Tag: Sci-fi

AZURA GHOST – Essa Hansen

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Caiden has been on the run for ten years in order to keep his Graven ship out of the hands of his old adversary, Threi. But when a childhood friend he once thought dead reappears to take it, he is lured into a game of hunter and hunted with the one person whose powers rival Threi’s; his sister, Abriss.

Now to have a fighting chance against the most influential siblings in the multiverse, Caiden is left with no choice. He must unlock the Azura’s true potential—which means finally confronting his own mysterious genetic origins.
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STAR WARS: PATH OF VENGEANCE

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Marda and Yana belong to the Path of the Open Hand, a group led by a charismatic woman called the Mother, which believes the Force must not be used by anyone. While Marda joins a perilous expedition to Planet X in search of more mysterious creatures to use against the Jedi, Yana finds herself forming an unexpected alliance with the father of her dead lover in attempt to wrest the Path from the Mother’s control. These two young women will face a crossroads, forced to choose not only their own fates, but that of the galaxy itself.

So this is kind of it, the last full length novel in Phase Two of The High Republic. There’s still a handful of issues of the different comics to come, THE EDGE OF BALANCE: PRECEDENT (the manga, which I feel like I’ve been waiting my whole life for!) is out in like a week, and there’s also the upcoming YA short story collection.

But as far as any full length novels of any type, Cavan Scott has the last word with PATH OF VENGEANCE. I loved this one a whole lot, and I’ll obviously get into the reasons why. I definitely couldn’t help but feel like I had a slight hangover from the outright masterpiece that was CATACLYSM.

Additionally (and this one is on me, because I knew what I was getting into), I do kinda wish I had waited until the Marvel comic was finished before reading PATH OF VENGEANCE. As I’m writing this, I think there’s just one or two issues left, but PATH OF VENGEANCE is set after the events of the Marvel comic. And so while the trade-off for me was outstanding (having Matty, my fav character from the comic being one of the main characters in PATH OF VENGEANCE), it did feel a little odd/spoilery jumping ahead in time like this, before actually reading the conclusion of the comic.

BUT ANYWAY!

The heart of this story was always going to be the relationship between Yana and Marda Ro. And while there are of course big moments in this book that were set up in other books/formats, this aspect of the story really picks up where PATH OF DECEIT left off.

There’s this sort of relentless push & pull, a wavering of loyalties where Yana and Marda are concerned. As The Mother has gotten more & more…let’s say unhinged, things just feel super tumultuous within The Path of the Open Hand. There’s a lot of anger & grief & resentment & feelings of helplessness boiling inside Yana, and it all comes to a head in some really emotional ways.

All roads lead to Dalna, and as I mentioned, it’s characters from the Marvel comic leading the way here. Matty Cathley has been far & away my favorite new Jedi from the comics, so for her to get main character status in this book meant the world to me. She’s just such a vibrant character, kind of the best of the Jedi, while also being a bit of an awkward & relatable mess. I loved getting a deeper look at her character, something the comics don’t necessarily allow for.

Same goes for Oliviah Zeveron, another fav of mine from the comic. Oliviah & Matty team up in PATH OF VENGEANCE, and it felt like we really got to know them both so much better. There’s almost a standoffishness to Oliviah that gets explored, something that’s not really even hinted at in the comic. Comic readers will know that Oliviah is Going Through Some Shit, and it just felt right having Matty along for the kind of chaotic & upbeat support she provides.

I started this review quite awhile ago & in the meantime, have been hit with some profoundly awful news & so this really isn’t coming together the way I’d hoped. All that said, this is of course essential High Republic reading & a really incredible way to close out (for the most part) the second phase of this epic Star Wars publishing initiative.

New we wait for Phase Three news/cover reveals and I am READY!

May the Force be with you!!

STAR WARS: CATACLYSM

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After five years of conflict, the planets Eiram and E’ronoh are on the cusp of real peace. But when news breaks of a disaster at the treaty signing on Jedha, violence reignites on the beleaguered worlds. Together, the royal heirs of both planets—Phan-tu Zenn and Xiri A’lbaran—working alongside the Jedi, have uncovered evidence that the conflict is being orchestrated by outside forces, and all signs point to the mysterious Path of the Open Hand, whom the Jedi also suspect of causing the disaster on Jedha.

With time—and answers—in short supply, the Jedi must divide their focus between helping quell the renewed violence on Eiram and E’ronoh and investigating the Path. Among them is Gella Nattai, who turns to the one person she believes can unravel the mystery but the last person she wants to trust: Axel Greylark. The chancellor’s son, imprisoned for his crimes, has always sought to unburden himself of the weight of his family name. Will he reconcile with the Jedi and aid in their quest for justice and peace, or embrace the Path’s promise of true freedom?

As all roads lead to Dalna, Gella and her allies prepare to take on a foe unlike any they’ve ever faced. And it will take all of their trust in the Force, and in one another, to survive.
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INFINITY GATE – M. R. Carey

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The Pandominion: a political and trading alliance of a million worlds. Except that they’re really just one world, Earth, in many different realities. And when an A.I. threat arises that could destroy everything the Pandominion has built, they’ll eradicate it by whatever means necessary.

