Spoiler-Free Review

Following the events of Star by Star, Jaina and the Young Jedi survivors go off to the Hapes Cluster in their stolen Vong ship in search of rest and recovery. Instead, they find intrigue and battle as the Yuuzhan Vong track them. While not the tour de force Star by Star was, Dark Journey is an entertaining book, although it's brought down by a very disappointing ending.

The Real Review (major spoilers)

Well, it's been a few weeks since I finished Dark Journey, and it's probably a good thing that I waited to write the review. Had I written this right after I finished the book, you would have gotten something much different.

Of course, I was expecting some letdown -- after all, it'd be a very neat trick to top Star by Star, which was in my mind the best Star Wars novel ever written --  but Dark Journey is a rough change in tone from the epic battles of Star by Star, focusing instead on one planet and the royal intrigues of the Hapan court. After my first reading of the book, I was ready to write one heck of a negative review ... 

...  but you know what? The book grew on me. It's almost a direct contrast to Star by Star -- in that book, events were epic, and the lines were well drawn. Yuuzhan Vong evil, New Republic just. Voxyn bad, Jedi good. In Dark Journey, everything is very subtle. Where is the line between good and evil? When do the ends justify the means, and when do they not? If you do evil to advance the cause of good, is it really wrong? Apart from the subpar ending (which I'll get to later), Dark Journey does an admirable job of tackling very tricky questions.

A quick summary of the major events of Star by Star: Coruscant falls, Anakin dies, Jacen is captured by the Vong, Jaina turns to the Dark Side. So, how are these momentous events handled?

We actually get nothing dealing with the New Republic (if they still exist) this time around. Jaina and friends in their stolen Vong ship jump back to Coruscant only to find all the lights going out -- a rather poetic image that only gets a few lines in the book. Other than that, there's nothing mentioned of the governmental power structure -- anybody with any rank is conspicuously absent. We don't even get Wedge or Lando. The fate of the New Republic lies completely unresolved -- obviously, this is something that deserves at least a book to itself, so I'm not too put out by its absence.

Anakin's death is handled pretty well in this book, as well. In Star by Star, the Jedi strike team survivors got Anakin's body and took it with them as they escaped, and so we get Anakin's funeral this time around. Before I talk about the funeral, though, I just want to say that Anakin's leaving a body behind at all is a bit questionable. When he became the conduit to the Force, so much energy was going through him that his flight suit burned away and his cells ruptured -- that's what killed him, after all. What's left, just skin? It's very strange, to say the least. However, let's go through the list of Jedi dead that we've seen in the movies: Qui-Gon, Obi-Wan, Yoda, and Anakin Skywalker. Everybody but Qui-Gon faded away upon death and returned later as luminous beings in the Force. Qui-Gon didn't, and Lucas has said that we'll find out why in Episode II or III. Apparently it has something to do with why Obi-Wan told Vader "Strike me down and I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine"; so keep an eye out there and we may get some clues about Anakin's possible return. Anakin's funeral, when it happens, is done in a very Dune-like fashion; if you've read the books, remember Jamis's funeral? Everybody comes forward to say "Jamis was my friend," in order to honor him. At Anakin's funeral, everybody comes forward to say "Anakin saved my life." It's a touching tribute to the young hero that Anakin was. Luke himself puts the torch to the funeral pyre. Bye-bye, Anakin. I still hope for his return, but the funeral put a real touch of finality on his death; a resurrection of some sort doesn't seem likely, folks.

Now to deal with Jacen's situation. At the end of Star by Star, he had been captured by Vergere and Nom Anor. We never see him in this book, not for a second -- and therefore no hints of Nom Anor or Vergere -- and Tsavong Lah only appears once or twice via villip. It's a courageous decision to have a lot of the major villains step offstage for an entire novel, but Dark Journey handles it pretty well. All Cunningham gives us regarding Jacen's fate is that, about midway through the book, every Jedi in the galaxy feels a huge rush of agony from Jacen, and then their sense of him blinks off, leading everyone to believe that Jacen has been killed. Leia, however, who is not a full Jedi Knight, maintains that he is still alive, because she didn't feel the same way she did when Anakin died. I'm siding with Leia on this one -- I don't think Jacen is dead by a long shot, but he may be getting the Tahiri treatment. Teasing us with only that one glimpse into Jacen's fate is a good way of making us look forward to the next novel in the New Jedi Order series -- now I want to know what happened to him that much more.

