Let me just begin this review by saying that every Star Wars fan should read Bloodline.

Not only was the characterization of Leia fantastic, the politics of the time (5 years before Episode VII) were completely believable, interesting, and sounded a little too familiar. I was hooked from the first chapter, which rarely happens to me. As fans of the movie we only see the surface of everything that’s going on, Claudia Gray digs into the world and makes it work logically while giving it diversity and flavor. I will never stop being impressed.

One of the most important things to me as a SW fan and a booklover is that I could hear the voices of beloved characters like Leia, Han, and C-3PO while reading. Not only did the author capture this, she helped to develop Leia’s character more by presenting a whole new story in which the stakes were both political and personal. We get to see inside her mind and understand the heartbreak of losing Alderaan, the tumultuous feelings she has towards Vader, the frustration she feels at being trapped in a political process that no longer works, and her determination to take action to get something done. This is the Leia we know and love and, with all the benefits that the novel form of storytelling has, we get to know her better than ever before.

On a side note, with novels it’s so much easier to add in backstory and explanations of things that the movies should have addressed. For example, the fact that Leia and Han are married. THANK YOU! Obviously Bloodline also deals with much more than this small detail since it has the freedom and the time to, but their marriage was something that was not established in the new canon until now and I am thankful for it, no matter how small of a detail it may be.

I was a bit surprised that the story followed more than just Leia’s POV and I thought I would get bored reading the “extra” characters’ chapters, but it was great seeing the universe through their eyes and learning more of their stories. I came to love the side characters like Greer, Joph, and Ransolm; it was amazing to watch each of them grow and change over the course of the novel. Especially the young Senator Ransolm Casterfo (who I imagine looks like Loki). I started off hating his guts and by the end of the book he was my favorite character, second only to Leia. Because he belongs to the political opposition he and Leia get off to a rocky start, made worse by the fact that he has a thing for collecting Imperil artifacts for fun. If you can’t imagine Leia’s horror, just imagine a WWII veteran meeting a young punk who collects Nazi memorabilia. It was like that. But over the course of the book Leia (and the reader) begins to understand his character, which is so interesting and layered! I would love to see a companion novel that focuses on Ransolm after the events of this book. There are brief cameos and occasional mentions of established SW characters besides Leia, but they aren’t used as a crutch. This makes the appearance/reference of said characters *cough* Han *cough* even more rewarding.

Bloodline managed to balance political games with high stakes action while also slowing down just long enough to delve deep into the minds and backstories of beloved characters, both old and new. It is a great novel by its own merit, but the fact that it is a great SW novel makes me love it even more. This has been my favorite book of the year. I literally loved every page. I hope the future is filled with many more Star Wars books written by Claudia Gray. ( )

Bloodline definitely felt a piece of the Star Wars universe, both in good and bad ways. At its best it explored themes of power and dealing with a society's dark past. Interesting comparisons can be drawn between how the characters in Bloodline view the Empire and the various reactions to Nazism and Confederate apologists in our own world. At its worst, the book get mired in discussing galactic politics that are both boring and don't make much sense. I've always thought it was weird when Star Wars takes a turn away from fantasy to focus on political debates, because at its heart, such a simplistic universe in which entire planets are populated by single cultures and ideologies can't support the types of political insight the writers strive for. In the end, the central story line felt contrived, the twist felt unearned, and much of the book was just rather boring. However, it is about Princess Leia, and she is awesome enough to almost carry the rest of the book. ( )

Claudia Gray's "Bloodline" provides vital links between the Original Trilogy and "The Force Awakens," with an excellent mix of political intrigue and action, giving readers enough details to infer just how the First Order comes to power (turns out they got a lot of their empire era ships from the outer rim were a certain emperor planned for them to be stored if he was to die but I digress) . We join Princess Leia in her role as a New Republic senator six years before the events of the new movie and find she has been negotiating a challenging political landscape since the fall of the Empire. The New Republic is now the political status quo with a Galactic Senate (or universal senate if you will) as its governing heart and the Senate is divided by Populists and Centrists, both of which share opposing ideals. The Galactic Senate, based on the doomed Hosnian Prime, has been divided into two distinct factions. Leia's side, the Populists, wish to see individual planets maintain autonomy, while the worryingly Imperial-sounding Centrists are pushing for a centralized galactic government backed by military might. The New Republic needs a leader, and as she wrestles with the truths of where she comes from, Leia is thrust into a position that she fears may tear the galaxy apart once again, especially if individuals discover exactly who her father was.
Gray is perhaps the best writer in the new canon Star Wars universe and she demonstrates a clear understanding of Leia's personality. This was a riveting read, with some insightful tidbits regarding Leia's emotions about her father, her relationship with Han, and her love and concern for Ben (who is training with Luke in this novel). Gray immerses readers into the world of Star Wars. Bloodline is a fun novel that fills in some of the blanks about what happened between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens and is highly recommended.

( )

In Bloodline, Claudia Gray shows us Leia a few years before the beginning of the sequel movies, grappling with frustrating and deadlocked galactic politics. She dreams of retiring and going adventuring with Han, but the need to hold the New Republic together make that unlikely to happen—even before she faces down an underworld threat and distrust from among her own.

There are lots of nicely-observed bits here, but equally much of the political manoeuvering felt as if it had to be kept fairly surface level because people tend not to read A Star War for the politicking—fair enough—and it was all way too thinly veiled an allegory for American Democrats vs Republicans. Was it not possible to conceive of a Galactic Senate with literally thousands of members that wasn't a two-party body? Hashtag Not All Centrists, I suppose, but Ransolm Casterfo—the Centrist senator with whom Leia at first reluctantly works and then grudgingly comes to respect and even like—just didn't work for me as a character. Is someone who spent his childhood in an Imperial forced labour camp and watched his parents die because of that really going to collect stormtrooper helmets and think, well, of course Palpatine was a bad guy but didn't the Empire make sure the trains ran on time? Weren't their helmets shiny? In the 2020s, I can't find myself at all warming to a character whom I'm being told is just fash for the aesthetics—Casterfo was not complex in the way I think Gray was trying to make him.

A solid movie tie-in, a quick read with a decent grasp on who Leia is as a character which nonetheless shows the limits of writing a novel to spec in an in-progress universe where you can't change much/get too innovative. ( )

This is maybe my fifth Star Wars book and maybe the best so far. I thoroughly enjoy listening to Star Wars audiobooks. This one seemed to have a little more meat to it. ( )