Star Wars: Legacy of the Force: Betrayal
Books and Publications Average Rating:

Rating: - Poor book in a poor 9 book series
I really disliked this book and the whole Legacy of the Force series. This is the first book of the series. The series seems bent on seeing how many former allies they can make into enemies and how messed up they can make both the Skywalker and Solo clans become. There is nothing about this series that furthers the Star Wars universe in a positive way. None of the characters are truly heroic including Luke who seems to have forgotton all hr learned from Ben, Yoda, and from lessons in his later years in bringing the Jedi order back into existence. All of the Jedi seem very inconsistent and many of the main characters portayed too differently by the 3 authors in the series. The ending to the series is quite ludricous. This particular book fails to explain how a universe that finally had many allies by the end of a recent series can suddenly be turned apart again so quickly and by the Solo and Skywalker children. It seems to be a very poor rehash of the prequel novels Save your time and money and avoid the Legacy of the Force series!

---

Rating: - WARNING! Tasteless and and unexcused retcons ahead.
This book is, IN ITS OWN RIGHT ok...


but if you read Legacy of the Force CLOSELY

you'll notice that the potentatium perspective IS NOT EVEN MENTIONED THROUGHOUT IT
'
I got the impression some people just fell that the NJO got too "Morally gray"

so they decided to go back to straightforward "Sith/Jedi" Duality


And spare me the "Thats what Star wars is about!" Line

I was so looking forward to seeing Jacens quest for further enlightenment and ultimately acheiving some type of bohidivistra state this cowardly kowtowing to some whiners is spineless!"

And


"Oh it turns out Vergere was Sith!?"


Can you be any more pathetic?

---

Rating: - Started Great and Ended Terribly
The first few books of this series start off spectacularly. We see new and old characters and new action. We see a seemingly new plot development with a good character starting to be lured to the dark side because of love...oh wait, that's been done already.
What's so bad about this series is it was seemingly written for shock value alone and nothing else. No thought is truly given to the characters motivations, they're just made up by the authors to fit a new series. The only EU that was consulted to derive how a character would be behave in a given situation was the dark nest trilogy. Other than that, everything just feels bad: glaring plot holes, everyone overlooks extremely simple solutions for the sake of keeping the series going and the previously mentioned fake character behavior to fit the series.

I don't want to mention specifics in the case of people who do decide to read the series. However, be prepared for the end. Or rather, the lack their of. The so called "conclusion" resolved almost nothing and introduces far more questions that it even tried to answer. What a great "ending."

---

Rating: - The Force Is Not As Strong As It Should Have Been With This Series
Well I guess I better start out by clearly stating that this review is based upon the entire "Legacy of the Force" series and not solely on this particular book. With that in mind, this same review will be posted on each book in the series under the same guidelines, as a review on the entire series, not just a single book in the series. With that in mind, here goes...

My first comment is that the overall feel for this series seems to be a bit off. Now I don't know if it is me, or if other readers got the same impression. I have the tendency to believe that it was due in part to having more than one author writing the series, rather than having just a single author write all nine (9) books in the series. There are definitely some books in the series that are much better written than others, not that any of these authors are bad by any means, it just feels like something got lost somewhere in the shuffle. Like I said, maybe it's just me.

The plot of the series is pretty good, with Jacen Solo turning over to the dark side and following in his grandfather's footsteps, while at the same time cementing his hold on the galaxy itself and attempting to get Luke and Mara's son Ben to become his apprentice. This of course put everyone on a collision course that makes it even more interesting because of the family ties involved.

However, did any other readers feel like Jacen was merely a punk trying to be Sith Lord? Or once again is it just me. I felt that the other Sith in the story, were much better portrayed as true Sith and that Jacen was merely being used as a puppet to an even greater Sith who has of yet been unrevealed. Which would make the story much better with that back-story alone instead of the predominant one.

I did really enjoy Jaina's relationship with Boba Fett and the Mandalorians and that alone brought the whole series an extra star and a half in my book.

I was saddened to see the demise of one of my favorite characters as I felt that this character had so much more to offer than the pipsqueak wannabee Sith, Jacen Solo.

I would recommend this series as it is "Star Wars," and therefore, a definite must read for those of us who are one with the force. However, please be forewarned that the various books in the series seem to have a rollercoaster of up and down moments and the whole series as a whole could have been much better if written by only one author rather than several.

Here are the links for each individual book in the series starting with the first one.

Betrayal (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force, Book 1)

Bloodlines (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force, Book 2)

Tempest (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force, Book 3)

Exile (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force, Book 4)

Sacrifice (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force, Book 5)

Inferno (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force, Book 6)

Fury (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force, Book 7)

Revelation (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force, Book 8)

Invincible (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force)

Shawn Kovacich
Star Wars Fan and Author of the Achieving Kicking Excellence series.