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3.7 AVERAGE
3.7 AVERAGE
dark
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Wow. Rating this book anything less than 5 stars is actually insane.
This book did something that 3 films and a tv show couldn't do- it made me a Mace Windu fan. Yes, this book is a legends novel, but I feel as though I have such a deeper understanding of this character.
Mace has always been a character I mostly respected but was ultimately always frustrated with. Shatterpoint provides a deeper look and understanding to what makes Mace, well Mace. It also shows how deeply Mace cares about his loved ones, though how truly he is a master Jedi as he really has mastered his own attachment to his previous Padawan, Depa Bilaba. Yes, he deeply loves Depa but Mace is a man of duty first and foremost.
I think I can also pinpoint some of the Jedi arrogance that truly comes out during this time period, and the deep belief in the Jedi tradition which I do think holds them back.
This book is dark and brutal. Mace goes out in into the jungle in search of Depa, as there are rumors of the brutal acts of murder and death she may have been involved in. This jungle is also in Mace's homeworld, and Mace finds himself in the midst of bloody, brutal war.
There are so many fantastic elements of philosophy- questions about the cost of humanity when people go to war. There is also an exploration of what this philosophy means for the Jedi specifically, who are what seems like, at the start of the Clone Wars. We see what the cost of war does to the Jedi (especially if you've seen SWTCW), but in the books it goes much deeper than that. Shatterpoint goes deeply in Mace's perspective what it means to be a Jedi and the lives they are meant to protect. What happens when war is the direct opposite of what the Jedi are meant to stand for? For Depa, and for many other Jedi in legends, it means a broken spirit.
It's fascinating and also tragic to see how this changes the Jedi. In SWTCW, and in most of the clone wars, we see the Jedi fight against driods. What's different about Shatterpoint is that we see two groups of people fighting against each other and what this war has brought upon them, and their children. It's horrifying and something I imagine is close to what we see in certain areas in the world.
This book had me hooked and when I was reading, I could not put it down. It was fast paced and tense and such a ride. I'm going to be making my way through some of the canon and legends books, but it's definitely one of my favorite Star Wars books so far!
This book did something that 3 films and a tv show couldn't do- it made me a Mace Windu fan. Yes, this book is a legends novel, but I feel as though I have such a deeper understanding of this character.
Mace has always been a character I mostly respected but was ultimately always frustrated with. Shatterpoint provides a deeper look and understanding to what makes Mace, well Mace. It also shows how deeply Mace cares about his loved ones, though how truly he is a master Jedi as he really has mastered his own attachment to his previous Padawan, Depa Bilaba. Yes, he deeply loves Depa but Mace is a man of duty first and foremost.
I think I can also pinpoint some of the Jedi arrogance that truly comes out during this time period, and the deep belief in the Jedi tradition which I do think holds them back.
This book is dark and brutal. Mace goes out in into the jungle in search of Depa, as there are rumors of the brutal acts of murder and death she may have been involved in. This jungle is also in Mace's homeworld, and Mace finds himself in the midst of bloody, brutal war.
There are so many fantastic elements of philosophy- questions about the cost of humanity when people go to war. There is also an exploration of what this philosophy means for the Jedi specifically, who are what seems like, at the start of the Clone Wars. We see what the cost of war does to the Jedi (especially if you've seen SWTCW), but in the books it goes much deeper than that. Shatterpoint goes deeply in Mace's perspective what it means to be a Jedi and the lives they are meant to protect. What happens when war is the direct opposite of what the Jedi are meant to stand for? For Depa, and for many other Jedi in legends, it means a broken spirit.
It's fascinating and also tragic to see how this changes the Jedi. In SWTCW, and in most of the clone wars, we see the Jedi fight against driods. What's different about Shatterpoint is that we see two groups of people fighting against each other and what this war has brought upon them, and their children. It's horrifying and something I imagine is close to what we see in certain areas in the world.
This book had me hooked and when I was reading, I could not put it down. It was fast paced and tense and such a ride. I'm going to be making my way through some of the canon and legends books, but it's definitely one of my favorite Star Wars books so far!
challenging
dark
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This shit's crazy. Hell yeah Matthew
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Death, Genocide, Gore, Violence, Blood, Grief, Suicide attempt, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, War
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
"Nothing is more dangerous than a Jedi who is finally sane."
Every so often, one of the (many) Star Wars novels strikes something special that makes it more than a "good" Star Wars story. With Shatterpoint, Matthew Stover—a writer with arguably the best track record in Star Wars literature—does precisely that. He takes the themes and premise from Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness and plants them firmly into the Star Wars mythology. It's a genius idea that readily aligns with the pre-existing ideas Lucas introduced with his Prequel Trilogy. Stover even includes some subtle themes regarding racial tensions, which feel like an appropriate counterpoint to the ugly racism that mars Conrad's original story. It's not a focal point, but the intent is there if you pay attention.
