Agents of Chaos I: Hero's Trial

Absolutely brilliant.

My God, Luceno.

One of the best SW writers by far.

Luceno seems to be the master of writing very slow books that seem boring at first, before turning everything around in the latter part of the book and suddenly making everything seem incredibly well-planned and executed.

Han Solo is characterised possibly the greatest so far, and it's finally time he got his due.

After scarcely appearing in the last two books, it was time for Han to get a focus, and finally properly talk about the grief of Chewbacca. Luceno just did it right. So good.

Various references to Indiana Jones throughout, etc. “fortune and glory”, “it's not the years, it's the parsecs”, clearly Luceno has a deep love for Harrison Ford and the character of Han Solo, and it shows.

His grief is portrayed in a really compelling way that perfectly matches his character. He's closed and difficult, trying to relive old glories and getting himself in sticky situations he knows better than now. He takes it out on his own son, and he disappears from everyone's lives.

The redemption of Han is amazing. His relationship with Anakin is on point here, and I simply adore, and I will gush about how many things came round at the end.

Chewbacca's gift to Anakin being used to save Han's life in the Falcon is absolute poetry, and I simply just love so much how Han is the one to figure everything out and save everyone. The twist with Vergere completely shocked me, but my God, I am glad Mara is cured! Finally!

I loved how Han figured out that Elan and Vergere weren't truthful, asking about the ooglith masquer, and once hearing their response, he immediately knew they were lying. How fucking clever!

This book is all about Han really, so I'm not going to critique it for not doing much with the other characters, unlike the past two novels from Stackpole. I think this focus was well-deserved and about time now.

In all honesty, this novel handled emotion generally the best. I found myself tearing up as Anakin and Han talked at the end, and Luceno just really gets people, how they speak, how they interact, real grief and getting over it.

This novel takes you on a proper emotional journey and it is an extremely satisfying one too. Whilst it also harkens back to a rebellion era Han Solo as he begins to slip back into his old ways, both charming yet sad to see him fall so far, then satisfying to see him pick himself back up.

I love, however, that this is not it for Han. He still has a long way to go before being completely out of the dark, but he's almost there.

The only thing I'm not sure on is where the next book will go with Han and Droma.

But otherwise, this was a stunning novel. Another Luceno to blow me away.

Probably my favourite of the series so far!