Claudia Gray’s YA novel “Into the Dark” is a part of the Star Wars: The High Republic series. Set between Charles Soule’s “Light of the Jedi” and Cavan Scott’s “The Rising Storm”, “Into the Dark” introduces us to yet another group of characters that aren’t given enough time or story to develop. What we get is a decent enough Star Wars adventure, but one that we would expect better from a talented writer like Gray.

It must also be said that there isn’t anything in this novel that hasn’t been done before, or better, in other series.

The novel opens with a spaceship carrying several Jedi Knights to the Outer Rim caught in the Great Hyperspace Disaster (see “Light of the Jedi”), and they are forced to find shelter in an ancient space station. While exploring the ancient station, the Jedi discover an ancient evil strong in the Dark Side of the Force. It appears to be linked to four artifacts, which they deduce was put there by an ancient race to keep the evil at bay. When they take the four artifacts back to the Jedi Council, they realize, too late, that they have deduced wrong.

I liked “Into the Dark”, but, I’ll be honest: parts of it dragged. The side-story involving the background of the two Jedi Masters probably could have been removed entirely with no serious detriment to the main story. And the introduction to the Drengir—-an enemy that I find infinitely more interesting than the Nihil—-was somewhat anti-climactic. They also kind of reminded me of the Daleks from Doctor Who.

So far, I have read four of the novels in the High Republic series, and I have not been overly impressed by any of them. Still, I’m not giving up hope. Because rebellions are built on hope… which doesn’t really apply, but whatever… ( )

3.75★
“It takes strength to question your own actions. Just don’t dwell on the past to the point of forgetting the present.”

I would say Claudia Gray is easily the best author in the current Star Wars pantheon, so it was quite a surprise for me when I just... kinda liked this book. It's still good, but definitely the weakest one she has given in the universe so far.

Gray remains a master in crafting characters, and they're without a doubt the highlight of the book. They're funny, and flawed, and each fear and self-doubt seem extremely realistic.

The Jedi, specially, engage in philosophical discussions of morals, duty, the Order and the light and dark sides of the Force; and that's always great to see! Even then, I would've hoped it was made clear that a lot of it was, in fact, a crisis of faith and the characters' own flawed view, as I believe an unreliable narration would only enhance the experience story-wise and that wouldn't be a path I'd love to see canon take as a hard-fact.

The plot suffers with unnecessary flashbacks that affect the main story very little, but the book wasn't as much about the plot as it was about the characters journey, and as said before: each of them was a protagonist in it's own right. ( )

Listened to an audiobook mostly while doing chores over a 3-week period. Serviceable Star Wars. I kind of preferred this more low-key story to Charles Soule's sprawling "Light of the Jedi" which just had too many characters (including boring farmers). A lot of plot beats, character arcs, and conflicts are not-too-subtly telegraphed. To be honest the narrator blew a lot of life into the heroes and made their chemistry enjoyable--I am not sure how much I would enjoy actually reading the book. This novel and Soule's introduce the two big villains in the "High Republic" setting and I don't find either terribly interesting, although the personalities in the Nihil seem to have more potential than the "Drengir"--carnivorous sentient plants that for reasons I do not understand appear to pose a challenge for the Jedi (not sure what is the role of the Dark Side). I note that Marc Thompson, the audiobook narrator for Light of the Jedi, and Dan Bittner, the audiobook narrator for this novel, appeared to have coordinated and decided to voice big baddie Marchion Ro with a soft, nerdy kind of voice. ( )

4.5/5
I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts are my own.

While the first few titles of The High Republic came out last month, I haven’t read any of them. Instead, I wanted to start my High Republic journey with Claudia Gray’s entry—the YA novel, Into the Dark. Gray is one of my favorite Star Wars authors and the book’s synopsis had a very claustrophobic Alien vibe. So, I was pretty excited to read it. And, having read it, it lives up to my expectations. Star Wars: Into the Dark is an exhilarating, character-driven story that deftly explores this new era. It’s a quick-paced, satisfying read, and I’m eager for more.

