yavin four, which has been there since the rebel occupation of the planet more then twenty years ago. As Jania's curiosity gets the best of her, and she tries to repair it, the pilot, who has lived in the jungle with a broken arm for twenty-five years now happens upon them, kidnaps the solo children and forces them to continue the repair work, as tenel ka and lowbacca struggle to survive the suddenly deadly forest of yavin and attempt to obtain help.

If My preceding paragraph didnt make you stop and and ponder if I was kidding (which I wasnt), then your suspension of disbelief may be just enough to eek some entertainment out of the main plot. The idea of qrol (the hermit/former tie pilot) is initially a interesting one until one stops to ponder how does a trained pilot survive in a rainforest without aid for 25 years with a broken arm? Or how come the rebel alliance, or the jedi, never happened upon him during their separate tenure's upon the jungle moon. Then there's little facts such as humidity's ability to corrupt electrical equipment, and how that little nugget of knowledge would factor into trying to repair a crashed aircraft thats been allowed to fester in a rainforest for 25 years that sort of takes all the believability out of the main plot. And while I am nit picking, allow me question how would a 13 year old amateur mechanic be able to successfully integrate a hyperdrive module onto a aircraft designed not to have one, and how come all the really dangerous animals only come out when two young jedi knights are lost in the jungle? yet after this there are no further cases of jedi being attacked by the same creature's. Okay, Ill stop nit picking now.

nit picks aside, while the main plot is poorly researched, thought out, and written, the characterization is even worse. I understand Jacen is supposed to have a poor sense of humor, but an attempt at comic relief ends up just being flat out painful when the person writing it has an even worse one. Eventually readers that even have a inkling of a proper sense of humor or what is funny will eventually start skipping paragraphs or entire pages whenever jacen utters "want to hear a joke". Then there's the character of Em-tee-dee. Lowbacca's translator droid whom im surprised functioned past this novel. C3-P0 may be annoying, but his schtick is often amusing and works as a character. He's meant to be annoying, and it works for getting a laugh or smirk from the audience. Anderson is incapable of working the same delicate balance in his characters, yet attempts to create a youger, chattier, and even more redudant version of C3-P0. To sum up the overall effect of the character and the writing, if jacen is irritating, then Em-tee-dee will just send you into fits of page tearing rage whenever he gets the spotlight.

This book and future ones in the series introduced vital and important characters in the NJO series, and in the recent Dark Nest Trilogy, but the elements and characters it introduces are handled far better by the superior writers that wrote those novels. The 14 young jedi knights novella's should be considered required reading only for the most obsessive of completists wanting to read all of the extended universe's chapters. For those looking for well written, character heavy, well thought out science fiction for young readers, look elsewhere. Perhaps the young adult novels chronicling young obi-wans relationship with qui-gon-jin and their early days as master and apprentice.

This novella, and the entire YJK series is, to quote the bard, "sound and fury, representing nothing". Meaningless and poorly written tripe with only a few interesting moments, such as Zekk's recovery from his tenure as a dark jedi, to brighten the overall storyline. Avoid at all costs.

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