As recognizable as many of the novel's story beats are, Windu's characterization makes everything around it work. Stover maintains the simmering stoicism that Samuel L. Jackson gave the character in the films while also putting it to the test by placing the character in an environment designed to undo him. Seeing him wrestle with his role in the Clone War and the ripple effects the conflict has on himself, the Jedi, and the people closest to him is compelling right out of the gate and rarely loses its edge. It's a dark, often brutal war story about murky motivations and moralities that exposes how futile the concept of being a "hero" is during a war. I love how Stover pokes into Windu's blindspots regarding the Jedi and the Republic, subtly showing the audience how and why both entities were doomed to fail without losing touch with Windu's belief in both. It's a tricky balancing act to pull off, but Stover sticks the landing.
That said, I will confess to being less enthused by the action of the latter half than I was by the more cerebral material in the earlier half of the book. While those action sections are written very well and paced even better, the story shines brightest when it hyper-focuses on the punishing jungle setting and uses it as a living symbol of the fears and mistakes that haunt Mace Windu. Once he reunites with his old Padawan, some of those cerebral intrigues are lost.
Even with that nitpick, Shatterpoint remains a helluva read. I read it several years ago and have thought of it often since, and revisiting it in audiobook form was an even better experience. This new recording is nothing short of excellent. I'll always love hearing familiar sound effects and music cues from the films, but it's Sullivan Jones' vocals that make this the auditory stunner it is. His voices for each character are great, and he brings a steely-edged conviction to the prose that couldn't have been better. It's easily one of the favorite audiobooks I've listened to, and I'm so glad I chose to revisit the story in this format. I wish more Star Wars books were as tightly nuanced and sharply written as this one is.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Death, Violence, War
Moderate: Gun violence, Blood, Suicide attempt, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Abandonment, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Sexual assault, Torture, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol
Not sure about this one. I just didn’t feel like the book was true to Mace Windu. He doubted himself a lot and was much weaker than he should be. Ultimately the book was a shallow “hack-n-slash” action story.
For 2022, I decided to go back in time and reread all the Prequels Era novels published between 1999 and 2005, plus a smidgen of other novels (like [b:Survivor's Quest|46623|Star Wars Survivor's Quest|Timothy Zahn|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1330605305l/46623._SY75_.jpg|1197542] and the Dark Nest trilogy) released during that time frame. This shakes out to 21 novels, four eBook novellas, and at least thirteen short stories.
This week’s focus: the first novel in the Clone Wars multimedia project, Shatterpoint by Matthew Stover.
SOME HISTORY:
Apocalypse Now, the 1979 Vietnam War movie directed by Francis Ford Coppola, is widely considered to be one of the greatest and most influential films of all time. But Coppola wasn't the first choice for director, and instead George Lucas intended to direct the film. He worked with screenwriter John Milius for several years, but ultimately chose to instead work on American Graffiti and Star Wars. So with that Lucas connection, perhaps it's not surprising that in trying to brainstorm ideas for his Clone Wars novel focused on Mace Windu, Matthew Stover chose Apocalypse Now and its base story [b:Heart of Darkness|4900|Heart of Darkness|Joseph Conrad|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1392799983l/4900._SX50_.jpg|2877220] by Joseph Conrad as the inspiration for his novel. He wanted to lend it a gritty feel: “Apocalypse Now with Jedi.”
MY RECOLLECTION OF THE BOOK:
I'm fairly certain that I read Shatterpoint when it was initially released, because I was keen to read most of the Clone Wars novels and fill in that gap between Episodes II and III. But all I really retained was that it was dark, and it was violent, and that it was focused on Mace Windu.
A BRIEF SUMMARY:
The jungle planet of Haruun Kal, Mace Windu's homeworld that he barely remembers, has become a battleground between the Republic and the Separatist forces. The Jedi Council has dispatched Jedi Master Depa Billaba, Mace's former padawan, to train the local tribesmen into a guerrilla movement. But Depa has vanished, and when news reaches Mace of terrible events on Haruun Kal, he must leave behind the Jedi and civilization to return to his homeland, to seek out his former padawan, and to learn the terrible price that must be paid when keepers of peace turn to war.
A BRIEF TIMELINE DISCLAIMER:
Depa is first sent to Haruun Kal two months after the events of the Battle of Geonosis, and Mace in turn goes to Haruun Kal four months after that. So we can pretty accurately place Shatterpoint at six months into the Clone Wars, after Episode II: Attack of the Clones.
Side note: my library copy of Shatterpoint had a Clone Wars timeline on the inside cover that placed Escape from Dagu nine months into the Clone Wars. If you’re unaware, Escape from Dagu was a canceled novel by William C. Dietz that was going to focus on Shaak Ti.
THE STRUCTURE:
Shatterpoint contains an introduction and an afterword set on Coruscant, involving Mace Windu, Yoda, and Supreme Chancellor Palpatine, then the rest of the novel is broken up into three parts and is entirely set on Haruun Kal. Most interestingly, each of the chapters have chapter titles—something that we usually don't see in Star Wars books, and that I had not seen since Matthew Stover's [b:Traitor|35461|Traitor (Star Wars The New Jedi Order, #13)|Matthew Woodring Stover|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1331430506l/35461._SY75_.jpg|1163697]. The first part—actually the first half of the book—involves Mace arriving on Haruun Kal, meeting Nick Rostu and Chalk and Besh & Lesh, and then heading further into the jungle in search of Depa. Part Two involves Mace traveling with Depa, thinking that they're going to be picked up by Republic forces very soon, and Part Three has a big battle between the Korunnai and the Balawai, as well as a fair bit of Separatist/Republic interference in the battle.