Scientist Hadiz Tambuwal is looking for a solution to her own Earth’s environmental collapse when she stumbles across the secret of inter-dimensional travel, a secret that could save everyone on her dying planet. It leads her into the middle of a war on a scale she never dreamed of. And she needs to choose a side before every reality pays the price.
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THE STRANGE – Nathan Ballingrud

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Since Anabelle’s mother left for Earth to care for her own ailing mother, her days in New Galveston have been spent at school and her nights at her laconic father’s diner with Watson, the family Kitchen Engine and dishwasher as her only companion. When the Silence came, and communication and shipments from Earth to its colonies on Mars stopped, life seemed stuck in foreboding stasis until the night Silas Mundt and his gang attacked.

At once evoking the dreams of an America explored in Ray Bradbury’s The Martian Chronicles and the harder realities of frontier life in Charles Portis True Grit, Ballingrud’s novel is haunting in its evocation of Anabelle’s quest for revenge amidst a spent and angry world accompanied by a domestic Engine, a drunken space pilot, and the toughest woman on Mars.
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STAR WARS: JEDI: BATTLE SCARS – Sam Maggs

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Cal Kestis has built a new life for himself with the crew of the Stinger Mantis. Together, Cal’s crew has brought down bounty hunters, defeated Inquisitors, and even evaded Darth Vader himself. More important, Merrin, Cere, Greez, and faithful droid BD-1 are the closest thing Cal has had to a family since the fall of the Jedi Order. Even as the galaxy’s future grows more uncertain by the day, with each blow struck against the Empire the Mantis crew grows more daring.

On what should be a routine mission, they meet a stormtrooper determined to chart her own course with the help of Cal and the crew. In exchange for help starting a new life, the Imperial deserter brings word of a powerful, potentially invaluable tool for their fight against the Empire. And even better, she can help them get to it. The only catch—pursuing it will bring them into the path of one of the Empire’s most dangerous servants, the Inquisitor known as the Fifth Brother.

Can the Imperial deserter truly be trusted? And while Cal and his friends have survived run-ins with the Inquisitors before, how many times can they evade the Empire before their luck runs out?
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SOME DESPERATE GLORY – Emily Tesh

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Since she was born, Kyr has trained for the day she can avenge the murder of planet Earth. Raised in the bowels of Gaea Station alongside the last scraps of humanity, she readies herself to face the Wisdom, the powerful, reality-shaping weapon that gave the majoda their victory over humanity.

They are what’s left. They are what must survive. Kyr is one of the best warriors of her generation, the sword of a dead planet. When Command assigns her brother to certain death and relegates her to Nursery to bear sons until she dies trying, she knows she must take humanity’s revenge into her own hands.

Alongside her brother’s brilliant but seditious friend and a lonely, captive alien, Kyr escapes from everything she’s known into a universe far more complicated than she was taught and far more wondrous than she could have imagined.
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STAR WARS: CHAOS RISING

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Beyond the edge of the galaxy lies the Unknown Regions: chaotic, uncharted, and near impassable, with hidden secrets and dangers in equal measure. And nestled within its swirling chaos is the Ascendancy, home to the enigmatic Chiss and the Nine Ruling Families that lead them.

The peace of the Ascendancy, a beacon of calm and stability, is shattered after a daring attack on the Chiss capital that leaves no trace of the enemy. Baffled, the Ascendancy dispatches one of its brightest young military officers to root out the unseen assailants. A recruit born of no title, but adopted into the powerful family of the Mitth and given the name Thrawn.

With the might of the Expansionary Fleet at his back, and the aid of his comrade Admiral Ar’alani, answers begin to fall into place. But as Thrawn’s first command probes deeper into the vast stretch of space his people call the Chaos, he realizes that the mission he has been given is not what it seems.

And the threat to the Ascendancy is only just beginning.
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YMIR – Rich Larson

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Yorick never wanted to see his homeworld again. He left Ymir two decades ago, with half his face blown off and no love lost for the place. But when his employer’s mines are threatened by a vicious alien machine, Yorick is shipped back home to hunt it.

All he wants is to do his job and get out. Instead, Yorick is pulled into a revolution brewing beneath Ymir’s frozen surface, led by the very last person he wanted to see again—the brother who sent him off in pieces twenty years ago..
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STAR WARS: CONVERGENCE – Zoraida Córdova

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It is an age of exploration. Jedi travel the galaxy, expanding their understanding of the Force and all the worlds and beings connected by it. Meanwhile, the Republic, led by its two chancellors, works to unite worlds in an ever-growing community among near and distant stars.

On the close-orbiting planets of Eiram and E’ronoh, the growing pains of a galaxy with limited resources but unlimited ambition are felt keenly. The two worlds’ hatred for each other has fueled half a decade of escalating conflict and now threatens to consume surrounding systems. The last hope for peace emerges when heirs from the planets’ royal families plan to marry.

Before lasting peace can be established, an assassination attempt targeting the couple tilts Eiram and E’ronoh back into all-out war. To save both worlds, Jedi Knight Gella Nattai volunteers to uncover the culprit, while Chancellor Kyong appoints her own son, Axel Greylark, to represent the Republic’s interests in the investigation.

But Axel’s deep distrust of the Jedi sparks against Gella’s faith in the Force. She’s never met such a puffed-up, privileged party boy, and he’s never met a more self-serious, relentless do-gooder. The harder they work to untangle the shadowy web of the investigation, the more complicated the conspiracy appears to be. With accusations flying and potential enemies in every shadow, the pair will have to work together to have any hope of bringing the truth to light and saving both worlds.
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