Read, You Can: The Last Jedi

With The Last Jedi now available for home viewing, or coming soon depending on where you live, you may be looking for ways to expand on your enjoyment of the movie. Or perhaps you're looking for something to do between repeat viewings?

Here are several books for young readers that expand or enhance the story from the latest Star Wars film.

The Last Jedi Junior Novel - Author Michael Kogge (The Force Awakens Junior Novel, Poe Dameron: Flight Log) retells The Last Jedi for middle-grade readers, with deleted and extended scenes, as well as exclusive scenes you won't find anywhere else featuring Rey, Chewbacca, R2-D2, Finn, and more! This book also includes an 8-page full-color insert.

The Legends of Luke Skywalker - In The Last Jedi, the issue of Luke's status as a hero and legend has become a concern for the aging Jedi. This collection of tales (written by award-winning author Ken Liu) told by the crew aboard a cargo ship gives readers an idea of the kinds of stories floating around about Luke. But are the stories true, or merely tall tales passed from one corner of the galaxy to another? Readers will have to decide for themselves!


Colbalt Squadron - Author Elizabeth Wein offers this adventure starring sisters Rose and Paige Tico sets up their stories in The Last Jedi. Similar to previous middle-grade novels like Weapon of a Jedi and Moving Target, which both also featured art by Phil Noto, this story goes into the lives of the Resistance flight crew members. Like Before the Awakening did for The Force Awakens, Colbalt Squardon leads up to the events of The Last Jedi.

Bomber Command - covering similar ground to Cobalt Squadron, frequent Star Wars author Jason Fry creates the journal of Paige Tico, the ill-fated sister of Rose. This covers many aspects of The Last Jedi from the perspective of the Resistance fighter. Much like previous journals from Studio Fun (Rey's Survival Guide, Sabine: My Rebel Sketchbook) it is fully-illustrated with Paige's notes plus diagrams, sketches and fold-out sections.


Star Wars The Last Jedi The Visual Dictionary - Can never say enough good things about the Visual Dictionary books. In-depth details and photos of nearly every alien, droid, weapon, helmet, vehicle and more.

Star Wars The Last Jedi Incredible Cross-Sections - for the extremely detail-oriented fans, the Incredible Cross-Sections books show all the ins and outs of key vehicles and spaceships and more! Plus gorgeous large-size photos from the movie. Illustrated by the amazing Kemp Remillard (The Force Awakens Incredible Cross-Sections) with descriptions by the above-mentioned Jason Fry.

That's not every tie-in book but it's sure a great start to expanding on your enjoyment of The Last Jedi!

Read, You Must: Poe Dameron Flight Log

Poe Dameron: Flight Log is a new “replica journal” from Studio Fun, the publishers of previous Star Wars middle grade books like Ezra’s Rebel Journal and Sabine’s My Rebel Sketchbook. This means the book is set "In-Universe" and meant to be a replica of Poe’s actual writings and data files. 

The story of The Force Awakens, or at least Poe’s part in the adventure, is told by “the best pilot in the Resistance” himself through a series of transcribed conversations and notes. The back cover warns that these are “highly classified” documents inside this 96 page hardcover!

Similar to the earlier Rey’s Survival Guide, Poe Dameron: Flight Log includes photos, diagrams of ships, and insights specifically from Poe’s perspective. There are fold-out pages and hologram images cleverly revealed through lift-the-flaps.

The book goes beyond simply re-telling the story of the movie. There are events that happen before Poe meets Lor San Tekka on Jakku. Such events may be familiar to readers of the Poe Dameron comic series, but might be new to others.  

Poe Dameron: Flight Log also has a few other bits and pieces of Poe’s family history included, pulled from comics and other novels. There’s even a bit of insight of what happened to Poe after he and Finn crashed on Jakku, who rescued him and how Poe made it off-world.

Poe Dameron: Flight Log is written by Michael Kogge who has previously written several Star Wars Rebels novels and the terrific The Force Awakens Junior Novel. Kogge captures the same confident attitude that hotshot pilot Poe displays throughout the film. Poe shows disdain for reports and protocol: he just wants to fly!

Check this out too!

The book ends with an overview of Poe’s fellow pilots that participated in the final destruction of Starkiller Base and a promise of more adventures to come!     

