Star Wars: Return of the Jedi Junior Novel (Star Wars Junior Novel 3) by Ryder Windham

Star Wars: Return of the Jedi Junior Novel (Star Wars Junior Novel 3) by Ryder Windham
Buy Star Wars: Return of the Jedi Junior Novel (Star Wars Junior Novel 3) by Ryder Windham at Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com
Category: Confident Readers
Reviewer: John Lloyd
Summary: This volume in the series of reprinted YA adaptations brings the saga to what was once upon a time a close.
Buy? Yes	Borrow? Yes
Pages: 192	Date: May 2017
Publisher: Egmont
ISBN: 9781405285445
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We open here with the Rebellion in disarray, and our heroes separated. Obviously they need to rescue the ones imprisoned, liaise with the ones acting as secret agents, and get back to what they do best. For the Empire are doing the same – they are building another Death Star – a new, bigger, quicker one without a piddly little hole in it that just happens to allow the goodies the chance to destroy it at the first attempt. Oh, and our main hero, Luke, still has the matter of who he should count as a family member to settle… Yes, this is the third film made in the Star Wars universe, in a handy form for the eager junior novelisation reader.

These editions have been well served by a nice design – the three books definitely look a piece, with a star field and lightsaber, which varies each time, on the cover. Return of the Jedi comes with a lightsaber beam in Yoda green, in honour of Luke's first do-it-yourself one, and the pages have the same colour edging them, to make the whole piece look funky. But design is nothing if the writing isn't up to conveying the adventure of the film. And it does make a good fist of it – noticeably so, because it uses pretty much the entire dialogue from the script.

But it's where the non-dialogue that is concerned that we see both the pleasures and the perils of the YA format. The action above the Sarlacc pit is a great evocation of the drama, as all our heroes risk life and limb above the gulping mouth of the monster in the sand. But before then, in and around Jabba the Hutt's throne room, we don't get nearly enough description. We're supposed to be worried about a five-metre high lethal reptile, the rancor, but we have no idea what colour it is. Jabba is hardly described, either, and there's no mention of what, famously, Leia looked like in her slave garb – although perhaps I'm going too far, as this is a book for the under-twelves.

But… what we do get is the full-on action of the third act, and if anything the book is better than the film in this regard, relying as it doesn't on the tweeness of the Ewoks. George Lucas never seemed to realise he'd created a wonderful gang of underdogs, so felt the need to pepper his universe with alien stone-aged dwarvish critters with the cute factor and chutzpah, that people thought they hated until they met with Jar-Jar Binks. In this final third we're in top gear for the duration, and speeding through the action, and handling three distinct scenes – the battle on Endor, the dogfight above it, and Luke's personal one on the Death Star mark 2 – very well. In a way it epitomises the problems with the series – it's a lot easier to read these books if you've had the visuals from the cinema or TV, as there are very few clues on the page, but you do get some rip-snorting action courtesy of the originals, so they do, in the end, have to count as great fun.

I must thank the publishers for my review copy.

The series began here.

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You can read more book reviews or buy Star Wars: Return of the Jedi Junior Novel (Star Wars Junior Novel 3) by Ryder Windham at Amazon.com.

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