Survivor's Quest

by Timothy Zahn



When I had the idea to start the blog I thought mostly I would talk about TV, and have a place to review movies. With the exception of talking about some election coverage I've never really gotten to TV or film, but curiously here is another book review. I haven't been reading enough. Years ago, while doing stock, I came to depend on reading as a stress management tool. Even mid install I would always have a book that I'd fall back to during breaks. It was a real welcome distraction. I could use more of that these days.

Being, as I have said before, from the Star Wars generation I think it makes perfect sense that I would be reading these books. So far to date I have read some ridiculous number of Star Wars books. There are so many of them that for a stretch it was difficult standing in the bookstore to remember which ones I had yet to read. I've read five prior publications of this author which I had really enjoyed. So much so that I think I've read at least another five non-Star Wars titles of his as well. He's a good writer.

Once again, Zahn is working with the Chiss and the mythology around Grand Admiral Thrawn. Thrawn was a great character and I think Zahn is bummer out that he had to kill him off in the first group of books he wrote. The second pair of books brought us a clone of Thrawn. This book doesn't go that far, but Thrawn is there in the background for the entire story as the events taking place are all fallout from a great battle years before, orchestrated by - it could only be - Thrawn.

The story is also nice because I think Zahn has a special attachment to Mara Jade. The Mara from before she was Mara Jade Skywalker, the Mara who worked for Talon Carrde. Since I really liked that character its nice to read a story where she's more like she was at the start.

The whole plot revolves around Luke and Mara going with a party of Chiss to the wreckage of "Outbound Flight" which was a deep space exploration mission launched just before the Clone Wars by the Jedi. They were looking for undiscovered civilizations and for possible colonization worlds. The legend went that soon after leaving Republic space they were obliterated by Thrawn. Luke is hoping as usual to pick up some piece of the Jedi's history.

Its a nice set up and worth reading for that if you're a fan. If you're not one of the indoctrinated though its a fairly average sci-fi story. A lot of it is derivative of "Universe Common Sense" written by Heinlein half a century ago. The story mechanism of a lost ship and its insulated culture is one that has been repeated many times. Zahn repeats it here somewhat to middling effect. It's not nearly as good as "Heir to the Empire" and its follow ups, or the "Conquerors" series of non Star Wars book he wrote after that.

Good enough for the fans though.