Author James Luceno returns to the prequel biz with Star Wars: Labyrinth of Evil, a novel sure to be required reading for die-hard fans of George Lucas's galaxy far, far away. Written with Lucas's blessing, Luceno's tale leads right to the opening sequence of Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, setting the stage for the fiery conclusion of the Clone Wars and the rise of the Empire.

As the action begins, the Republic and Jedi have seemingly pushed the Separatists and Sith back into the outer reaches of the galaxy thanks to the clone army deployed in Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones. But as victory seems near, the ruthless General Grievous--think Darth Vader on steroids--emerges from the shadows. In the battle against Grievous, Anakin Skywalker--who is a little Vader-ish too these days--and Obi Wan Kenobi find themselves in a race to discover the identity of the Sith Lord Darth Sidious and unravel the web of duplicity surrounding the Separatist uprising.

While essential for obsessive fans, Labyrinth of Evil is a clunky novel and Luceno struggles with Lucas's ungainly and Byzantine plotting. Full of cumbersome, Star Wars technophillia, the novel merely serves its purpose by fleshing out the thin line between Episodes II and III. True believers will revel in the level of technical detail and tantalizing nuggets of trivia while the less zealous could satisfy their Star Wars cravings by checking out Timothy Zahn's masterful post-Episode VI works. --Jeremy Pugh


From Publishers Weekly
Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker, now a Jedi Knight, pursue old enemy Viceroy Gunray, who has been oppressing the intelligent beetles on the planet Cato Neimoidia, in bestseller Luceno's jaunty contribution to the Star Wars franchise. As the pair venture deep into interstellar space, to some well-drawn if unappetizing worlds, they also cross paths with Separatist leaders Count Dooku, Darth Sidious and General Grievous. Meanwhile, intrigues simmer back on the home planet Coruscant, and doubts grow about the loyalties of the Jedi Knights. The action builds smoothly to the climactic attack by the Separatists under General Grievous on Coruscant, where Anakin's wife, Senator Amidala, finds herself in mortal peril. While the author does a good job of maintaining excitement without revealing any secrets of the forthcoming final Star Wars movie, this tie-in, unlike some other Star Wars novels, has no features to give it interest apart from its link to the popular film series. Agent, Eleanor Wood at Spectrum Literary Agency. (On sale Jan. 25)Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.


From Booklist
The newest prequel novel to the Star Wars movie Revenge of the Sith should be the last before the movie's May release. In it, Anakin Skywalker is a full Jedi knight, fighting side-by-side with Obi-Wan Kenobi, his mentor. The Jedi knights attempt to capture Nute Gunray, a key separatist, in a battle on Cato Neimoidia. Gunray escapes but accidentally leaves behind a mechno-chair that he used to communicate with the evil separatist leader, Darth Sidious. The Jedi take the chair, hoping it can lead them to Sidious and end this conflict with the separatists once and for all. In the heart of the republic, Padme Amadala, Bail Organa, and several other senators are hoping to convince Supreme Chancellor Palpatine to cede some of the power he was given when the conflict began. As the final confrontation looms, the separatists make a bold strike at the heart of the republic--Coruscant. Star Wars fans won't want to miss this superior tale, which ends right where Revenge of the Sith will pick up. Kristine Huntley
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


From the Inside Flap
The war that erupted in Star Wars: Episode II Attack of the Clones is nearing its boiling point, as the dauntless Separatist forces continue their assault on the teetering Republic–and the diabolical triumvirate of Count Dooku, General Grievous, and their Master, Darth Sidious, fine-tune their strategy for conquest. In Episode III Revenge of the Sith the fates of key players on both sides of the conflict will be sealed. But first, crucial events that pave the way to that time of reckoning unfold in a labyrinth of evil. . . .

Capturing Trade Federation Viceroy–and Separatist Councilmember–Nute Gunray is the mission that brings Jedi Knights Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker, with a squad of clones in tow, to Neimoidia. But the treacherous ally of the Sith proves as slippery as ever, evading his Jedi pursuers even as they narrowly avoid deadly disaster. Still, their daring efforts yield an unexpected prize: a unique holotransceiver that bears intelligence capable of leading the Republic forces to their ultimate quarry, the ever-elusive Darth Sidious.

Swiftly taking up the chase, Anakin and Obi-Wan follow clues from the droid factories of Charros IV to the far-flung worlds of the Outer Rim . . . every step bringing them closer to pinpointing the location of the Sith Lord–whom they suspect has been manipulating every aspect of the Separatist rebellion. Yet somehow, in the escalating galaxy-wide chess game of strikes, counterstrikes, ambushes, sabotage, and retaliations, Sidious stays constantly one move ahead.

