Into the Dark by Claudia Gray
Into the Dark by Claudia Gray
Two distinct timelines that alternate between each other make up the book--one being in the current Hyperspace Disaster timeline with Starlight Beacon still not officially up and running and the other being 25 years prior. The bulk of the story is in the current timeline, but the 25 years prior story is essential to understanding the character of Master Cohmac.
Essentially, the Hyperspace Disaster has left a ship containing Jedi passengers on their way to the Starlight Beacon stranded...along with myriad other ships. The stranded travelers team up and board an ancient space station where they must work together to confront and overcome the perils that await. Secrets are revealed and deceptions are enacted and the ride is wonderful!! Find much more detail below! (I go over some location/plot points for both timelines first and then go into detail about characters both major and minor, planets, species, detailed information, and random trivia in that order.)
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The current timeline takes place mostly on a space station built many many years previous by the Amaxine Warriors (you know...Snoke's space station?!?! from "The Rise of Kylo Ren" short-run comic series). "Its center was a large sphere made of hexagonal plates of some transparent material. Heavy metal rings clustered on square-shaped tethers at its poles, with another metal ring stretching around its equator, which [Reath] estimated at roughly five hundred meters in diameter. One airlock was part of the sphere itself, but was unusable, mostly because it was both enormous and highly irregularly shaped, built to welcome some kind of ship none of them had ever seen before, perhaps because it had ceased to exist." "the central globe [...] included booths and kiosks on multiple layers of walkways. They might've once been shops, laboratories, all open to the glassy sphere that formed the body of the station--and all covered in vines. And ferns. And moss. Even a couple of trees. Plant life spilled over every beam, climbed up every wall. This was more flora than Reath saw in a year on Coruscant." The plants are cultivated and cared for by small droids of "an antique 8-T gardening model, which looked a lot like the 'head' dome of an astromech let loose on its own." They appear to only care about the plants and thus not pose any threat to the travelers aboard the station...but that's the problem, they care about the plants A LOT...
Four statues/idols stand in a sort of ceremonial area in the central sphere of the station. "Each one depicted a different species, or perhaps mythological figure, but they all shared the golden plating and the richly jeweled ornamentation." There is an insect, a human, an amphibian, and a bird. Cohmac and Orla disagree on what these statues represent--monarchs, historical leaders, gods, mythological figures, conquered civilizations, but they agree on one thing, they each hold a dark evil in check within them...or do they???
The Amaxines "were ancient warriors--from really long ago, even before the Republic. Their fierceness in battle was supposedly unmatched. There are all these legends of how their scouts would appear almost out of thin air, signaling the troops to sweep in for attack." You actually learn how they were able to manage such a feat as you get deeper into the book--it's quite a fascinating bit of technology!! Reath continues with, "Apparently, when the Republic unified so much of the galaxy, the Amaxines weren't willing to accept the peace. So they left the galaxy and flew into empty space, in search of another great war to fight."
The big bad of this book, although they don't actually appear until about 70% of the way through, are the Drengir--sapient plants made of stems/stalks, vines, and large cavernous mouths, can hold blasters, and are super hungry for meat...other sapients mostly. Did I mention they're incredibly strong in the dark side of the Force?? These guys were first introduced in the Dark Legends book in the short story "A Bitter Harvest." They then appeared in the "High Republic" long-run comic series (check out an image from said series below, and check out my reviews on said series at the link found below next to Sskeer under Minor/Mentioned Characters). Even the Sith were challenged by the Drengir's great power!! A wonderful description--"Behind them he heard the eerie rustle-thudding that had to be the sound of the Drengir running." I am so happy that they simultaneously released a comic book with vivid imagery of these guys and a novel with vivid descriptions of these guys' tactics and attitudes--the synergy is monumentally fabulous!!