THE CHARACTERS:
Mace has some memories of Haruun Kal: he was taken as an infant by the Jedi, but he came back as a teenager to participate in traditional rites and to learn about their culture. While the Jedi aren't keen on attachments, they don't seem to mind if you learn about your heritage as long as you come back. However, when Mace returns to Haruun Kal, he finds it very different from when he visited decades ago.
This galaxy-wide conflict between the Republic and the Separatists has drawn in smaller local conflicts as well, and on Haruun Kal that includes the Summertime Wars between the Korunnai—the natives of the planet—and the Balawai—the off-worlders who have come because the jungles of Haruun Kal are hugely profitable. The Summertime Wars have been going on for decades at this point; it was mainly a seasonal conflict, but the Balawai siding with the Separatists has made this conflict even more intense, and brought the Korunnai even closer to extinction. The Korunnai and the Balawai are not able to coexist peacefully, and it’s reached a point where the Balawai are quite happy to wipe out all the natives with weapons and ships provided by the Separatists.
That's what Mace struggles with for a lot of this book: recognizing that what's happening on Haruun Kal isn't Republic versus the Separatists, that it goes even deeper to these deep-seated conflicts that have become a part of each culture. Mace’s opinion changes throughout the story; he begins thinking that Depa and the ULF have done terrible things (and they have) but the Balawai have also done horrible things. No one is free of blame here. Yet at the same time, you feel so sympathetic for the Korunnai’s plight, who are facing the end of their way of life and the genocide of their people.
With the way the story is structured, we stay in Mace’s head the entire time. Stover cuts back and forth between limited third person (“he said this” and “he did that,” yet it’s clearly Mace’s POV) and entries from Mace’s private journal, which are written in the first person. It’s an interesting choice—I enjoyed getting to hear some of the entries in Mace’s voice, but I also felt like they were a conceit for Stover to add elements of a first person narrative without committing to it for the entire novel. I didn’t always buy that Mace had time to record his journal entries, especially when some of the entries referred to later events yet we’re told that the datapad is encrypted and he can’t revisit old entries. The journal excerpts are only really present for the first two parts; for obvious reasons, once we get to the climactic battle, Mace doesn’t have time to record his thoughts.
Mace fights A LOT. He’s very good at fighting, but he also says at one point that he likes fighting. I’m not sure if I believe that; I believe that Mace is a strong warrior, especially since he invented a new style of lightsaber combat (Vaapad) but I'm not sure that he enjoys it. He's always seemed more of a stoic character to me; that he's good at what he does, but he doesn't get sheer enjoyment out of it. Especially in the fight scenes, I felt like Mace was stepping perilously close to the Dark Side, and I preferred the scenes where we saw a more thoughtful Mace—the Mace who's trying to save children, who's trying to get Balawai civilians to safety—the Mace who looks at a situation and decides that restraint is the best option. That's the Mace I was interested in learning about, and I wish we could have seen even more of him.
I also liked his relationship with Depa Billaba, his former padawan. He saved her as a young child and then he trained her for over 10 years, so at this point he sees himself not just as her former master but almost as her father figure. Part of the reason why Mace is so upset about what has happened to her, and wants to find her and bring her back to the Jedi Temple, is because he feels responsible for her actions.
But perhaps because we see the story through Mace's eyes, I felt like we didn't get as much of Depa as I would have liked. When we encounter Depa in person in the second part she's physically weak: she's suffering from headaches and nightmares, and she's falling apart before our eyes. There are a few bits, especially in the third part, where Depa does amazing physical feats…but we don't really see them. She does them off-screen, or we'll catch only a glimpse of it and then she collapses. I would have liked to spend a little more time with Depa, to see what a great Jedi she was, rather than just seeing her at her lowest point when the madness of the jungle has overtaken her and she completely falls apart.
I expected Depa to be the antagonist of the story, but instead we have a different main antagonist in the form of Kar Vastor. Vator is a Korunnai from ghosh Windu, like Mace, whose entire family was killed by Balawai when he was a teenager. He was left alone in the jungle for a year, and survived at the cost of his ability to speak. He’s become like a shaman, a strong channeler of the Force energy of the jungle, but like the rest of the natives of Haruun Kal he’s completely untrained. Vastor is just sheer, immense dark power—it’s not Sith, but it’s definitely not Light. I felt like he overshadowed Depa at times—swallowed her up so that she had less of a mind of her own, and was doing what Vastor wanted. Mace’s relationship with Vastor changed throughout the story: he was straight up evil, then they work together, then Mace decides again that he’s a force of evil.
Of the other Korunnai characters that Mace meets, we have Nick Rostu, a smart alecky young man who ends up helping Mace; Chalk, who has had a traumatic life and deserved better than she got; and Lesh & Besh, who don’t end well because the jungle is a dangerous, deadly place.