Star Wars: Into the Dark follows Reath Silas, a Jedi Padawan, as he journeys alongside two Jedi Masters (Orla and Chomac), a Jedi Knight (Dez), and the crew of a shipping freighter called The Vessel (Leox, Affie, and Geode). Their mission takes them to the Starlight Beacon, a new Republic space station being built on the edges of the Outer Rim. But before they can arrive, a hyperspace disaster forces them to dock at a mysterious space station in the middle of nowhere. However, all on the space station is not what it seems and they quickly uncover a mystery wrapped in Dark Side energy and an imminent threat from the mysterious Nihil (a previously-unseen kind of space pirate). To say much more, though, would venture too far into the territory of spoilers. Into the Dark takes a bit of time to get going. The plot doesn’t completely kick in until a hundred pages in, or so, leaving much of the first chunk of the novel to exposition and narrative setup. This isn’t the waste of time you might think, though, as it allows Gray to let one of her greatest strengths shine—character development. Yes, I’d have loved it if the novel had a more energetic, enveloping opening, but there are six characters who have to be introduced in a fairly quick manner, so it’s understandable why the first chunk of the novel would need to be dedicated to doing that.

At first, Gray’s penchant for hopping between each character’s point of view is a bit disorienting, but it quickly settles into a comfy rhythm that helps keep the first chunk of the book interesting and tense. It’s impressive how quickly Gray establishes the characters. Each of them feels wholly unique, with well-defined wants, well-sketched backgrounds, and distinct voices that feel authentic to who they are. Reath makes for a compelling protagonist, fitting nicely into the reluctant adventurer trope. His character arc is an obvious one—he’ll need to adjust to a life of adventure and find the value in that—but that doesn’t make it any less enjoyable. Equally enjoyable are the crew of The Vessel, a ragtag bunch of smugglers who bring some much-needed levity to the story. There’s even a special level of enjoyment that comes with uncovering Cohmac and Orla’s shared backstory—which is told through several interludes scattered throughout the novel. Their past seems to be reflecting the experiences they’re undergoing in the present and it’s neat to see Gray explore how this impacts them.

After a while, the plot does get going, but I’d never call this a plot-driven book. It’s definitely one that’s driven by its characters’ wants, needs, and actions. That’s not to say that nothing happens, though; far from it. It’s just that almost everything that happens is the direct result of something one of the characters does or learns. A character learns something or experiences something, they react to that thing, and the plot is propelled forward. It’s not a difficult story to follow, by any means—even as the mystery deepens and wrinkles are added to it. But this sense of grounded simplicity is among the novel’s greatest traits. Because everything that happens is so deeply grounded by the characters, it’s very easy to follow what’s going on because it’s easy to track the characters’ motivations and plot arcs. There’s a fairly big conspiracy at play in this book, and it would’ve been easy to get lost in it, so this grounded approach works very well. It results in a book with rather large stakes that still manages to feel intimate—and I loved every bit of it.

Gray’s talent isn’t only in writing strong characters, though. Her prose is equally wonderful. She wastes no time overly-describing things that aren’t particularly important to the story or its characters. Instead, she prioritizes keeping things light and breezy while adhering to the voices she’s given each of her characters. To be clear, none of this novel is written in a first-person perspective; all of it is written from a limited third-person point of view that shifts from between each character as the novel shifts between their perspectives. This works remarkably well, giving the novel a sense of fluidity and largely resulting in this YA novel feeling dissimilar to most YA novels one might think of. Honestly, the only thing that makes Into the Dark a YA book seems to be that its main character is a teenager. Otherwise, there aren’t many noticeable differences between this book and any other “adult” Star Wars novel you might find. The themes here are just as complex, the characters are just as well developed (if not better), the commitment to worldbuilding is just as present, and there’s quite a bit of action. If you have an aversion to YA books (which you shouldn’t—there are plenty of great ones!), then you needn’t worry here.

All in all, Star Wars: Into the Dark is an excellent entry in this ongoing saga of The High Republic. It seems to stand on its own, requiring little knowledge of anything that’s happened in the rest of the event. What’s on display here is an excellently crafted, character-driven story that follows this group of characters as they uncover the mysteries of a strange space station. The pacing is quick and breezy, with the prose split between the points of view of all of the characters. The plot is easy to follow, feeling both epic in scale and delightfully intimate. The characters are so well-sketched, feeling wholly believable, authentic, and lived in. Every aspect of this book works remarkably well and, aside from the slow(ish) beginning, I loved every page of it. I’m eager to see what else Gray may write for The High Republic and I’d love to see these characters pop up in one of the future stories. Until then, this book is a wonderful read for Star Wars fans of all ages and I thoroughly recommend it. ( )