Jedi Twilight (Star Wars: Coruscant Nights I) (Mass Market Paperback)

by Michael Reaves (Author)
Key Phrases: factory district, protocol droid, Star Wars Coruscant Nights, Michael Reaves, Jedi Twilight (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
With the dark ascension of the Empire, and the Jedi Knights virtually wiped out, one Jedi who escaped the massacre is slated for a date with destiny–and a confrontation with Darth Vader.

Jax Pavan is one of the few Jedi Knights who miraculously survived the slaughter that followed Palpatine’s ruthless Order 66. Now, deep in Coruscant’s Blackpit Slums, Jax ekes out a living as a private investigator, trying to help people in need while concealing his Jedi identity and staying one step ahead of the killers out for Jedi blood. And they’re not the only ones in search of the elusive Jax. Hard-boiled reporter Den Dhur and his buddy, the highly unorthodox droid I-5YQ, have shocking news to bring Jax–about the father he never knew.
But when Jax learns that his old Jedi Master has been killed, leaving behind the request that Jax finish a mission critical to the resistance, Jax has no choice but to emerge from hiding–and risk detection by Darth Vader–to fulfill his Master’s dying wish.

Don’t miss the continuing adventures in the Coruscant Nights series, coming this Fall!

About the Author
Michael Reaves received an Emmy Award for his work on the Batman television animated series. He has worked for DreamWorks, among other studios, and has written fantasy novels and supernatural thrillers. Reaves is the New York Times bestselling author of Star Wars: Darth Maul: Shadow Hunter, as well as the co-writer (with Steve Perry) of Star Wars: Death Star and two Star Wars: MedStar novels: Battle Surgeons and Jedi Healer. He lives in the Los Angeles area.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 368 pages
• Publisher: Del Rey (June 24, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0345477502
• ISBN-13: 978-0345477507
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (26 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #144,343 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Delightfull Return to the Gritty Streets of the Star Wars Universe, July 1, 2008

By	Nemonus (New Jersey, USA) - See all my reviews

I went into this book knowing that I was going to like it because of the characters. I'd been very eager to know the adventures of Lorn Pavan's son, greatcoat-wearing Jedi Knight Jax Pavan, and the further adventures of reporter Den Dhur, snarky droid 1-5, and especially Nick Rostu (originally of Matthew Stover's SW: Shatterpoint, he is one of the main characters here and quite faithful to the original). However, knowing that I was going to like it was not the same as being confidant that I would be able to praise its literary worth.

So I was pleasantly surprised when the prose proved to be deft and dense, sprinkled with Reaves' characterisic vocabulary words ("ecumenopolis", "reliquary"), most of which didn't appear in my Elementary Edition Webster's. Reaves' writing can be either flippant and funny or serious and musing. Sometimes I laughed (or at least sort of snorted) out loud. There were also quite a few sections which boardered on the existential, and some interestingly metafictional passages about humans as the diminant species of the SW galaxy.

There are none of Death Star's half-memorable characters here (although there is another Twi'lek girl, a scarred Jedi of an obscure sect, who at the half-mark could do with some more characterization and screen time in general). The plot moves fast in a similar manner as in Death Maul: Shadowhunter.

It's not perfect: there are some long pasasges without action and some irritating Star Wars-y substitutes for metaphors (ex. "carried like a sack of potatoes" becomes "carried like a pack of Zelosian Moorfruits"), which, in excess, can be too vague, I mean, I know a lot about Star Wars, but I don't know what some of these things they're referencing are. One character, Laranth, got less screen time than she needed to be fully realized, not even contributing to a discussion where everyone else pipes up. I begin to fear that she is the requisite Twi'lek woman of the book.


I already think that this one will deserve an immediate reread, for the thought-provoking parts and for the joyous reunions with Nick and 1-5. It is a book that wonderfully captures the feel of Star Wars, and makes me feel really comfortable in that universe again and to long for it like I haven't since Legacy of the Force came out.

It is an almost needless caveat to say that I loved that Jedi Twlight came out in paperback, so that it was relatively non-bank-breaking for me to buy it. Good on ya, Lucasbooks. You're dead set on parting us fans from our money, but you're giving us some vaping good reading material in return.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Adventurous romp set in the early Dark Times, August 1, 2008

By	Andrew Pruette "Rancors Love to Read" (Winston-Salem, NC USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The aptly-named Jedi Twilight, the first book of the Coruscant Nights trilogy by Michael Reaves, is an adventurous, fast-paced romp of a tale that skillfully weaves in many characters and story elements of the larger Expanded Universe. The setting is the largely untapped Dark Times, the eighteen years between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope. The Jedi have been decimated by the infamous Order 66, Emperor Palpatine is consolidating his grasp on the galaxy and building his new Empire, and Darth Vader is growing comfortable in his position at his master's side.

