Star Wars Heir to the Empire Review - SW Force 4 Continuity

Heir to the Empire is the first in a 3 book trilogy that fired up the Star Wars franchise novels and expanded universe, the first novel since the Lando Calrissian trilogy.

This first book introduces thrilling new characters and challenges. The New Republic leadership is ripe with political backbiting. A new Imperial Warlord is uniting the remnants of the fleet and striking back successfully. And he has secrets of the Emperor and a dangerous new threat that could threaten Luke Skywalker, his friends and all they stand for.

The characters in the Heir to the Empire aka Thrawn trilogy are some of the most enduring of the Expanded Universe. It’s a can’t put down read that came out after a long hiatus and naturally it’s well loved. Mysterious species and unknown enemies this is a heart pounding adventure.

But the best thing is, that now if you get hooked you no longer need to wait a whole year until the next installment.

Grand Admiral Thrawn is a mysterious character, first of his species introduced in the Expanded Universe. He has a lot of Sherlock Holmes’s observational skills and expertise in figuring out people’s motivations. Captain Pellaeon is his ‘Watson’, learning a whole new way of doing things. This makes him a new deadly foe to the New Republic. His ruthlessness is cooler, more calculated. His long term manipulations and strategies are a deadly threat to a fledgling New Republic, where acrimony and division threatens to tear it apart politically before it’s foundations are set.

The New Republic, of course, has on it’s side a struggling Luke Skywalker. He has left the New Republic military to focus on his Jedi training, and helping his sister due the same. A mysterious rumor will have him chasing a potential new source of information: a Jedi Master who vanished before the Clone Wars.

Leia is settled down and married to Han Solo, heavily pregnant. She is juggling the Jedi training with serving the Republic on diplomatic missions as an Ambassador. Han is willing to back her up wherever needed. Lando has gone off on a new business venture.

Into the mix there is is a wild card. Quite literally, a ship called the Wild Karrde, and a Captain named Karrde. He has a mysterious associate named Mara Jade, who has an inexplicable hatred for Skywalker.

The heroes are tested as they haven’t been since the fall of the Emperor and Darth Vader in Heir to the Empire.

Ultimately, who truly is the Heir to the Empire? That’s is really what the story is all about. Can Grand Admiral Thrawn do what even the Emperor and Darth Vader couldn’t? Destroy the fragile Alliance that has destroyed the head of the Empire?

Heir to the Empire’s initial hardcover release was a hardcover at a special low price and wasn’t expected to sell well. It quickly sold out and the new stock was full price. Since then it has had an 40th anniversary edition with annotations by Timothy Zahn. It has since had a special ‘Legends’ edition cover that combined with the other two of the Thrawn trilogy to make a complete piece of art. It has received Essential Legends treatment as well. Heir to the Empire originally had an abridged audiobook on cassette, with Denis Lawson (who played Wedge Antillies) as narrator. It later received a full digital release read by Marc Thompson.