Star Wars: A New Hope: The Princess, the Scoundrel, and the Farm Boy

The book starts off quite well by telling the first third of the movie from Leia's perspective. Not exactly genre defining literature but not a bad read. The expectation that this creates is that you'll be told the story through alternating view points of key events, similar to Game of Thrones. Sadly this is not the case. Instead the story is split into blocks proceeding entirely in chronological order through the events of the film. What this means of course is that entire pivotal moments are cut out entirely, or briefly mentioned later on. For instance Luke's experiences on Tattooine, the majority of the first third of the movie are simply never addressed beyond a few comments made to Han. While Leia's perspective is at least decently written things go downhill when Han (the scoundrel) takes charge of the story. Han is a messy and badly handled mish-mash of contradictions. Everything he does essentially follows a two part formula: be rude and dismissive, spend the next two paragraphs on an internal monologue about how he's "not like that, not REALLY." Finally the conclusion of the story is related from Luke's perspective, which is unfortunate because he has no perspective. The majority of his time is spent dwelling on how awesome his new friends Han and Leia are interspersed with commentary regarding how much of a Rube he is. The weakness of Han and Luke's parts of the story complicates things because most of the action occurs during their stories. To say that the action is badly written wouldn't be fair, because it's not written at all. There's no excitement, nothing. Just a few sentences occasionally making a poor attempt to describe things that happen in the movie. Even the thrilling conclusion and the destruction of the Death Star are treated to just ten pages which fail to convey any urgency, clarity or satisfaction. Overall it gets a two because Leia was actually given an interesting voice. But as soon as she closes her mouth the book falls to pieces.

I just didn’t vibe with this. I thought it was an okay read but I guess I was expecting a little more. I love Star Wars but I felt this was a little lacking compared to it. It’s exactly like the movie but a little extra that the author wrote in. I like that it focuses on that character and their thoughts and actions that weren't on the movie, but I felt like the characters were bland (especially compared to her other books she’s written). In all honesty, it took me a little to get into. I really didn’t start getting involved with it until the portion that was Luke Skywalker’s and the last the last half of the book. Overall, it was okay just wasn’t for me. I’m onto the next book. Hopefully it goes better.

Star Wars: A New Hope The Princess, the Scoundrel, and the Farm Boy by Alexandra Bracken in a wonderful book! I love Star Wars and up until now have only ever watched the movies but reading this book is a real treat. I love that the Princesses part is told from her point of view. It goes much deeper into the characters and there's so much more story line in this book than in the movie. This book is beautifully written and is sure to be loved by any star wars fan! Disclosure: I received product(s) for free, in exchange for my honest review. I only recommend products I've used personally, and believe will be good fit for consumers.

I loved this in-depth look at Han, Luke, and Leia--I actually really love the idea of these re-tellings as a way for young Star Wars fans to enter the trilogy or explore it more fully. I thought, in particular, Leia's section was the real standout, and the author illuminated several aspects of her personality that I'd just never considered before. Han's voice conveyed warmth and humor, and I loved his struggle between what he wanted to believe and the reality of the universe. And Luke! There are a few really cool off-camera scenes that the author included that were absolute highlights. A must-read for Star Wars fans, big and small!