Okay, now enough with the Star by Star echoes and into the book itself. Nearly a third of the way through, I was nearly beside myself with anger. Jaina, who went Dark so dramatically when we had last seen her, blasting her way through the Vong with Force Lightning, was acting nearly entirely normal! She wasn't tainted by the Dark Side at all! I was getting a great rant written in my head, as the truth slowly dawned on me. Jaina had fallen, and was still corrupted. It was just a subtle thing, but she was indeed evil. I like this book's portrayal of the Dark Side ...  not everything has to be straight up, black hat, tied to the railroad tracks, soon my electro-ray will destroy Metropolis bad. It was a nifty way of looking at the Dark Side that we haven't seen before, and quite frankly, I was looking forward to a lot more of it. Dark Jaina has good goals, but she goes about them all wrong. Want to trick the Vong, but don't have enough information? Send up pilot after pilot on suicide runs. Been kicked out of the pilot's seat? Send the other guy a mental picture of Force lightning and watch him get up real quick. Need to learn how to be an effective leader? Who better to consult than Ta'a Chume, former Queen Mother of Hapes?

Yeah, Jaina's thinking real clearly. Throughout the book, we see a few flashes of Jaina as pure Dark Jedi ...  she takes up her saber against Kyp Durron (returning here to be her master once more) a few times, and even zaps him with the Force Lightning once. Most of the time, though, the signs are more subtle.

Jaina, when she's not advancing along the Dark path, manages to have some really fantastic ideas on combating the Vong, carrying on the trend I first noticed in Star by Star of technology adapting to the new foe. Isn't it kind of ironic that the New Republic, which uses lifeless (and therefore static) machines, is proving far better at adapting than the Vong, who use living organisms? In the Vong ship that was stolen at the end of the last book, Jaina and Lowbacca manage to discover how to make a ship unidentifiable to the Vong: keep fluctuating the gravitic signature that the dovin basals make. (Oy, the technobabble in that sentence ...  nearly Star Trek levels. I'll back away slowly ... ) Then they go further and realize that they can make the Vong think any ship is any other ship they want them to ...  after identifying the ship's frequency, Jaina makes implants that can be shot at enemy vessels to make them emit that frequency. Good way to screw with the Vong!

Off on a completely unrelated tangent ...  the role of the Yuuzhan Vong gods can be seen as a mirror to the overarching galactic war. When the Vong arrived in Vector Prime, it was a matter of, "Oh, look, the invaders have pagan gods ...  they're extremists! How cute!" As the conflict went on, and the Vong took system after system, we got Yuuzhan Vong dogma fed to us, bit by bit. Yun-Yuuzhan, the creator. Yun-Harla, the Trickster. Yun-Yammka, the Slayer. The virtues of pain. The Shamed Ones. All of a sudden, what we've got is a fully fleshed out religion on our hands, and by this time the Vong have a solid presence in the galaxy. And then Tsavong Lah's arm replacement doesn't take. Well, now, that's odd. We've seen him get new limbs before (replacing his severed leg), and they took. Why isn't this one? Could it be (say it in hushed tones) that it's because he promised the gods Jedi twins and hasn't delivered? Gods have to be real to be angered ...  Note well that this takes place as the Vong take Coruscant and establish dominance over the galaxy ...  the rise of the Yuuzhan Vong parallels the rise of their gods.