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Twenty-five years prior to the events on the Amaxine station, there was a hostage situation involving the leaders of Eiram and E'ronoh. Now for a bit of backstory on these feuding planets--"Eiram and E'ronoh occupied a system that served as a waypoint through hyperspace; they held a gateway, one that had long remained closed to the rest of the galaxy. This could've led to immense power for both worlds, had they been willing to share it. Instead, they competed for control of the region, belligerently dealing with those who dared to violate their space, each limiting traffic almost to nothing. Eiram and E'ronoh weren't actively fighting a war against each other, but intelligence suggested a bitter standoff between the two, one that had lasted for more than a century. Its origins were obscure and, by then, beside the point. Eiram hated E'ronoh. E'ronoh hated Eiram. The end. Until royalty from each planet had been kidnapped and ransomed."
Between the two planets is a moon--"Nobody knew whether the moon had once orbited Eiram or E'ronoh, only that it had, at some point countless millennia past, drifted from its orbit and come to rest in dead space between the two worlds. The moon was so devoid of any value that Eiram and E'ronoh didn't even bother fighting over it. It just hung there, obscure and ignored." This is where the action of this timeline takes place as the two captured monarchs are being kept hostage in the tunnels deep beneath the moon's surface.
The two members of royalty that are kidnapped are Monarch Cassel of E'ronoh, a Pantoran, and Queen Thandeka of Eiram, a tawny-skinned human. Problem is, Thandeka is the queen consort...in other words, she's married to Queen Dima who is the actual queen or queen regnant. Another queer couple in the High Republic Era!! So much happy!!! I'm not going to go into detail about Thandeka here because I'll be saving that for an Aphra's Artifacts episode you won't want to miss...she's kind of a bada**. Their kidnapper is a Lasat named Isamer who represents the Directorate, a group that has made a deal with the Hutts in an attempt to keep the Jedi out of that part of the galaxy and destabalize local governments--"Fear would triumph. And Isamer would profit."
The jist of this timeline's plot is that upon the Jedi's (Orla and Cohmac, Master Laret and Master Simmix) approach to the moon, Orla answers a distress call from Cassel's ship immediately...but it's actually the kidnappers putting up a ruse and the Jedi ship gets attacked and crash lands, killing Cohmac's Master, Simmix, and leaving the Jedi stranded. They must enter the moon's tunnel and cave system and seek out the kidnapper's lair where the two hostages are being held. Things don't turn out for the best and it all weighs very heavily on Cohmac in the current timeline since being back on the Frontier has brought up old memories.
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Characters:
-Reath Silas: human with dark brown hair and freckles, Padawan to Jora Malli, not all that strong in the Force but a very hard worker with a great will to improve, does NOT want to go out to the Frontier to continue his Padawanship, would rather stay on Coruscant and bury his nose in research tomes thus continuing his work as an archivist, does NOT like the idea of adventure or excitement--"preferred reading stories to living them", but man oh man does he grow throughout this book and prove his extensive bravery when dire straits are upon his friends!! I definitely would LOVE to see more of this character in future High Republic publications.
-Dez Rydan: Jora Malli's former Padawan, craves adventure a bit too much, "handsome, driven, tall, with golden skin and thick black hair, Dez made friends readily." Does some intense growing and introspection of his own as he strives to become a more balanced Jedi.
-Orla Jareni: Umbaran with stark pale skin and high cheekbones, hair "a silver nearly as dark as black," double-bladed white lightsaber (aren't white lightsabers only the result of healing a crystal that has been bled by a Sith/dark side user??? how in the world did she end up with a healed crystal if there are no Sith...), wore snowy robes, has recently declared herself a Wayseeker--"a Jedi who would operate independently of the dictates of the Jedi Council.", has several discussions with Cohmac about dealing with emotions as a Jedi--"There is no emotion so justified or noble that it cannot lead to madness, if not kept in proper proportions."