ISSUES:
My favorite part of Shatterpoint was the first part/half. I felt like the first part integrated more bits from [b:Heart of Darkness|4900|Heart of Darkness|Joseph Conrad|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1392799983l/4900._SX50_.jpg|2877220]—Mace is the Marlow character, who's heading deep into the jungle to find Depa/the maddened Kurtz character. It's strange and it's unnerving and he tries to do the right thing and it's hard and he feels this dark pull on everything he does. He comes to revelations about the history of the planet, and how the Separatists have inveigled themselves into the local conflict.
I was really enjoying the first half, but then I felt like the second half—and especially Part Three, the big climactic battle at the end—started to lose me because it began to veer away from the inspiration that [b:Heart of Darkness|4900|Heart of Darkness|Joseph Conrad|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1392799983l/4900._SX50_.jpg|2877220] provides. Mace is an interesting Marlow-esque character because he is both an outsider and an insider: a native of Haruun Kal who has only been there for brief periods, but also the Jedi outsider trying to figure out what’s going on and why. In Part Two, he talks with Depa a lot and then he gets double crossed by her; in Part Three, there was so much military jargon of all the different missiles and ships and weapons that I lost interest.
Additionally, in Parts Two and Three Stover gave us multiple incidents where Mace has a plan, but it’s not revealed to the reader until afterwards. I can see how that would build suspense, but after it happened multiple times I began to get FRUSTRATED. I wish instead of getting “that’s what I intended, Nick” we had gotten some preemptive explanations, since this happened so many times throughout the story.
I felt like the main point of Depa's story was to show us that the Jedi are guardians of peace, and if you make them military officers they're going to fall apart. Because that's not what they've been trained for! That's not how they've learned to use the Force! As Depa gets drawn into the conflict between the Korunnai and the Balawai, she loses her objectivity and can’t separate herself from the Korunnai’s fate. She's in too deep, and she loses her mind as a result. The Jedi were never intended to command military forces—they were intended to be peacekeepers, or philosophers, or scholars, and to have them lead battles in the Clone Wars is the antithesis of what they’re meant to do.
But I feel like by the time we get to that final battle, that fact has been hammered into the reader’s head, and I felt fatigued reading what was happening. Shatterpoint is a very dark story. There's some humor from Nick Rostu’s quips, but on the whole it's unrelentingly grim. There is a lot of violence here: people get beheaded, and the jungle itself is treacherous and dangerous. (There are wasps that get in your bloodstream and go up to your brain and it’s so disgusting.) But at the same time, I really love that concept of the jungle as this dangerous force; it’s very Jedi-like of the Korunnai to figure out a way to exist within this world that constantly wants to kill them.
I think for me, Shatterpoint is very like [b:Star by Star|35448|Star by Star (Star Wars The New Jedi Order, #9)|Troy Denning|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1331005005l/35448._SY75_.jpg|349891]. It's an interesting story, but it's not a story I'd really want to revisit because it's draining to read. Even at the end, when Mace brings Depa back to the Jedi Temple on Coruscant, it's like she's gone inside. Her body physically is okay, but her mind isn't there anymore, and to watch a Jedi fall apart like that is really hard to read.
IN CONCLUSION:
Shatterpoint almost exclusively focuses on Mace Windu, and how much you like Mace may dictate how much you like this story. It's super dark, super violent, and the last part of the story is very much a war story--with all the elements that entails. But at the same time, I like Stover's attempt to show how the galaxy-wide conflict of the Clone Wars has drawn other localized conflicts in its wake...or in the case of Haruun Kal, has forced local grudges like the Summertime Wars to become even more horrific and devastating.
Next up: maybe the first Star Wars video game tie-in novel (if you don’t count [b:Shadows of the Empire|9549|Shadows of the Empire (Star Wars)|Steve Perry|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1361481442l/9549._SY75_.jpg|858558]): [b:The Ruins of Dantooine|571016|The Ruins of Dantooine (Star Wars Galaxies)|Voronica Whitney-Robinson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1320517326l/571016._SY75_.jpg|558053] by Voronica Whitney-Robinson with W. Haden Blackman.
My YouTube review: https://youtu.be/VmNLJx02arU
“Matt Stover on Shatterpoint” (May 2003): https://web.archive.org/web/20050204192329/http://www.starwars.com/eu/lit/novel/f20030529/index.html
This week’s focus: the first novel in the Clone Wars multimedia project, Shatterpoint by Matthew Stover.
SOME HISTORY:
Apocalypse Now, the 1979 Vietnam War movie directed by Francis Ford Coppola, is widely considered to be one of the greatest and most influential films of all time. But Coppola wasn't the first choice for director, and instead George Lucas intended to direct the film. He worked with screenwriter John Milius for several years, but ultimately chose to instead work on American Graffiti and Star Wars. So with that Lucas connection, perhaps it's not surprising that in trying to brainstorm ideas for his Clone Wars novel focused on Mace Windu, Matthew Stover chose Apocalypse Now and its base story [b:Heart of Darkness|4900|Heart of Darkness|Joseph Conrad|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1392799983l/4900._SX50_.jpg|2877220] by Joseph Conrad as the inspiration for his novel. He wanted to lend it a gritty feel: “Apocalypse Now with Jedi.”
