Dark Force Rising is the second book of Timothy Zahn's first Star Wars trilogy, and I have to say that I think he hit his stride here. Those who have read my review for Heir to the Empire will remember the criticisms I made about that book. It appears that he was able to fix many of those problems.
HTTE spent quite a bit of time, it seemed, reacquainting people with the movie characters. When I read that book, I feared that the rest of the series would be the same way. Instead, having now reacquainted the reader with these characters, he moves on with the story in full force.
I'd also noted that Mara Jade had a nice setup in the first book, with questions being raised about her character. Zahn continues to develop this character, showing us more of why she wants to kill Luke, but yet starting to move her out from beneath the Emperor's shadow as she is torn between following his last order and staying loyal to her new employer, Karrde.
Thrawn improves as a valid character in this book as well. In HTTE, Zahn spends much of his time establishing that Thrawn is different from Vader and the Emperor and that he is a genius. Again, I was afraid we were going to spend the entire trilogy listening to Pelleaon going on about this, but instead he decides to let Thrawn show through his actions and dialogue just how he's earned the rank of Grand Admiral. Yes, the New Republic people still go on about it, but that is natural for a group of people who have suffered that many defeats at his hands. This is also something else that they will have to fight within their own ranks: the belief that Thrawn is infallible.
For this book finally begins to show that he is fallible. I liked it that we not only saw him make mistakes, but how he was able to recognize them, admit them, and figure out how to turn them around so the Empire could profit after all. Even with that, by the end of the book, he still has not figured out just how close he'd actually been to Leia on Honoghr. This, in its own way, is the first sound of the knell of doom for Thrawn, since this means he has no clue about the Noghri's current mindset.
In my review of HTTE, I'd also commented on Borsk's play for Commander in Chief, noting his lack of command ability. I now understand how he was pursuing this, and loved watching it blow up in his face at the end. It's been awhile since I read The Last Command, so can't remember how this all plays out at the end, but I think it should be fun. 8)
One of the things that I wasn't too fond of was Luke on Jomark. Not the fact that he was there, but that he stayed as long as he did. His instincts were telling him a lot of things about this guy were wrong, and he never truly ignored them, but he should've put two and two together before then, fatigued or not. The things C'baoth said, the way he said them, the way he went about judging the people on Jomark, that would've had me seriously thinking Dark Side, but besides a few doubts and questions, Luke is clueless and decides to remain with C'baoth. To give him credit, I don't think he would've stayed there much longer, but I just thought he should've put things together much faster than he did.
I also was left wondering what happened to the rest of the Katana fleet. Karrde only spotted 15 of the ships there. He surmised that Thrawn beat them to the punch and got the rest of them, but I don't recall seeing any evidence from the Imperial side to support this. Thrawn wanted to be there in person to make sure they got the ships, and was not happy when C'baoth called him away. Killing off a few ships of the NR, regardless of the fact that Luke, Leia, and Han were there, doesn't explain his desire to be there personally. So where are the other ships? I hope The Last Command has the answer, but I don't recall this question ever really being answered.
I mentioned once that, after reading HTTE my first time, I was leery of picking up the next book, but if I had known how much better this book was going to be, I would have read it much sooner. This book answers a lot of questions while setting up the plot for the third book, making you want to read that one and find out how it all ends. The movie characters leave off nostalgia and get on with the plot, Zahn's characters continue to become interesting, and the story is fast-paced enough that it's hard to get bored.
Reviewed June 30, 2000 by Kelly M. Grosskreutz.
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