-Master Cohmac Vitus: probably the most relatable character, resonant voice, golden robe, "renowned as both scholar and mystic He seemed to have footnotes in half the books Reath read, on topics as diverse as ancient Force rituals and high-crisis hostage negotiations.", average height "but seemed taller because of his slender, angular build, the thick black hair he wore almost to his shoulders, and the gravitas of his presence.", a folklorist, in response to whether or not he could or should show emotions as a Jedi--"Why? Why should I overcome it? If I cannot feel anger over the loss of such a life, then I cannot feel anything at all. The Order asks us to excise the deepest parts of ourselves--and for what? So that a young man might die unmourned?", on what happened 25 years before--"I have come to realize that it was not my mistakes that scarred me then. I dwelled upon them because the Order would not allow me to grieve. My sorrow had no other outlet. And this, they tell us, is the proper Jedi way.", a thought in response to the Council's lack of emotion--"Why should it be a virtue to hide your feelings? To pretend that they don't exist?", "They command that master and apprentice spend years together, working as a partnership, as close as any family could possibly be, and then they expect us not to become attached. I never thought about it before--I never had to--but now I can't escape how unfair it is. Worse than unfair. It's wrong.", bringing up a GREAT point about the divisiveness of the Force as taught by the Jedi--"The darkness is as much a part of the Force as the light. The Order thinks it can bisect the Force so neatly--as though the primal living energy of all existence were a thing to be sliced and served. [...] does the divide only make the darkness darker, more dangerous, than it ever would have been in a state of nature?" SO MUCH YES!!! This guy is ON POINT with his ponderings!!
-Affie Hollow: a 17 year-old human girl, tan skin, long brown hair, wore a pilot's coverall that matched the blue of the outside of the Vessel (the ship she co-pilots), adoptive daughter of Scover Byne who is the owner of the Byne Guild shipping conglomerate, her birth parents had flown a ship called the Kestrel's Dive, A truly wonderful character who is loving, kind, generous, curious, and always wants to do what's right--I love her so much!
-Leox Gyasi: human, wears his shirt open to the waist, uses spice regularly, pilot of the Vessel, tall, tan, rangy, wavy dark blond hair, wears a beaded necklace, very funny and super enigmatic--definitely a nifty character
-Geode: a Vintian from Vint, looks like a giant rock, doesn't have a mouth, apparently instead of sleeping he recrystallizes, Okay...so I said Leox was enigmatic...I think this guy takes that title instead...
-Nan: a young human girl who's guardian is Hague, hardly more than a meter and a half tall, wears "a shabby but colorful dress", first to send a distress signal out after the Hyperspace Disaster amongst the ships that end up near the Amaxine station--received by the Vessel, has blue streaks in her hair...could that mean something??
-Hague: an elderly Zabrak who watches over Nan, flies a ship that is a patchwork of different parts some old and some new...could that mean something??
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Minor/Mentioned Characters:
-Jora Malli: Togruta, Jedi Council member, set to be the Jedi Master in charge of the Starlight Beacon, Master to Reath Silas, dies in the Battle of Kur (see Light of the Jedi and "Go Together: Part Two" both by Charles Soule) against the Nihil, many times throughout the book Reath has words from Jora pop up in his head as he approaches difficult or frustrating cirumstances--my favorite being "If you use your defeat to learn the path to victory, it was no defeat at all"--yes girl yes!!, a description of her from Reath's point of view--"her warm smile, her surprisingly deep laughter, her insatiable cravings for Bilbringi food"
-Kym: a Padawan friend of Reath's who is excited for his new frontier assignment
-Imri: a male human Padawan featured in A Test of Courage by Justina Ireland
-Vernestra: from A Test of Courage, knighted while still in her teens
-Scover Byne: a Bivall who owns the Byne Guild (to which the Legacy Run belongs!! see Light of the Jedi), adoptive mother to Affie who she is grooming to be her second-in-command, may not be the cleanest business woman..., doesn't show emotion much as that is a Bivall trait
-Master Laret Soveral: Orla Jareni's Master as a Padawan, found in the 25 years ago story line, one Force gift of hers was finding pathways within it
-Master Simmix: Cohmac Vitus's Master as a Padawan, found in the 25 years ago story line, a Filithar who died in a spaceship crash because "The safety harnesses aboard this shuttle had not been configured for Filithar or any other limbless species", scaly green body
-Master Adampo: on the Jedi Council, a Yarkoran "with magnificent whiskers"
-Master Rosason: on the Jedi Council, "a human woman of advanced years"
-Master Sskeer: was the one who declared Jora Malli lost in action, find his harrowing and mysterious story in the "High Republic" long-run comic series!! (Check out my reviews of this series on the Beyond the Blast Doors website.)