MY RECOLLECTION OF THE BOOK:
I'm fairly certain that I read Shatterpoint when it was initially released, because I was keen to read most of the Clone Wars novels and fill in that gap between Episodes II and III. But all I really retained was that it was dark, and it was violent, and that it was focused on Mace Windu.
A BRIEF SUMMARY:
The jungle planet of Haruun Kal, Mace Windu's homeworld that he barely remembers, has become a battleground between the Republic and the Separatist forces. The Jedi Council has dispatched Jedi Master Depa Billaba, Mace's former padawan, to train the local tribesmen into a guerrilla movement. But Depa has vanished, and when news reaches Mace of terrible events on Haruun Kal, he must leave behind the Jedi and civilization to return to his homeland, to seek out his former padawan, and to learn the terrible price that must be paid when keepers of peace turn to war.
A BRIEF TIMELINE DISCLAIMER:
Depa is first sent to Haruun Kal two months after the events of the Battle of Geonosis, and Mace in turn goes to Haruun Kal four months after that. So we can pretty accurately place Shatterpoint at six months into the Clone Wars, after Episode II: Attack of the Clones.
Side note: my library copy of Shatterpoint had a Clone Wars timeline on the inside cover that placed Escape from Dagu nine months into the Clone Wars. If you’re unaware, Escape from Dagu was a canceled novel by William C. Dietz that was going to focus on Shaak Ti.
THE STRUCTURE:
Shatterpoint contains an introduction and an afterword set on Coruscant, involving Mace Windu, Yoda, and Supreme Chancellor Palpatine, then the rest of the novel is broken up into three parts and is entirely set on Haruun Kal. Most interestingly, each of the chapters have chapter titles—something that we usually don't see in Star Wars books, and that I had not seen since Matthew Stover's [b:Traitor|35461|Traitor (Star Wars The New Jedi Order, #13)|Matthew Woodring Stover|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1331430506l/35461._SY75_.jpg|1163697]. The first part—actually the first half of the book—involves Mace arriving on Haruun Kal, meeting Nick Rostu and Chalk and Besh & Lesh, and then heading further into the jungle in search of Depa. Part Two involves Mace traveling with Depa, thinking that they're going to be picked up by Republic forces very soon, and Part Three has a big battle between the Korunnai and the Balawai, as well as a fair bit of Separatist/Republic interference in the battle.
THE CHARACTERS:
Mace has some memories of Haruun Kal: he was taken as an infant by the Jedi, but he came back as a teenager to participate in traditional rites and to learn about their culture. While the Jedi aren't keen on attachments, they don't seem to mind if you learn about your heritage as long as you come back. However, when Mace returns to Haruun Kal, he finds it very different from when he visited decades ago.
This galaxy-wide conflict between the Republic and the Separatists has drawn in smaller local conflicts as well, and on Haruun Kal that includes the Summertime Wars between the Korunnai—the natives of the planet—and the Balawai—the off-worlders who have come because the jungles of Haruun Kal are hugely profitable. The Summertime Wars have been going on for decades at this point; it was mainly a seasonal conflict, but the Balawai siding with the Separatists has made this conflict even more intense, and brought the Korunnai even closer to extinction. The Korunnai and the Balawai are not able to coexist peacefully, and it’s reached a point where the Balawai are quite happy to wipe out all the natives with weapons and ships provided by the Separatists.
That's what Mace struggles with for a lot of this book: recognizing that what's happening on Haruun Kal isn't Republic versus the Separatists, that it goes even deeper to these deep-seated conflicts that have become a part of each culture. Mace’s opinion changes throughout the story; he begins thinking that Depa and the ULF have done terrible things (and they have) but the Balawai have also done horrible things. No one is free of blame here. Yet at the same time, you feel so sympathetic for the Korunnai’s plight, who are facing the end of their way of life and the genocide of their people.
With the way the story is structured, we stay in Mace’s head the entire time. Stover cuts back and forth between limited third person (“he said this” and “he did that,” yet it’s clearly Mace’s POV) and entries from Mace’s private journal, which are written in the first person. It’s an interesting choice—I enjoyed getting to hear some of the entries in Mace’s voice, but I also felt like they were a conceit for Stover to add elements of a first person narrative without committing to it for the entire novel. I didn’t always buy that Mace had time to record his journal entries, especially when some of the entries referred to later events yet we’re told that the datapad is encrypted and he can’t revisit old entries. The journal excerpts are only really present for the first two parts; for obvious reasons, once we get to the climactic battle, Mace doesn’t have time to record his thoughts.
Mace fights A LOT. He’s very good at fighting, but he also says at one point that he likes fighting. I’m not sure if I believe that; I believe that Mace is a strong warrior, especially since he invented a new style of lightsaber combat (Vaapad) but I'm not sure that he enjoys it. He's always seemed more of a stoic character to me; that he's good at what he does, but he doesn't get sheer enjoyment out of it. Especially in the fight scenes, I felt like Mace was stepping perilously close to the Dark Side, and I preferred the scenes where we saw a more thoughtful Mace—the Mace who's trying to save children, who's trying to get Balawai civilians to safety—the Mace who looks at a situation and decides that restraint is the best option. That's the Mace I was interested in learning about, and I wish we could have seen even more of him.
