With the new show coming out in the near future, I thought it would be nice to read the book directly named after the character I think is probably one of the best from the Star Wars prequels. I’ve been reading a lot of Star Wars books lately and most of the audio books I’ve listened to lately have dealt more with characters unfamiliar to me, so I thought it would be a good change of pace to read something with someone familiar.

This story revolves around Obi-Wan- now turned hermit- struggling to come to terms with the past and adjust to the present. Having been turned away from the Lars family- deeming it unsafe to be too close to the family- he resigns himself to a new part of the deserts of Tatooine where he meets a new assortment of characters. He unassumingly runs into trouble forming in the new group and is faced with revealing his identity or allowing his new found friends to fall into the wrong hands.

This book was not what I expected. For a good maybe 50 pages, I was waiting for the book to put me into the head of the Jedi master but it was evident pretty soon thereafter that we were going to follow him from other characters perspectives- with a smattering of his thoughts placed at the end of each chapter as he meditated on that days events. At first, I wasn’t sure how it would work, but eventually I realized that I started caring about what happened to these new characters just as much as I cared about what happened to Obi-wan. The hard part about this book is knowing that there isn’t much space to do more with the character because we all know where he ends up. I thought that was the only thing weighing things down but overall the experience and the character of obi-wan was well written. He was snarky and sarcastic and had the same feel of the character we got to know in the films. so overall, I highly recommend reading this book. Maybe some elements of this book will go into the show? I really hope so because I really like the character of Anileen. I don’t think they will make the show anything like the book but one can hope and that’s what all these stories about right?

*Spoilers*

So in the book, we follow the perspectives of Tusken, Anileen a store owner, and Orrin a moisture farmer who is also in charge of a collective protection service overlooking other farmers around the oasis. When the book started I was surprised to be following these characters, I thought maybe they were extra’s we would get around with and we were just learning about their backstory. but no, Obi-Wan became a mystery man from the desert. that ended up working out though, in the favor of the story, because we got to know the characters we followed and we got to see Obi-Wan through the eyes of others. I think we got to learn things from the perspective of someone who doesn’t know about the force and the ways of a Jedi. I thought at one point there was going to be some kind of romance between him and Anileen. I kind of wish it did happen but, of course, duty came before anything else.

One thing I thought was really cool and would love to see on the big screen or tv screen is His fight with the Krayt dragon! the way it was written made it seem like some epic battle. plus I think it was the first time we get a description of what one looks like alive. Now we have the mandolorian version of a Krayt dragon which was somewhat reminiscent of the giant worms from Dune. I wonder if George Lucas’ Tatooine was inspired by Dunes Arakis.

I liked the way the book flipped the “bad guys” from being the Tuskens to being Orrin. I just knew he was too pushy and sketchy in the beginning. I just knew he was too good to be true plus I think my mistrust of him all started about the same time he set out the whole protection agency out on the tuskens. Turns out he was using the tuskens to get money from the agency to pay off the Hutts and to do that, he dressed up as Tuskens. I did not see that coming. it turns out the Tuskens had a bit more honor than that guy.

Anyways the book was pretty good. I’m not sure what I was expecting but what I got lived up to my expectations. even though I wanted a happy ending I think the ending we got was the ending that was closest to it. Merry Christmas everyone! hope you all have a good time with family and friends. God bless!