Star Wars, Episode IV - A New Hope [Mass Market Paperback]

George Lucas (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 12, 1986 | Series: Star Wars (Del Rey) (Book 4)

Luke Skywalker was a twenty-year-old who lived and worked on his uncle's farm on the remote planet of Tatooine...and he was bored beyond belief. He yearned for adventures that would take him beyond the farthest galaxies. But he got much more than he bargained for....

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"'I want to come with you to Alderaan,' Luke said, resolved. 'I want to become a Jedi like my father.'" This marks the start of Luke Skywalker's involvement with the Rebellion in George Lucas's grand narrative of good versus evil, Star Wars. You know the story, you've seen the film--but this chunky little book is a real gem. Star Wars fans of all ages will enjoy both the fine abridgment and Brandon McKinney's 146 two-color illustrations, drawn in classic comic book style. --C.B. Delaney --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

1998 Lucasfilm Ltd. STAR WARS , THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK , RETURN OF THE JEDI (TM) and THX and associated elements and logos are property of Lucasfilm Ltd. All content (e.g., clips, stills, designs, artwork, etc.) is protected by intellectual property laws and any use other than for private, non-commercial purposes is strictly prohibited.

STAR WARS 1977, 1998 Lucasfilm Ltd.; The Empire Strikes Back 1980, 1998 Lucasfilm Ltd.; Return of the Jedi 1983, 1998 Lucasfilm Ltd. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: LucasBooks (September 12, 1986)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0345341465
• ISBN-13: 978-0345341464
• Product Dimensions: 4.2 x 0.6 x 7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (39 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #113,579 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A great novelization, January 25, 2001

By 

Désirée Greverud (Stockholm, Sweden) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Star Wars, Episode IV - A New Hope (Mass Market Paperback)

First, let's dispense with the myth that Lucas wrote this himself. It was fully written by noted sci-fi/fantasy author Alan Dean Foster (who also wrote the novelizations for Alien, Aliens, Alien3, Krull, Black Hole, Alien Nation and although credited to Gene Roddenberry, he also wrote Star Trek The Motion Picture) Lucas was busy actually making the movie while ADF was writing this novel based on Lucas's working script. This accounts for some of the differences in the story.

ADF is a great writer, with a good voice and a great use of brevity to convey details. This is a quick read and a real treat for star wars fans. When this was first released it was called "Star Wars: From the adventures of Luke Skywalker" and was released before the movie even came out. ADF was already contracted to write a sequel since no one had any idea how the film would do, thus "Splinter of the Mind's Eye" makes a wonderful companion piece (the similar style between the two should be a dead giveaway that Foster wrote both).

This where it all began. If you want to read the SW books, make sure you start here.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Solid adaptation of a classic story, March 26, 2007

By 

Andrew Pruette "Rancors Love to Read" (U.S.) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Star Wars, Episode IV - A New Hope (Mass Market Paperback)

This novelization of the first Star Wars film is the alpha ancestor of the entire Star Wars universe. Published several months before the release of the film (which was simply titled "Star Wars" in 1977, picking up the "A New Hope" signifier in the 1979 theatrical re-release), the book was a success on a small scale but did not take off until the film became a phenomenon. George Lucas is credited with authoring this novel, but as he acknowledges in his introduction, the book was ghostwritten by Alan Dean Foster based on Lucas' screenplay. Foster went on to write two more Star Wars novels, Splinter of the Mind's Eye in the late 70's and The Approaching Storm in 2002.

Credit must be given to Foster for capturing a Star Wars "feel" in this novel without any preceding Star Wars material to work from and without knowledge of the scrutiny every scrap of Star Wars literature would eventually be subjected to. He follows the screenplay quite faithfully, and except for the inclusion of a sequence on Tatooine that was shot but cut from the film late in the editing process, his novel follows the film's sequence of scenes exactly. He does toy with the dialogue to an extent, re-writing lines throughout. To a modern-day Star Wars nut, this can sometimes be jarring, as everything about this story is so familiar. It's interesting in movie novelizations how the authors often change dialogue but nothing else: I like seeing a little more experimentation, such as that in Matthew Stover's superb novelization of Revenge of the Sith.

Foster is a descriptive writer and this story flows along briskly. One quirk that happens multiple times is he often uses comparisons rooted in our own mundane Earth to describe something, such as "like a dog padding on plastic," "like an Oriental poppy in a sea of oats, " and "like the damping rods in a nuclear reactor." Foster definitely had his work cut out for him in trying to describe such a visual universe before any visual media had been released to the public, but the dozen or so Earth allusions often shatter the otherworldly feel of the story.