I also liked his relationship with Depa Billaba, his former padawan. He saved her as a young child and then he trained her for over 10 years, so at this point he sees himself not just as her former master but almost as her father figure. Part of the reason why Mace is so upset about what has happened to her, and wants to find her and bring her back to the Jedi Temple, is because he feels responsible for her actions.
But perhaps because we see the story through Mace's eyes, I felt like we didn't get as much of Depa as I would have liked. When we encounter Depa in person in the second part she's physically weak: she's suffering from headaches and nightmares, and she's falling apart before our eyes. There are a few bits, especially in the third part, where Depa does amazing physical feats…but we don't really see them. She does them off-screen, or we'll catch only a glimpse of it and then she collapses. I would have liked to spend a little more time with Depa, to see what a great Jedi she was, rather than just seeing her at her lowest point when the madness of the jungle has overtaken her and she completely falls apart.
I expected Depa to be the antagonist of the story, but instead we have a different main antagonist in the form of Kar Vastor. Vator is a Korunnai from ghosh Windu, like Mace, whose entire family was killed by Balawai when he was a teenager. He was left alone in the jungle for a year, and survived at the cost of his ability to speak. He’s become like a shaman, a strong channeler of the Force energy of the jungle, but like the rest of the natives of Haruun Kal he’s completely untrained. Vastor is just sheer, immense dark power—it’s not Sith, but it’s definitely not Light. I felt like he overshadowed Depa at times—swallowed her up so that she had less of a mind of her own, and was doing what Vastor wanted. Mace’s relationship with Vastor changed throughout the story: he was straight up evil, then they work together, then Mace decides again that he’s a force of evil.
Of the other Korunnai characters that Mace meets, we have Nick Rostu, a smart alecky young man who ends up helping Mace; Chalk, who has had a traumatic life and deserved better than she got; and Lesh & Besh, who don’t end well because the jungle is a dangerous, deadly place.
ISSUES:
My favorite part of Shatterpoint was the first part/half. I felt like the first part integrated more bits from [b:Heart of Darkness|4900|Heart of Darkness|Joseph Conrad|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1392799983l/4900._SX50_.jpg|2877220]—Mace is the Marlow character, who's heading deep into the jungle to find Depa/the maddened Kurtz character. It's strange and it's unnerving and he tries to do the right thing and it's hard and he feels this dark pull on everything he does. He comes to revelations about the history of the planet, and how the Separatists have inveigled themselves into the local conflict.
I was really enjoying the first half, but then I felt like the second half—and especially Part Three, the big climactic battle at the end—started to lose me because it began to veer away from the inspiration that [b:Heart of Darkness|4900|Heart of Darkness|Joseph Conrad|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1392799983l/4900._SX50_.jpg|2877220] provides. Mace is an interesting Marlow-esque character because he is both an outsider and an insider: a native of Haruun Kal who has only been there for brief periods, but also the Jedi outsider trying to figure out what’s going on and why. In Part Two, he talks with Depa a lot and then he gets double crossed by her; in Part Three, there was so much military jargon of all the different missiles and ships and weapons that I lost interest.
Additionally, in Parts Two and Three Stover gave us multiple incidents where Mace has a plan, but it’s not revealed to the reader until afterwards. I can see how that would build suspense, but after it happened multiple times I began to get FRUSTRATED. I wish instead of getting “that’s what I intended, Nick” we had gotten some preemptive explanations, since this happened so many times throughout the story.
I felt like the main point of Depa's story was to show us that the Jedi are guardians of peace, and if you make them military officers they're going to fall apart. Because that's not what they've been trained for! That's not how they've learned to use the Force! As Depa gets drawn into the conflict between the Korunnai and the Balawai, she loses her objectivity and can’t separate herself from the Korunnai’s fate. She's in too deep, and she loses her mind as a result. The Jedi were never intended to command military forces—they were intended to be peacekeepers, or philosophers, or scholars, and to have them lead battles in the Clone Wars is the antithesis of what they’re meant to do.
But I feel like by the time we get to that final battle, that fact has been hammered into the reader’s head, and I felt fatigued reading what was happening. Shatterpoint is a very dark story. There's some humor from Nick Rostu’s quips, but on the whole it's unrelentingly grim. There is a lot of violence here: people get beheaded, and the jungle itself is treacherous and dangerous. (There are wasps that get in your bloodstream and go up to your brain and it’s so disgusting.) But at the same time, I really love that concept of the jungle as this dangerous force; it’s very Jedi-like of the Korunnai to figure out a way to exist within this world that constantly wants to kill them.
I think for me, Shatterpoint is very like [b:Star by Star|35448|Star by Star (Star Wars The New Jedi Order, #9)|Troy Denning|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1331005005l/35448._SY75_.jpg|349891]. It's an interesting story, but it's not a story I'd really want to revisit because it's draining to read. Even at the end, when Mace brings Depa back to the Jedi Temple on Coruscant, it's like she's gone inside. Her body physically is okay, but her mind isn't there anymore, and to watch a Jedi fall apart like that is really hard to read.
