Phasma

3.25 stars

Mediocre, and I still don't get the point. Is it that the First Order has honor and should not do anything it takes to survive, or that training children to do anything to survive sows the seeds of discontent? Some decent battle scenes and an exotic locale save the book, but the main motivation is hard to discern. So much musing and not much conclusion. I would have to agree with Phasma that the others are weak.

I'd heard good things. I was excited. I love Star Wars, and I thoroughly enjoy the new characters. And I loved Ladycastle. But this book. This boooooooook. No, it was so hard to read. I don't care about Cardinal or Vi. She's trite. He's milquetoast. Soooo milquetoast, by way of the First Order. A First Order characters should not be milquetoast. Cardinal almost killed me.

This book has a terrible framework. A Resistance Spy gets captured by Captain Cardinal of the First Order, a man who trains the li'lest stormtroopers before they get big and go to Phasma for training. He's butthurt because she stole his thunder, basically, and he wants Vi to give him dirt on Phasma so he can take her down. So Vi tells the story of Phasma, and we basically get it THIRD HAND, because she gets it from someone who knew Phasma on her home planet Parnassos. Bad stuff went down on Parnassos. Phasma is conniving, cold, brutal, and will literally kill her own family to survive. And there's Brendol Hux, a jerk. And then there's a fight with Cardinal and Phasma, and it's lame, and lalalala stuff happens.

And once again, every time I read about Armitage Hux in anything, I feel like he's just a Villain, and there's no nuance. Fanfic writers handle him much better, and they can still make him do brutal things. And what the heck is with the asexual First Order, just kidnapping kids to make into stormtroopers. Where are the families and real people doing real things and having kids growing up into the First Order because they born into it, like Armitage Hux was? But he's the only one of the major characters who is? I dunno. The handling of the world is a little sophomoric here. The writing is beyond sophomoric. Which is sad, because Ladycastle is so awesome! It's adorable and clever! But maybe Ms Dawson was given ridiculous restrictions by people who don't write.

All in all, I was sorely disappointed in this book. I was bored by Cardinal, and I wanted more just...Phasma.

So far, all we've seen of Phasma was the enigmatic Storm Trooper Captain, in chrome armor, powering down the shields when forced to in The Force Awakens. We never even saw her face.

So in the novel, we learn Phasma's true origins. The story is told via a framework - a Resistance spy, Vi Moradi, is captured by Captain Cardinal, Phasma's chief rival within the First Order. He forces her to tell him all she knows about Phasma, which she does, because it's not info directly about The Resistance, and she's hoping to turn him to her side. Phasma's life began on a once thriving planet that had been decimated about 150 years before her birth by some force. (I don't want to reveal too many surprises, and this book is full of them!) One of her old tribemates told the entire story of Phasma's youth, rise to power in the tribe, and eventual escape from the planet to Moradi. It's a story of survival at all costs, and illustrates just how good Phasma is at it.

I rather hope we see Captain Cardinal in The Last Jedi, as he grew on me even as he was interrogating Moradi. He goes from loyal First Order soldier with a grudge against Phasma to a conflicted man who's beginning to see how much he's been brainwashed. It's intriguing to read. The revelation that The First Order rewards the ruthless while overlooking those who play by its own rules also breaks him a little bit.

I really enjoyed this book, and I will definitely be picking up Bloodline and Princess of Alderaan, because I can never get enough Leia. If you're not a Star Wars fan, I'd definitely take a pass on this book, because it won't really mean anything. But as a fan, it's a fascinating look at the beginnings of a villain.

You can find all my reviews at Goddess in the Stacks.

It's the beginnings of a good book. However, you spend most the novel waiting for the story to actually start and it never really does. Told well though, with a viewpoint via First Order interrogation that's perhaps more intriguing than Phasma's origin story.

I read this book with my kids, who are Star Wars fans. I loved The Force Awakens, but just to add my own perspective, I think the proliferation of Star Wars material is a bit overwhelming and unnecessary to enjoying the movies. In addition, most Star Wars bonus material I have read is not that well done. I wanted to read this book mainly for my kids' enjoyment, but I was excited to hear that Delilah S. Dawson was doing an entire novel. Delilah is inspiring as a writer and blogger, and gives wonderful advice on how to build a strong career. So I picked up Phasma and was blown away by the amazing prose in the opening pages. The author takes an entirely boring scenario and makes it crackle with tension. I had to read the rest.If you like anything Star Wars, you'll love this book. If you like science fiction and fantasy, and good writing, the best parts of this book will be the current-time conflict between Cardinal and Phasma, two rival stormtroopers in the First Order. Phasma's backstory is an interesting quest with a very well-developed culture, and a mystery that will be satisfying for fantasy readers. I think the best writing and the biggest tension happens toward the end of the book, and it's well worth getting through some slow “endless desert” passages. The last hundred pages of this book are filled with suspense, and I really had a good time reading it.Phasma is already a bestseller, so if this is the first book you've read by the author, I highly urge you to pick up her original material, which is much much better. For example she has a Weird Western series under her pen name Lila Bowen that I highly recommend, the latest chapter of which is [b:Malice of Crows 34019231 Malice of Crows (The Shadow, #3) Lila Bowen https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1485478044s/34019231.jpg 55016762].

Unfortunately, not as interesting as I'd hoped. I really enjoyed the last couple of chapters (I do think the character of Phasma has potential under the right circumstances, and I started to really enjoy The Cardinal as well), but the majority of it is just such a dud.