Club Jade

We’ve got details this morning on the forthcoming Rebels series, most notably a brief blurb for Martha Wells’ still-untitled Leia novel:

Nebula Award finalist Martha Wells makes her Star Wars debut with a brand-new classic Star Wars: Rebels adventure starring Princess Leia and her new friends, Luke Skywalker and Han Solo, in the time just after the destruction of the Death Star in Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope!

Princess Leia Organa is on a mission for the Rebel Alliance when Imperial forces attack. Now she, Han, and Luke are on their own, working with pirates and dealing with traitors as they race the clock to protect the secrecy of a crucial meeting of Rebel conspirators!

The listing also gives us (presumably tentative) dates for the other books in the series: March 2014 for James S. A. Corey’s Han book and January 2015 for Kevin Hearn’s Luke novel. (via)

John Jackson Miller’s Kenobi also gets a blurb:

In this original novel set between the events of Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith and Episode IV A New Hope, Obi-Wan Kenobi comes to the aid of the residents of Tatooine during his exile. But he struggles with his new mission when he realizes that protecting Luke Skywalker-the last hope of the galaxy-means setting aside his compassion and his Jedi warrior training, for the future of the galaxy lies not with Obi-Wan Kenobi, but with a mystical desert recluse known only by the name of Crazy Old Ben.

There’s also a listing for William Shakespeare’s Star Wars (with the cover and a few interior pages.)

Ty Franck – one half of James S.A. Corey, who’s working on a Han Solo book for the Rebels series, gave fans the first progress update yesterday:

Ground has been broken on the Star Wars novel. An outline has been approved, and chapters are being typed. Things I’ve learned so far: It is important to know ahead of time how you will handle Chewie talking, the Star Wars universe has instantaneous communication and nearly instantaneous travel but space is STILL big enough to hide things, hyperspace is how you get away from badguys but jumping through hyperspace ain’t like dusting crops kid, and Leia is the brains of the operation. If someone has a good idea, it’s Leia. Han is always always always wrong when he makes a plan or predicts the future, but man does he improvise gracefully. More robots. Always more robots.

The post got passed around quite a bit today, and well:

Thing I learned today: If you blog about writing a Star Wars novel, PEOPLE CARE.

— James.S.A.Corey (@JamesSACorey) January 15, 2013

Ha. Welcome to the, ah, family. Keep your seatbacks and tray table in the locked and upright position…

You can learn a little more about Franck and writing partner Daniel Abraham in an excerpt from a recent interview in Locus. I also recommend checking out their first two novels – Leviathan Wakes and Caliban’s War. I have horrible luck with Star Wars writers outside of Star Wars (sorry, it’s true, no recs please) but these books are pretty fantastic. Hopefully that means good things for this Han book.

Well, here’s the big news out of New York Comic Con: John Jackson Miller is moving up to the big leagues with a post-Revenge of the Sith novel tentatively titled Kenobi. And the Rebels series announced at CVI continues with a Han Solo novel from new-to-the-EU author James S. A. Correy, aka Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck, whose Leviathan Wakes was recently nominated for a Hugo. They’re a big get for Del Rey!

On his blog, Miller describes Kenobi as “part epic western, part high-stakes drama, part romance.” You can get a closer look at Scalf’s preview art on his DA. (via) The book will be a hardcover and is currently scheduled for Fall 2013.

Also revealed: Golden’s Sword the the Jedi series will also feature Jag (well, obviously,) Ben Skywalker, Allana and Tahiri. And there’s still no word on Kemp’s duology, but Frank Parisi promises “It will f’ing blow your minds!” (Riiight.) And, finally, Crucible is not the big 3′s last adventure, it’s just going to “change them forever.” Thanks to @DelReyStarWars and avgoins for the live tweets!