Then the trail takes a shocking turn. For Sidious and his minions have set in motion a ruthlessly orchestrated campaign to divide and overwhelm the Jedi forces–and bring the Republic to its knees.


About the Author
JAMES LUCENO is The New York Times bestselling author of the Star Wars: The New Jedi Order novels Agents of Chaos: Hero’s Trial, Agents of Chaos: Jedi Eclipse, and The Unifying Force, as well as Star Wars: Cloak of Deception, and the eBook Darth Maul: Saboteur. He also co-authored the popular ROBOTECH series with his close friend the late Brian Daley. Luceno wrote the film adaptations for The Shadow and The Mask of Zorro. He lives in Annapolis, Maryland, with his wife and youngest child.


Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
1

Darkness was encroaching on Cato Neimoidia’s western hemisphere, though exchanges of coherent light high above the beleaguered world ripped looming night to shreds. Well under the fractured sky, in an orchard of manax trees that studded the lower ramparts of Viceroy Gunray’s majestic redoubt, companies of clone troopers and battle droids were slaughtering one another with bloodless precision.

A flashing fan of blue energy lit the undersides of a cluster of trees: the lightsaber of Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Attacked by two sentry droids, Obi-Wan stood his ground, twisting his upraised blade right and left to swat blaster bolts back at his enemies. Caught midsection by their own salvos, both droids came apart, with a scattering of alloy limbs.

Obi-Wan moved again.

Tumbling under the segmented thorax of a Neimoidian harvester beetle, he sprang to his feet and raced forward. Explosive light shunted from the citadel’s deflector shield dappled the loamy ground between the trees, casting long shadows of their buttressed trunks. Oblivious to the chaos occurring in their midst, columns of the five-meter-long harvesters continued their stalwart march toward a mound that supported the fortress. In their cutting jaws or on their upsweeping backs they carried cargoes of pruned foliage. The crushing sounds of their ceaseless gnawing provided an eerie cadence to the rumbling detonations and the hiss and whine of blaster bolts.

From off to Obi-Wan’s left came a sudden click of servos; to his right, a hushed cry of warning.

“Down, Master!”

He dropped into a crouch even before Anakin’s lips formed the final word, lightsaber aimed to the ground to keep from impaling his onrushing former Padawan. A blur of thrumming blue energy sizzled through the humid air, followed by a sharp smell of cauterized circuitry, the tang of ozone. A blaster discharged into soft soil, then the stalked, elongated head of a battle droid struck the ground not a meter from Obi-Wan’s feet, sparking as it bounced and rolled out of sight, repeating: “Roger, roger . . . Roger, roger . . .”

In a tuck, Obi-Wan pivoted on his right foot in time to see the droid’s spindly body collapse. The fact that Anakin had saved his life was nothing new, but Anakin’s blade had passed a little too close for comfort. Eyes somewhat wide with surprise, he came to his feet.

“You nearly took my head off.”

Anakin held his blade to one side. In the strobing light of battle his blue eyes shone with wry amusement. “Sorry, Master, but your head was where my lightsaber needed to go.”

Master.

Anakin used the honorific not as learner to teacher, but as Jedi Knight to Jedi Council member. The braid that had defined his earlier status had been ritually severed after his audacious actions at Praesitlyn. His tunic, knee-high boots, and tight-fitting trousers were as black as the night. His face scarred from a contest with Dooku-trained Asajj Ventress. His mechanical right hand sheathed in an elbow-length glove. He had let his hair grow long the past few months, falling almost to his shoulders now. His face he kept clean-shaven, unlike Obi-Wan, whose strong jaw was defined by a short beard.

“I suppose I should be grateful your lightsaber needed to go there, rather than desired to.”

Anakin’s grin blossomed into a full-fledged smile. “Last time I checked we were on the same side, Master.”

“Still, if I’d been a moment slower . . .”

Anakin booted the battle droid’s blaster aside. “Your fears are only in your mind.”

Obi-Wan scowled. “Without a head I wouldn’t have much mind left, now, would I?” He swept his lightsaber in a flourishing pass, nodding up the alley of manax trees. “After you.”

They resumed their charge, moving with the supernatural speed and grace afforded by the Force, Obi-Wan’s brown cloak swirling behind him. Victims of the initial bombardment, scores of battle droids lay sprawled on the ground. Others dangled like broken marionettes from the branches of the trees into which they had been hurled.