As I mentioned earlier, the book contains a sequence set on Tatooine that did not make the final cut of the movie. It occurs early in the story with Luke observing the capture of the Tantive IV in orbit and rushing off to Anchorhead to tell his friends about the battle. When he arrives at Tosche Station, he has an unexpected joyful reunion with his old friend Biggs Darklighter. This segment with Biggs plants the seeds of sympathy toward the Rebellion in Luke's mind and also heightens the impact of Biggs' death during the Death Star attack at the end of the story.

The novelization of Episode IV is a serviceable rendition that does not add too much to the film. It would be interesting to see a new interpretation, either by Foster or another author, written in the modern day that could incorporate material from the prequels and the Expanded Universe material that has been released since 1977.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A fun read for Star Wars fans, July 13, 2011

By 

Tiger Holland (North Alabama) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Star Wars, Episode IV - A New Hope (Mass Market Paperback)

I was really interested in picking up this novelization that fleshes out George Lucas' original screenplay of A New Hope, because I wanted to hear more of the details behind this beloved story. Well, I got the details, and they're great but many of them don't line up with the original movies or with later stories. I'm not even sure if George Lucas considers this book to be 100% canon, but really the Star Wars literary franchise doesn't concerns itself too much with canon in general. "What happened" and "what did not happen" are rather fluid concepts.

The prologue informs us that, "The old Republic was the Republic of legend, greater than distance or time. No need to note where it was or whence it came, only to know that...it was the Republic." I begin to smile when I read this, because it's such a 1970's Science Fiction type of thing to say. These days, readers usually like a little more info, but in the 70's an author could handwave the details by saying that the Republic was big and that's all the facts we need to know. The prologue's writing style is a little archaic, going for a grandiose sound ("the Republic throve and grew"), and then it says that the Emperor was almost a puppet ruler while his underlings grabbed power for themselves and launched a reign of terror. That's not how I remember it from the movies, but hey, no big. A few oppressed planet systems decide to rise up, and a rebellion is born! Dum. DUM. Duh-da-duh-DUM!!!

It's actually pretty exciting to see the well-known lines from the film cushioned with exposition that explains the underlying emotions a little better. The narration provides some great insights about how the Star Wars universe was intended to be. When Darth Vader enters a Rebel ship, the book says, "fear followed the footsteps of all the Dark Lords". All of them. Apparently, there were originally meant to be many Sith lords, but later stories chopped the number down to just two. I like the idea of multiple Sith instead of just a master and an apprentice, but it's an idea that seems to have been shelved.

The insight into the characters is pretty neat. When we first meet Luke, he's a frustrated 20-year-old angrily working with some vapor-farm equipment. The book shows us more of why Tatooine's a place he'd want to get away from, and emphasizes how barren his environment is. Luke's not a special snowflake in his hometown--the young folks at Anchorhead think he's kind of nutty for dreaming of the far-away space rebellion. Seeing Luke being ridiculed by kids his own age makes it all the more stunning that in about a year he becomes someone that everybody in the galaxies takes seriously. He does whine, but at least he's relatable.

Princess Leia looks even more capable on the page than she did onscreen, because the reader gets to hear her thought processes and how she's always looking for a way to improve her situation. Even while imprisoned in a flowy white dress, she capably shows off her girl power. Though it's hard not to question her wisdom in sending an R2 unit containing vital information to Obi-Wan's planet, just expecting that he'd find the droid and help out with the rebellion. Some plot points sound more farfetched the more you examine them...

Han Solo is said to have "the openness of the utterly confident--or the insanely reckless". Sounds like our favorite anti-hero to me. He gets more lines in the book than in the movie, of course, but we don't particularly get more insight into his character because at this point in the story, we're not meant to. I don't think Han was ever meant to become as popular as he did.

Some quirky things: 1. Spelling. The book insists on spelling out R2D2 and C-3PO phonetically as Artoo Deetoo and See Threepio, and spells droids and 'droids, with an apostrophe in front of it. Jabba is a "Hut" with with the second letter T. 2. The discrepancies between the known prequel stories and the book are vast. In a small example, Obi-Wan keeps talking about Luke's Uncle Owen like Owen and Luke's dad Anakin were always locked in this big brotherly battle about whether it was better to go off into space or to stay at home and farm. But the prequels show that Anakin and Owen met each other like, once, and were adult stepbrothers with no real connection. 3. Biggs Darklighter (remember good ol'
Biggs? Few people do. He was supposed to have a bigger part in the movie, I believe) is a fairly big influence on Luke in this story.

Even though I makes quips and tease this story, I had a great time reading it. If you're a Star Wars fan and you don't mind the old-fashioned language of the novelization, it ought to be a real treat to read.