Reaves brings a very intriguing cast of characters to this story. Referencing his own earlier works, the main character is Jax Pavan, son of Lorn Pavan who had the limelight in Darth Maul: Shadow Hunter. Happily, Lorn's sarcastic and self-aware droid sidekick I-5YQ returns, bringing along his closest friend, Sullustan reporter Den Dhur. Den was first featured in another Reaves work, the Medstar duology, as was rising Black Sun vigo Kaird, also returning here. More surprisingly, Reaves also grabs Prince Xizor of Steve Perry's Shadows of the Empire fame and tosses in Nick Rostu from the superb Shatterpoint by Matthew Stover. It's definitely an interesting brew of characters.

The storyline primarily focuses on weaving relationships between these disparate people, using a chase for a missing protocol droid named 10-4TO as its focal point. Reaves deftly depicts the grittiness and peril of the less desirable reaches of Coruscant, creating a vaguely film noir atmosphere with what really is a detective story at its core. The inclusion of Prince Xizor and the insights into his ascension up Black Sun's ladder are particularly compelling reading. The sections featuring Vader are brief, and some of his dialogue doesn't seem quite right tonally. Arguably, since this is so early into Anakin's career as Vader, he may indeed have spoken differently from the familiar dialogue we heard in the Original Trilogy. His actions, however, are very much in keeping with his characterization from the films.

Events weave into a gripping climax set in Coruscant's downtrodden Factory District. There is an illuminating foreshadowing of Xizor's humaniform creation Guri in his hidden facility, and Reaves brings an extremely entertaining new concept to the Star Wars universe in the form of feral droids. These regressed droids are the result of programming gone haywire and act as a thematic counterpoint to the heightened self-awareness of I-5.

Jedi Twilight is a fun, entertaining kickoff to a promising trilogy. Reaves does a good job with managing an unusual cast and setting up future books while simultaneously creating a reasonably self-contained story. The book doesn't end with a particular cliffhanger, but through its strong character focus it creates excitement for the second volume in the series, Street of Shadows.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Coruscant Confidential? Not., July 27, 2008

By	Michael Lichter (Buffalo, NY USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

As should be evident from the cover artwork, JEDI TWILIGHT is being marketed as a hardboiled detective story, with former Jedi Jax Pavan as a sort of latter-day Philip Marlowe. The prototypical hardboiled detective is a man who, although a good egg (yep) and a smart guy, has been toughened up by encounters with corrupt institutions (like the police and politicians) on one hand, and the seedy underbelly of society, on the other hand. He is a flawed hero whose past fall from grace both limits and drives him. A Jedi like Pavan, who was a respected knight before the overthrow of the Republic, and who is now forced to live in the margins of society, might plausibly make a hardboiled detective.

But he's not; he's too young, he's not really a detective, there's nary a femme fatale in sight, and, in any event, this novel is not really his story--rather, it is a story Pavan shares in equal measure with an underworld assassin, an aide to Darth Vader, and an ex-reporter and his droid companion. Aside from reveling in the seediness and decay of the lower levels of Coruscant -- you didn't think that the glitz at the top of the skyscrapers was all there was to the capital planet, did you? -- this isn't much like a hardboiled detective story, either. On the surface there are some resemblances to THE MALTESE FALCON, with an elusive droid playing the part of the MacGuffin (an object whose main purpose is to drive the plot), but that's just on the surface. Like THE MALTESE FALCON, there are many subplots going on, but, alas, unlike in the MALTESE FALCON, none of them are very interesting. At the core, this is a Star Wars novel that serves as a vehicle for Star Warsy characters to do Star Warsy things like tricking a battle droid into colliding with a repulsor field in order to give a Jedi a chance to ram his light saber into something-or-other and make the droid explode.

One of the book's strong points is its exploration of the underside of life on Coruscant. In Reeves' reading, Coruscant is like a cross between Asimov's Trantor (from the Foundation Trilogy -- that's something to read before you pick up this book!), Ridley Scott's Los Angeles (from "Blade Runner"), and the stereotypical inner city you see on TV cop shows every day. It's a neglected world of 24-hour (26-hour?) twilight, where a Hutt and his gang or a horde of schizoid droids might be hiding around any given corner.

Another point of interest is the Reeves' treatment of droids. We know that Obi-Wan famously said "If droids could think, there'd be none of us here, would there?" in "Attack of the Clones," and I'm still not sure whether this was intended to show that Obi-Wan had a blind spot or was meant as a Lucasfilm policy statement on the issue of droid sentience. In any event, we are given every reason to think of R2D2 and C3PO as sentient beings. If they are sentient beings and they are owned by others, then they are slaves and the citizens of the Republic are slaveholders. Lucas et al. don't want to touch this, because they want droids to be both controllable pets and smart beings capable of independent thought. Reeves suggests that it is only rare droids that, like his I-5YQ, have somehow achieved self-awareness, but even the disposable, centrally controlled foot-soldier battledroids seem to have some self-awareness ("Uh-oh!"). I don't find I-5YQ particularly interesting as a character, but it will still be interesting to see how the Star Wars powers that be allow Reeves to develop the character and what he is allowed to say about droids in general.

In sum, while marketed as stylish sci-fi noir, this novel is pretty standard Star Wars fare. It's not great and it's not terrible, and if you're at the airport and need something to help pass the time, you could do worse.