Oh boy.
Entertainment Weekly reports that Journey to Episode VII – of which we’ve already heard about in drips and drabbles – will in fact encompass 20 books and comics across the various publishers. (Including such things as ‘sticker books,’ so it’s not exactly the New Jedi Order all over again, thankfully.)
“The Force Awakens is an extraordinarily, heavily guarded storyline. To track it, a lot of top-secret meetings were happening up in San Francisco as we worked through this program,” says Andrew Sugerman, executive vice president of Disney Publishing Worldwide. The company is managing the release through its own imprints as well as at least seven outside companies, among them sci-fi publisher Del Rey, Dorling Kindersley, and Marvel Comics.
The only Del Rey book mentioned is Star Wars: Aftermath – no author is given, but it certainly sounds like something in the new gap years between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens. Marvel will put out at least two TFA prequel stories, including one from Threepio’s perspective.
The YA books – the one we’ve primarily heard about thus far, do get authors:
Cecil Castellucci (author of Tin Star) will write Moving Target, an adventure following Princess Leia; Jason Fry, who earlier wrote Darth Maul: Shadow Conspiracy, will be the author of The Weapon of a Jedi, about Luke Skywalker; Claudia Gray, author of the Evernight series of fantasy books, will write a book titled Lost Stars; and Greg Rucka, a comic book scribe and writer of the Atticus Kodiak novels, will pen Smuggler’s Run, a Han Solo tale.
We knew about Claudia Gray, and Jason Fry is (so far) our only returning author. Now, we wait for more from Del Rey and Marvel… Cross your fingers.
Wow.
Wow is right! It’s certainly impressive and will, no doubt, attract new readers.
However, in talking to someone else this morning, my feeling is…ambivalent? Like, those of us who’ve been around a minute or two have already done this rodeo? For the old readers like myself, I might just wait and see how the movie is before diving into new!canon.