         

Perhaps due to the marketing of The Force Awakens, or that the toys stand side-by-side on the shelves, it’s easy to forget how little Poe crosses paths with Rey in the movie. Reading books like Rey’s Story and this one really point out that those two key characters, though they make mutual friends in Finn, really have no contact. Perhaps in The Last Jedi they'll get to have a conversation?

If you want to expand on what you know of Poe, or just revisit The Force Awakens from a new perspective, this book is for you.

Publisher’s recommendation Ages 6-12

Also available now for Poe Dameron fans from Lucasfilm/Disney Press:

Read, You Must: Aliens of the Galaxy

What’s Star Wars without the aliens? Hard to imagine! 

With memorable characters like Jabba the Hutt, Yoda, Jar Jar Binks and Maz Kanata, Star Wars has always shown a wide variety of lifeforms that populate the galaxy far, far away. Some aliens are terrifying like Darth Maul and others are huggable like Chewbacca, but they sure are all a big part of what makes Star Wars so great!

In Star Wars: Aliens of the Galaxy frequent Star Wars author Jason Fry (Weapon of a Jedi, Star Wars in 100 Scenes and many more!) describes the interesting traits of numerous alien species. The book is 42 pages full of photos and images spanning all 7 “Episode” movies (no Rogue One sneak peeks here). One nice feature is the large fold-out section at the back that really highlights the different aliens of The Force Awakens in a big way!

There are other great guidebooks to the characters of Star Wars but they usually focus only on the movies OR the TV shows – rarely both. Thankfully not here! 

In Aliens of the Galaxy you usually see a variety of images for each kind of alien including how they appeared on TV. Along the way there are many nuggets of information to “Increase your galactic IQ” as well.

 

For younglings wanting to learn more about the non-human characters of Star Wars, particularly those in The Force Awakens, Aliens of the Galaxy is a fun, informative read with plenty of detailed visuals.

Publisher's Recommendation: Ages 6 - 9

Also by Jason Fry:  

Catch up with Star Wars Rebels!

If you are new to Star Wars Rebels, or just hungry for more Rebels while waiting for Season 3, check out a few terrific books you may have missed when they first appeared.

Obviously watching the season 1 and 2 episodes is top priority for getting caught up. Season one has been available for some time and season 2 will be released on DVD & Bluray on August 30 (N. America). 

Over the past two years many entertaining books were also released to expand the experience, particularly for younger fans. Here’s just a few recommendations:

Ezra’s Gamble is a middle-grade novel by Ryder Windham that introduces the main character Ezra before he meets any of the Ghost crew. What was his life like before Ezra met Kanaan and Hera? Find out in this book. Highly recommended! Our review here. 

Star Wars Rebels: The Visual Guide & Star Wars Rebels Visual Guide: Epic Battles  If you want to dive deeper into the details of Rebels, these books are your best bet! Loaded with full-colour pictures from the episodes and all kids of information from author Adam Bray you may not catch watching the show. 

Ezra’s Journal & Sabine: My Rebel Sketchbook are two books “written by” Ezra and Sabine themselves! Ok, not really (cartoons don’t usually write real-world books) but that’s the idea here and the reader can get inside the mind of the characters in a whole different way with these middle-grade books. Review of both here.

Draw Star Wars Rebels from Klutz Books is a great place to start if the show inspires you to create your own Rebels adventures. Step-by-step instructions and even comes with art supplies! Our review here.

Rise of the Rebels is a chapter-book retelling by Michael Kogge of the short videos released before the Rebels show premiered. You can see these shorts online and on the DVD or Bluray or enjoy them expanded upon in this book.

For younger readers Ezra’s Wookiee Rescue Book & CD is a shortened version of the debut special Spark of Rebellion, this storybook comes with a CD reading of the book along with music, sound effects and actors from the show. Very entertaining!

The Servants of the Empire series – In the first season of Rebels viewers met Zare Leonis, a young Imperial cadet with a secret agenda, who befriends Ezra in the episode “Breaking Ranks”. Zare hasn’t appeared much in the show since, but is the main character of the Servants of the Empire series of middle-grade novels written by Jason Fry.

Do you have a favourite Star Wars Rebels book, toy or game? Did we miss something awesome? Post a comment below!