IN CONCLUSION:
Shatterpoint almost exclusively focuses on Mace Windu, and how much you like Mace may dictate how much you like this story. It's super dark, super violent, and the last part of the story is very much a war story--with all the elements that entails. But at the same time, I like Stover's attempt to show how the galaxy-wide conflict of the Clone Wars has drawn other localized conflicts in its wake...or in the case of Haruun Kal, has forced local grudges like the Summertime Wars to become even more horrific and devastating.
Next up: maybe the first Star Wars video game tie-in novel (if you don’t count [b:Shadows of the Empire|9549|Shadows of the Empire (Star Wars)|Steve Perry|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1361481442l/9549._SY75_.jpg|858558]): [b:The Ruins of Dantooine|571016|The Ruins of Dantooine (Star Wars Galaxies)|Voronica Whitney-Robinson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1320517326l/571016._SY75_.jpg|558053] by Voronica Whitney-Robinson with W. Haden Blackman.
My YouTube review: https://youtu.be/VmNLJx02arU
“Matt Stover on Shatterpoint” (May 2003): https://web.archive.org/web/20050204192329/http://www.starwars.com/eu/lit/novel/f20030529/index.html
The Clone Wars. Mace Windu. Mace Windu in the Clone Wars. How could this be bad? Well, when the author doesn't use Mace Windu, for one.
Yes, yes, that's Mace on the cover, and yes, he features in the novel. The problem is the Mace Windu in Shatterpoint is not the same Mace Windu in the prequels (and let's face it, Mace Windu is one of the best things about the prequel movies). He's supposed to be, but Stover decides to make Mace Windu into some amalgamation of the character from the movies and Jules Winnfield, going heavy on the Jules in creating his central character. A Mace Windu who has trouble controlling his temper, shouts in people's faces, and threatens violence and death on anyone who crosses his path is not a Jedi. He's treading on the Dark Side, which might make for an interesting theme, but Stover doesn't use any subtlety in how he portrays his character.
Mace in the movies is intense, yes, and even threatening, but he's never out of control. In Shatterpoint we meet a man who likes to fight, and wants to fight, but struggles with holding on to the Light Side of the Force to resist those urges. To his credit, Stover attempts to create an environment that makes people more susceptible to the Dark Side, but it doesn't ring true with me. The author doesn't create his setting and atmosphere well enough to convey that properly, which makes his version of Mace Windu even more out of place in the story.
In the story, Mace travels back to his home planet, a barely hospitable planet covered in dense poison gas, with the only habitable regions existing in the points of the land that rise above the gases. There, the inhabitants live either in cities or the jungle, with the jungle being a dangerous place. Much has been made in other reviews of Stover's attempt to make the story a combination of Star Wars and Apocalypse Now, so I won't go into that except to say that I didn't find it convincing. The two kinds of stories don't mesh well at all, especially when your central character is supposed to be a Jedi.
I also had trouble with Stover's style of writing. His pace and action are fine, but he has a bad habit of overusing colons, and not even properly. He does this thing: it's this thing where he uses it for effect. It doesn't really work, though: all it really does is distract the reader. I got more and more used to it the longer I read: but then he would go and use it in a way that distracted me again. I'm not impressed with writers who want to appropriate grammar for their own uses; they should just stick with the normal rules and not try to get too fancy.
Based on other reviews, I see there's a lot of love for this story, so maybe I'm missing the point, but I couldn't find much to like in it. My biggest issue is the disconnect between the Mace Windu in the book and the one in the prequel movies; had it been handled more appropriately, or with a touch more subtlety, I might have liked it more. As it is, though, I'm hard pressed to recommend it.
Yes, yes, that's Mace on the cover, and yes, he features in the novel. The problem is the Mace Windu in Shatterpoint is not the same Mace Windu in the prequels (and let's face it, Mace Windu is one of the best things about the prequel movies). He's supposed to be, but Stover decides to make Mace Windu into some amalgamation of the character from the movies and Jules Winnfield, going heavy on the Jules in creating his central character. A Mace Windu who has trouble controlling his temper, shouts in people's faces, and threatens violence and death on anyone who crosses his path is not a Jedi. He's treading on the Dark Side, which might make for an interesting theme, but Stover doesn't use any subtlety in how he portrays his character.
Mace in the movies is intense, yes, and even threatening, but he's never out of control. In Shatterpoint we meet a man who likes to fight, and wants to fight, but struggles with holding on to the Light Side of the Force to resist those urges. To his credit, Stover attempts to create an environment that makes people more susceptible to the Dark Side, but it doesn't ring true with me. The author doesn't create his setting and atmosphere well enough to convey that properly, which makes his version of Mace Windu even more out of place in the story.
In the story, Mace travels back to his home planet, a barely hospitable planet covered in dense poison gas, with the only habitable regions existing in the points of the land that rise above the gases. There, the inhabitants live either in cities or the jungle, with the jungle being a dangerous place. Much has been made in other reviews of Stover's attempt to make the story a combination of Star Wars and Apocalypse Now, so I won't go into that except to say that I didn't find it convincing. The two kinds of stories don't mesh well at all, especially when your central character is supposed to be a Jedi.