Areas of the leafy canopy were in flames.

Two scorched droids little more than arms and torsos lifted their weapons as the Jedi approached, but Anakin only raised his left hand in a Force push that shoved the droids flat onto their backs.

They jinked right, somersaulting under the wide bodies of two harvester beetles, then hurdling a tangle of barbed underbrush that had managed to anchor itself in the otherwise meticulously tended orchard. They emerged from the tree line at the shore of a broad irrigation canal, fed by a lake that delimited the Neimoidians’ citadel on three sides. In the west a trio of wedge-shaped Venator-class assault cruisers hung in scudding clouds. North and east the sky was in turmoil, crosshatched with ion trails, turbolaser beams, hyphens of scarlet light streaming upward from weapons emplacements outside the citadel’s energy shield. Rising from high ground at the end of the peninsula, the tiered fastness was reminiscent of the command towers of the Trade Federation core ships, and indeed had been the inspiration for them.

Somewhere inside, trapped by Republic forces, were the Trade Federation elite.

With his homeworld threatened and the purse worlds of Deko and Koru Neimoidia devastated, Viceroy Gunray would have been wiser to retreat to the Outer Rim, as other members of the Separatist Council were thought to be doing. But rational thinking had never been a Neimoidian strong suit, especially when possessions remained on Cato Neimoidia the viceroy apparently couldn’t live without. Backed by a battle group of Federation warships, he had slipped onto Cato Neimoidia, intent on looting the citadel before it fell. But Republic forces had been lying in wait, eager to capture him alive and bring him to justice—thirteen years late, in the judgment of many.

Cato Neimoidia was as close to Coruscant as Obi-Wan and Anakin had been in almost four standard months, and with the last remaining Separatist strongholds now cleared from the Core and Colonies, they expected to be back in the Outer Rim by week’s end.

Obi-Wan heard movement on the far side of the irrigation canal.

An instant later, four clone troopers crept from the tree line on the opposite bank to take up firing positions amid the water-smoothed rocks that lined the ditch. Far behind them a crashed gunship was burning. Protruding from the canopy, the LAAT’s blunt tail was stenciled with the eight-rayed battle standard of the Galactic Republic.

A gunboat glided into view from downstream, maneuvering to where the Jedi were waiting. Standing in the bow, a clone commander named Cody waved hand signals to the troopers on shore and to others in the gunboat, who immediately fanned out to create a safe perimeter.

Troopers could communicate with one another through the comlinks built into their T-visored helmets, but the Advanced Recon Commando teams had created an elaborate system of gestures meant to thwart enemy attempts at eavesdropping.

A few nimble leaps brought Cody face-to-face with Obi-Wan and Anakin.

“Sirs, I have the latest from airborne command.”

“Show us,” Anakin said.

Cody dropped to one knee, his right hand activating a device built into his left wrist gauntlet. A cone of blue light emanated from the device, and a hologram of task force commander Dodonna resolved.

“Generals Kenobi and Skywalker, provincial recon unit reports that Viceroy Gunray and his entourage are making their way to the north side of the redoubt. Our forces have been hammering at the shield from above and from points along the shore, but the shield generator is in a hardened site, and difficult to get at. Gunships are taking heavy fire from turbolaser cannons in the lower ramparts. If your team is still committed to taking Gunray alive, you’re going to have to skirt those defenses and find an alternative way into the palace. At this point we cannot reinforce, repeat, cannot reinforce.”

Obi-Wan looked at Cody when the hologram had faded. “Suggestions, Commander?”

Cody made an adjustment to the wrist projector, and a 3-D schematic of the redoubt formed in midair. “Assuming that Gunray’s fortress is similar to what we found on Deko and Koru, the underground levels will contain fungus farms and processing and shipment areas. There will be access from the shipping areas into the midlevel grub hatcheries, and from the hatcheries we’ll be able to infiltrate the upper reaches.”

Cody carried a short-stocked DC-15 blaster rifle and wore the white armor and imaging system helmet that had come to symbolize the Grand Army of the Republic—grown, nurtured, and trained on the remote world of Kamino, three years ear- lier. Just now, though, areas of white showed only where there were no smears of mud or dried blood, no gouges, abrasions, or charred patches. Cody’s position was designated by orange markings on his helmet crest and shoulder guards. His upper right arm bore stripes signifying campaigns in which he had participated: Aagonar, Praesitlyn, Paracelus Minor, Antar 4, Tibrin, Skor II, and dozens of other worlds from Core to Outer Rim.

