Revelation is the penultimate chapter in the Legacy of the Force series, and it’s been a whirlwind, to be sure.

This book finds Darth Caedus (formerly Jacen Solo) has taken a plunge even deeper into the Dark Side and coming to terms with his status as a Dark Lord of the Sith and revealing himself to the galaxy, slowly throughout the book. Luke Skywalker and the entire order of the Jedi have gone into hiding, desperately searching for a plan that would unseat Jacen as the co-Chief of State of the Republic. Luke’s son, Ben, has taken it upon himself to further investigate the murder of his mother, Mara Jade, to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that she was indeed killed by Jacen’s hand.

My favorite story line in the book, by far and away, is Jaina Solo’s. Jaina, as the prophesied ‘Sword of the Jedi’, has taken it upon herself to kill her twin brother and in order to do that, she arrives to the conclusion that she needs training she doesn’t have. Where does that take her? Mandalore, and in to the murderous influence of Boba Fett. She asks Fett (whose own daughter was killed by Jacen’s hand) to give her the skills she needs to assassinate her brother.

This was Karen Traviss’ final novel in the cycle, and I certainly think it’s been worth her effort. Aside from a short story or two about Boba Fett and, perhaps Shadows of the Empire (maybe), I don’t recall reading much about Boba Fett and she forged him into one of the coolest characters in the Expanded Universe. I mean, let’s be honest, Boba Fett is cool, but he was only in half the movies and we didn’t get to know him very well. Traviss was able to suffuse our memory of a quiet Boba Fett with the reality of a bad-ass Jango Fett to give us this portrait of an aging bounty hunter, a simple man trying to make his way through the universe. Her treatment of Fett in these novels has made me fall in love with the idea of this character all over again, and watching him train Jaina to kill Jacen was one of the single most satisfying things I’ve read in this entire series.

Traviss once more elicited most eyes from me in a couple of scenes, most notably, the one where Ben Skywalker lays out his body of evidence against Jacen to the entire Solo and Skywalker family. It had the same tone, timbre and emotional resonance for me as that moment in Revenge of the Sith where Obi-wan confesses to Padme that he’s seen a security hologram of Anakin killing younglings. And that might not mean much to you, but no matter how many times I see it, that scene tears my heart out of my chest and kicks it into a trash can.

This book is obviously meant to put situations in motion to be paid off in the final book in this cycle, and it worked quite effectively. I’m already deep into book 9. (In fact, by the time you read this, I’ll be reading the second book of the next series.)

And so, it is with my fullest endorsement that I suggest to you that you start with the first book in this series and work your way here. It may take you a little longer than it’s taken me (hell, it might take less time) but it’s well worth the effort.

To purchase Revelation on Amazon, click here.

Other reviews in this series:
Betrayal
Bloodlines
Tempest
Exile
Sacrifice
Inferno
Fury