Why am I wasting your time, reader, with my philosophical ramblings? Because Jaina comes up with a fantastic idea in this book, even better than her signal maskers: controlled blasphemy. When a priest, via villip, tells her that he will sacrifice her for his patron goddess, Yun-Harla the Trickster, Jaina replies, "Thanks for the suggestion. I've been wondering what to call this rock. Trickster sounds just about right." She then takes the theme further: each of the implants that gives out the Trickster's signal has the symbol of Yun-Harla engraved upon it, and before the final battle of this book, she goes on the villip and shows the Vong that she has drawn the very same symbol on her forehead. Obviously, they're infuriated. They fight angry, which is never a good idea, and continously underestimate her: I can't count how many times one Vong or another said "No infidel could be that clever," or some variation on the theme, only to have Jaina prove them wrong. Not only is this prime psychological warfare, but it's a step in the right direction. Exposing the Vong pantheon to ridicule is a good first step.

Quite a bit of this book deals with Jaina's personal relationships. Jag Fel returns, and he and Jaina spend the entire book dancing around each other, with each one clearly smitten with the other. Everybody but Jag and Jaina know full well what's going on between them, but the two remain blissfully unaware, taking huge offense at words which had entirely different meanings. Near the end, though, each of them is getting fairly close to realizing just what's going on, so that's a nice thing to look forward to in later stories. In other relationship news, Tenel Ka realizes she was in love with Jacen all along (duh!), and Kyp makes one too many inappropriate comments about how pretty Jaina is. Urgh ...  you're twice her age, Kyp!

So, with all the positive things I've written about this book, I find myself having to deal with the end. Let me be utterly blunt: it's a complete disappointment. First off, the whole thing feels slightly forced ...  the Yuuzhan Vong "menace" is one priestship and a military escort of a few dozen coralskippers. I am not impressed. Rule one -- a threat that Rogue Squadron could handle fairly easily is not a climactic confrontation. Better just to not have the space battle; when did it become a rule that every Star Wars book has to have one anyway? Secondly, the ending begins with Kyp confronting Jaina about her Dark Side ways. Jaina blasts Kyp with Force Lightning and he dispels it, telling her that she's not the only one with access to those powers. Jaina blasts off for the battle (the Yuuzhan Vong "fleet" is attacking Hapes) and Kyp goes up after her. Then, in battle, Jaina has some sort of half-baked vision, and hey presto!, she's back from the Dark Side. What the bloody hell? Every Jedi that comes back from the Dark Side cheapens what Luke did for Anakin. Whatever happened to "once you start down the Dark path, forever will it consume your destiny," Del Rey? A son's plea to his father redeemed Anakin. That's the benchmark. A sister's love pulled Luke back most of the way, and the love of the woman who would become his wife got him all the way back. Nicely enough done. Kyp redeemed himself with years of hard work, reparations, and honest repentance. Well ...  okay. Then Jaina goes back because she has a stupid vision, and not a very well described one, either! There just aren't words to express the extent of my fury.

Bottom line? If this book had come out in hardcover, I would have told you to wait for paperback, but since it came out in paperback? Get yourself a copy ...  just watch out for those last ten pages or so.

The Light Side (spoilers)

• The way the Dark Side is portrayed. I wanted so much more.
• More technology advancements. It's stuff like this that wins wars.
• Jaina's blasphemies. It's about time somebody started poking the Vong where they're sore.
• The return of Jag Fel. A brilliant pilot who learned strategy from the Chiss? He might as well have "savior of the New Republic" tattooed on his forehead.
• Hapan Court intrigues. Ta'a Chume is at her subtle, manipulating best.
• Teneniel Djo's fate is bittersweet but well done ...  I liked her so much in Courtship, but she just never was a match for palace life. Poor Teneniel.
• The cover art is fantastic. With all the comments on how attractive Jaina is, and so many men buzzing around her, it's a real bonus to have the smoldering picture of Jaina on the cover. I'd be chasing after her too -- she's gorgeous.
• Tenel Ka's decision. When she took the crown to save her planet from falling into the wrong hands, my heart broke for her.
• Anakin's funeral being handled with such a perfect tone of somber honor to a fallen hero.

Buy this book at Amazon.com