Title: Star Wars – A New Dawn
Author: John Jackson Miller
Series: Technically not?
About this Book: Ever since the Jedi were marked for death and forced to flee Coruscant, Kanan Jarrus has devoted himself to staying alive rather than serving the Force. Wandering the galaxy alone, from one anonymous job to another, he avoids trouble–especially with the Empire–at all costs. So when he discovers a deadly conflict brewing between ruthless Imperial forces and desperate revolutionaries, he’s not about to get caught in the crossfire. Then the brutal death of a friend at the Empire’s hands forces the ex-Jedi to make a choice: bow down to fear, or stand up and fight.

But Jarrus won’t be fighting alone. Unlikely allies, including a bomb-throwing radical, a former Imperial surveillance agent, a vengeful security officer, and the mysterious Hera Syndulla–an agent provocateur with motives of her own–team up with Jarrus to challenge the Empire. As a crisis of apocalyptic proportions unfolds on the planet Gorse, they must stand together against one of the Emperor’s most fearsome enforcers–for the sake of a world and its people.

The Jedi had always preached against forming connections, to prevent their acolytes from putting too much value in any one relationship. In so doing, they had unwittingly trained their students to be the perfect fugitives, able to cut and run at any moment. As long as they didn’t stop to care, they could go on indefinitely

My Thoughts:

Did you think Hera and Kanan in Rebels were a little bit angsty and tragic? Well do I have a book for you. You want pain? Post-66 Kanan Jarrus who feels like there’s no hope in the universe. Yeah. It’s a lot. But it’s also so wonderfully written that you’ll cry, but maybe feel good about it a little.

It’s important to note that I had watched all of Star Wars: Clone Wars, Star Wars: Rebels and Star Wars: The Bad Batch prior to reading this book so I am familiar with who Kanan Jarrus was when he was Caleb Dume, and what happened to him during order 66, and what he saw happen during order 66.

It is because of that background that I feel I had a good understanding and empathetic reaction to Kanan, and his pain in the ass attitude during this book to be honest. He thinks he’s doing his best, surviving but not so much living when Hera Syndulla is introduced and basically tries to light a fire under his ass.

He makes the ultimate mistake of using the force in this book, and is going to run, when Hera arrives and tries to convince him that he should stay and help.

Count Vidian is a sinister villain, but not without his cartoonish ways, which are common in Star Wars more often than not. However, it didn’t stop me from feeling a great deal of anger and disgust toward his character. As always, his character has ulterior motives, which a good portion of the Imperials seem to have.

It’s been mentioned before, but the decision to not have Chopper in this novel is an interesting one, though the body count most certainly would’ve been a lot higher if he had been.

This book is a quick read and a good look into the beginning of the Ghost crew, making me want more of them. It is classified as YA, I believe, which doesn’t bother me at all, but it does cause the grit I have come to appreciate in Star Wars novels to be a little less.