-Master Poreht La: a Lasat who was an expert on ancient techniques
-Master Tia Mirabel: a human archivist who "had learned more about Force-imbued objects than anyone else in the Order."
-Master Giktoo Nelmo: a Lurmen!!! whose "power spoke for itself" (remember this species of pacifists from "The Clone Wars" animated show??? I loved them!!)
-Jedi present at the Starlight Beacon dedication: senior Jedi Avar Kriss, Elzar Mann, and Stellan Gios; Sskeer and Burryaga (the Wookiee Padawan from Light of the Jedi!!)
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Mentioned planets:
-Zeitooine: Dez had exploits here, taught him a lot about poisons, "The Zeit royalty were made up of treacherous houses, forever attempting to assassinate one another by elaborate means such as powders added to wineglasses or venoms smeared on pillowcases.", apparently this planet made its first appearance in Lost Stars also by Claudia Gray--forgot that!!
-Christophsis: Dez had exploits here, featured in "The Clone Wars" animated show
-Kennerla: a planet Affie had traveled to
-Brield system: Reath had once "helped clear passengers from a badly malfunctioning transport" here
-Wrea: Affie's birth parents took her here where they swam when she was younger, an aquatic planet featured as a hideout of Saw Gerrera's where he raised Jyn in the book Rebel Rising!!
-Zardossa Stix: clay warriors were "ancient statues of a fallen army. The Zardossan legends claimed that the statues were the only things keeping the warriors dead--that if they were ever destroyed, the army would spring back to life.", where Mace Windu and Jar Jar Binks rescued Queen Julia of Bardotta in "The Clone Wars" animated show
-Crothy: A fever was raging there when the Hyperspace Disaster happened and one ship was headed there with vaccines.
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New species:
-Mizi: "not as susceptible to radiation as most sentient species, so they haul cargo a lot of other ships can't.", "preferred to be nameless to strangers"
-Orincan: "Their lack of outer beauty is perfectly matched by their lack of inner beauty.", "appeared to be related to the Gamorreans, only paler and less photogenic"...yikes!!
-Ogemites: some were traveling on the Journeyman from Cerea (see below under Random Trivia)
-Trodatomes: a very large sentient species...wait a second...Klaud from The Rise of Skywalker is a Trodatome!!! Duh!
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Further detailed information:
The Vessel: "It was an unusual ship, at least to Reath: its plating was dark blue, and its cockpit and engines both rounded to the point of being bulbous." Leox says, "I named it not for the container itself, but the space within the container that gives it its value and purpose. To remind me to look beyond the obvious"--typical Leox and I love it!
"The Kyber Arch stood within one of the vast meditation chambers of the Coruscant temple. Each crystal in the arch was a kyber crystal, one retrieved from the damaged lightsaber of a Jedi fallen in battle. As beautifully as it sparkled in the light, it was a reminder of the price their fellow Jedi had paid in pursuit of justice over the past millennia. Thick at the bases, the very topmost curve of the arch had deliberately been left extremely narrow, as a representation of the perils the fallen had faced." It is made very clear in this book that lightsaber battle training is mostly for show as no saber on saber battles have occurred in a VERY long time thus these crystals must be quite old.
Reath's explanation of the Jedi to Affie: "So, the Jedi are Force users united in our quest to understand the mysteries of the Force and to serve as guardians of peace and justice throughout the galaxy. [...] we ground ourselves in a spiritual existence and give up individual attachments in order to focus entirely on greater concerns." Dang what a canned explanation!!