Over the years Obi-Wan had formed battlefield partnerships with several Advanced Recon Commandos—Alpha, with whom he had been imprisoned on Rattatak, and Jangotat, on Ord Cestus. Early-generation ARCs had received training by the Mandalorian clone template, Jango Fett. While the Kaminoans had managed to breed some of Fett out of the regulars, they had been more selective in the case of the ARCs. As a consequence, ARCs displayed more individual initiative and leadership abilities. In short, they were more like the late bounty hunter himself, which was to say, more human. While Cody wasn’t genetically an Advanced Recon Commando, he had ARC training and shared many ARC attributes.

In the initial stages of the war, clone troopers were treated no differently from the war machines they piloted or the weapons they fired. To many they had more in common with battle droids poured by the tens of thousands from Baktoid Armor Workshops on a host of Separatist-held worlds. But attitudes began to shift as more and more troopers died. The clones’ unfaltering dedication to the Republic, and to the Jedi, showed them to be true comrades in arms, and deserving of all the respect and compassion they were now afforded. It was the Jedi themselves, in addition to other progressive thinking officials in the Republic, who had urged that second- and third-generation troopers be given names rather than numbers, to foster a growing fellowship.

“I agree that we can probably reach the upper levels, Commander,” Obi-Wan said at last. “But how do you propose we reach the fungus farms to begin with?”

Cody stood to his full height and pointed toward the orchards. “we go in with the harvesters.”
Obi-Wan glanced uncertainly at Anakin and motioned him off to one side.

“It’s just the two of us. What do you think?

“I think you worry too much, Master.”

Obi-Wan folded his arms across his chest. “And who’ll worry about you if I don’t?”

Anakin canted his head and grinned. “There are others.”

“You can only be referring to See-Threepio. And you had to build him.”

“Think what you will.”

Obi-Wan narrowed his eyes with purpose. “Oh, I see. But I would have thought Senator Amidala of greater interest to you that Supreme chancellor Palpatine.” Before Anakin could respond, he added: “Despite that she’s a politician also.”

“Don’t think I haven’t tried to attract her interest, Master.”

Anakin placed his artificial hand on Obi-Wan’s left shoulder. “Perhaps, Master. But then, who would look after you?”

FROM THE PUBLISHER

"The war that erupted in Star Wars: Episode II Attack of the Clones is nearing its boiling point, as the dauntless Separatist forces continue their assault on the teetering Republic - and the diabolical triumvirate of Count Dooku, General Grievous, and their Master, Darth Sidious, fine-tune their strategy for conquest. In Episode III Revenge of the Sith, the fates of key players on both sides of the conflict will be sealed. But first, crucial events that pave the way to that time of reckoning unfold in a labyrinth of evil." "Capturing Trade Federation Viceroy - and Separatist Councilmember - Nute Gunray is the mission that brings Jedi Knights Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker, with a squad of clones in tow, to Neimoidia. But the treacherous ally of the Sith proves as slippery as ever, evading his Jedi pursuers even as they narrowly avoid deadly disaster. Still, their daring efforts yield an unexpected prize: a unique holotransceiver that bears intelligence capable of leading the Republic forces to their ultimate quarry, the ever-elusive Darth Sidious." "Swiftly taking up the chase, Anakin and Obi-Wan follow clues from the droid factories of Charros IV to the far-flung worlds of the Outer Rim...every step bringing them closer to pinpointing the location of the Sith Lord - whom they suspect has been manipulating every aspect of the Separatist rebellion. Yet somehow, in the escalating galaxy-wide chess game of strikes, counterstrikes, ambushes, sabotage, and retaliations, Sidious constantly stays one move ahead." Then the trail takes a shocking turn. For Sidious and his minions have set in motion a ruthlessly orchestrated campaign to divide and overwhelm the Jedi forces - and bring the Republic to its knees.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

and Anakin Skywalker's pursuit of old enemy Viceroy Gunray leads the pair deep into interstellar space, to some well-drawn if unappetizing planets, in James Luceno's jaunty Star Wars: Labyrinth of Evil. While the author does a good job of maintaining excitement without revealing any secrets of the forthcoming final Star Wars movie, this tie-in, unlike some other Star Wars novels, has no features to give it interest apart from its link to the popular film series. Agent, Eleanor Wood at Spectrum Literary Agency. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

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