I also had trouble with Stover's style of writing. His pace and action are fine, but he has a bad habit of overusing colons, and not even properly. He does this thing: it's this thing where he uses it for effect. It doesn't really work, though: all it really does is distract the reader. I got more and more used to it the longer I read: but then he would go and use it in a way that distracted me again. I'm not impressed with writers who want to appropriate grammar for their own uses; they should just stick with the normal rules and not try to get too fancy.
Based on other reviews, I see there's a lot of love for this story, so maybe I'm missing the point, but I couldn't find much to like in it. My biggest issue is the disconnect between the Mace Windu in the book and the one in the prequel movies; had it been handled more appropriately, or with a touch more subtlety, I might have liked it more. As it is, though, I'm hard pressed to recommend it.
What an amazing book. I don’t want to say that Matthew Stover is too good for Star Wars, but… this book is better than Star Wars has any right to be. Most Star Wars books are pulpy fun space adventures, but this- this is literature. Putting aside the plot, characters, and themes, the writing is absolutely gorgeous, some of the best I’ve ever read. Some of the writing is legitimately gruesome. The way this book expands on Mace’s character feels authentic and true to the movies while also showing us a depth that we previously didn’t even know was there. I think Stover has the best insights into the Force, the dark side, and what it means to be a Jedi out of any Star Wars author I’ve ever read. This book has some very cool things to say about Jedi, and some very real things to say about war.
I’ve heard this book described as “Heart of Darkness with lightsabers.” I’m not going to pretend to have read Heart of Darkness, but from what I know about it, that’s a very good way to put it. A story like that is a perfect one to put a Jedi like Mace Windu into. Depa is a fantastic, tragic character, and while she occasionally acts antagonistically, she’s more of a victim than anything else. The true antagonist is Kar Vastor. He’s brutal, and I’m so glad we got a character like that opposite a character like Mace. It did a great job of challenging his Jedi ideology. Nick, while not the most pivotal character, was a welcome addition and provided some much-needed levity. The worldbuilding here is also great. We’ve seen dangerous jungle worlds in Star Wars before, but Haruun Kal is uniquely brutal and unforgiving.
My one very specific complaint comes from a chapter that’s mostly focused on aerial combat. It’s a bit difficult to figure out exactly what’s happening, but that’s a problem I have with a lot of dogfight scenes. Other than that, I found it easy to follow and fantastic throughout.
It’s a huge shame to me that Matthew Stover only wrote four Star Wars books, but I do cherish what we have. This definitely makes me want to read his original works as well. I just need more of his writing.
I’ve heard this book described as “Heart of Darkness with lightsabers.” I’m not going to pretend to have read Heart of Darkness, but from what I know about it, that’s a very good way to put it. A story like that is a perfect one to put a Jedi like Mace Windu into. Depa is a fantastic, tragic character, and while she occasionally acts antagonistically, she’s more of a victim than anything else. The true antagonist is Kar Vastor. He’s brutal, and I’m so glad we got a character like that opposite a character like Mace. It did a great job of challenging his Jedi ideology. Nick, while not the most pivotal character, was a welcome addition and provided some much-needed levity. The worldbuilding here is also great. We’ve seen dangerous jungle worlds in Star Wars before, but Haruun Kal is uniquely brutal and unforgiving.
My one very specific complaint comes from a chapter that’s mostly focused on aerial combat. It’s a bit difficult to figure out exactly what’s happening, but that’s a problem I have with a lot of dogfight scenes. Other than that, I found it easy to follow and fantastic throughout.
It’s a huge shame to me that Matthew Stover only wrote four Star Wars books, but I do cherish what we have. This definitely makes me want to read his original works as well. I just need more of his writing.
I love books and reading and literature and all that. The classics are great, and I love me some modern classics even more. I'll read non-fiction and memoirs and love every bit. Now this, this is literature too. Let's forget it's a Star Wars book for a quick second and analyze it like anyone would a work of "real" literature. The novel addresses genocide, fighting over resources, warring factions and tribes, military presence, colonization, the power and brutality held in rural lands, conflict with self and conflict with nature. All that while giving you an entertaining story of fighting for salvation of a friend, doing the right thing even when it's a hard thing, and (bringing it back to that this is a Star Wars book) what it means to be a Jedi and live by their unique code. Matthew Stover has a beautiful way with words and his writing taps into the feelings, conflicts, and emotional toll of each character. This was great. This was "Heart of Darkness" with lightsabers. This is literature.
dark
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I once heard the world of the prequels described as "bright and shining" - which is true, but it is also incredibly dark and horrifying. This novel really gets into what can make a Jedi fall to the dark side, which is something that I've been wondering about a lot lately, after watching The Clone Wars and seeing Anakin's behavior in them which made me wonder just how he could fall from there to slaughtering younglings. Anyway, good fight scenes, good story, good characters, excellent exploration of the ramifications of war and Force use. I don't know what more you could want in a Star Wars novel.