Interestingly enough, during this era, as is made clear in Light of the Jedi, the Republic is beginning to expand outward into "the Frontier" and apparently "The Republic's arrival in their sector had driven shipping to feverish levels of activity; everyone wanted to move cargo before it could be taxed, tariffed, or outlawed." I love these kinds of details!!
Beneath the Jedi Temple on Coruscant is a place called "the Shrine in the Depths" that is locked off from the rest of the Temple and is covered by a meditation area...in fact, the Jedi Temple itself had been built atop a Sith shrine--"A vergeance in the Force existed there--a nexus of power and energy that could be put to many uses, both worthy and wicked. Vergeances rose of their own accord; they could not be created, only discovered. In the far distant past of the Old Republic, back during the ancient Sith Empire, Sith and Jedi had often warred for control of these vergeances. The Sith had held this one first." This brings me to a question...if vergeances can't be created, what about Darth Plagueis influencing the midichlorians to create life?? What about the creation of Anakin in a fatherless birth??
The Nihil do feature in this book but they are not the main baddie. Regardless, there seems to still be a disconnect between how the Nihil hierarchical structure works. Here we have a group of Nihil referred to as a Storm and another as a Cloud, similar to what we see in A Test of Courage, but in Light of the Jedi, a person is a Storm or a Cloud. WHICH IS IT?!?! Ugh. The fact that a Tempest Runner is in control of this particular Cloud is mentioned but I wanna know which Tempest Runner it is!! There is some great description of the Nihil though, "They didn't wear uniforms, exactly, though there was a sameness to their garb: dark, padded, covered in strips or panels of safety material that would be impervious to water, maybe to fire, as well. Their telltale helmets and breathmasks hung around their necks or from utility belts". On their motives--"For a split second, the Nihil hesitated. That second was long enough for Reath to recognize that these were raiders, not warriors, and their courage faltered in a conflict where no profit was to be had. But all beings will fight for their lives."
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Random trivia:
-Orla and Cohmac when Padawans flew a T-1 shuttle on their mission to Eiram/E'ronoh.
-Jedha tea is a thing!!
-"Helix rings were incredible energy boosters, the equivalent of enough pure coaxium to fuel forty or fifty large spaceships; they were seldom used because they generated too much power for almost any non-hyperspace purpose. They had a tendency to malfunction, especially when older, and created energy surges capable of melting metal, blowing circuits, or--"...you'll have to read to find out!!
-The Journeyman was a carrier ship that had left from Cerea with 300 passengers and hit space debris while traveling through a hyper lane thought to be clear post the Hyperspace Disaster.
-The Rushlight Equinox and the Spiderspun are two other ships in the Byne Guild fleet.
-"creche-minders" are a thing in the Jedi temple...I'm guessing they watch over younglings??
-The Coruscant Jedi Temple has a Padawan dorm.
-barafuraha: an ice-based delicacy
-"Nihil ships are uniquely dangerous because they can join together or separate into smaller sections."
-The Alisandre Hotel was a luxury hotel on Coruscant, beds are enormous to accommodate species such as Gigorans and Trodatomes
-Two fairytales rooted in fact involve the Good Princess Chaia of Alderaan and the Ithorian pirate Bluebrow
-Jedi receive stipends...I wondered how they made their money!!
-Containment of the dark side could take a few different forms: "the echo of a Sith or other servant of darkness; a specific memory of an atrocity, usually the remembrance of those who had committed it; or a more amorphous, unfocused energy."
-"A Jedi could last longer without breathing than the average sentient being"
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Phew!! Well at least this review was shorter than the one I did for Light of the Jedi lol...I think... Anyway, this was a fabulous book with some truly wonderful world-building details. Claudia Gray has knocked it out of the park again!! And the character development was fascinating and real and so much fun to witness. The plot was surprising, intriguing, and kept throwing me for a loop in all the best of ways. So much goodness in this novel!!! If I've sparked your interest, check out the link at the top of this review to purchase your own copy...you won't regret it!
-Marie E. Wilson a.k.a. @AliaMorgaine
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