What Your Favorite Star Wars Book Says About You
Every Star Wars book falls into a category that says a lot about those drawn to it.
I always like to say that there is a Star Wars book out there for everyone, but I rarely explain what this actually means. Sure, everyone has a favorite character and there’s probably at least one book featuring that character to some degree (even Bo-Katan gets one book appearance). But it’s not just about characters or eras or even story genre. Your favorite Star Wars book, or type of Star Wars book, says a lot about what means the most to you and who you are as a person.
One of my favorite Star Wars books of all time, for example, is Ahsoka by E.K. Johnston. I wouldn’t say that Ahsoka Tano is necessarily in my top five favorite characters. But I’m generally really drawn to character-driven stories. That, and the Rise of the Empire era is one of my favorites in all of Star Wars because I like stories about hopeless people who find hope anyway. And that’s what this particular era is all about.
My draw to the Ahsoka novel speaks to my preference for stories about people discovering their life’s purpose through overcoming hardship. This narrative chronicles the journey toward Ahsoka’s ultimate choice to commit to bringing down the Empire no matter the risk. There are lightsabers in this book, and nods to The Clone Wars, and Bail Organa even shows up for part of it. But it isn’t these things that win it a spot among my favorites. It matters to me because surviving trauma and using that experience as a weapon against oppression is a concept that matters to me.
This was something I really didn’t know about myself until I started to explore what it was about the Ahsoka novel that resonated with me so much. When I read it for the second time, I was surrounded by a lot of people who didn’t like it. And when I’m in that situation, in addition to listening to others’ reasons for not liking something, I like asking myself questions about why the thing I like that others don’t had such a positive impact on me.
This is why our favorite Star Wars books matter. They can teach us just as much about ourselves as they can about a galaxy far, far away. Maybe your favorite Star Wars book is Kenobi by John Jackson Miller. Is it because Obi-Wan Kenobi is your favorite character and Tusken Raiders are cool? Maybe. But it could also be because you resonate with stories about the strangers we come across in our lives, who may only be around for a short time but shift the trajectory of our futures in that brief period of space we share with them. Maybe you connect on a deep level with stories about people who are afraid to take a leap of faith, only to realize that the only way forward is to dive headfirst into the unknown.
There will be Star Wars books that entertain you, Star Wars books that fill in gaps movies or shows couldn’t cover. There will be books that take you to new fictional places, books that grant you a good love story — even books that are so fast-paced and filled with lore that you can’t stand to just read them once and never pick them up again.
But your favorite Star Wars books — the ones you keep coming back to, the ones you think about and sometimes maybe even reference in your everyday life — are a viewport into your own soul. Try as you might, it may prove impossible not to learn more about yourself the more you explore the stories that matter to you most. They say that the best authors leave parts of themselves behind in their work, but it’s also true that readers are changed by the books made for their hearts.
Go to the place you keep your Star Wars books and pick out three of your favorites. Ask yourself why they resonate with you so deeply. How do their characters and events speak to you? What about them keeps you coming back for more? You don’t always have to think about Star Wars books this way. But in the moments you do, pay attention to the themes that stay with you long after you’ve put the book down. These themes are your themes. They’re the ideas that in turn spark your own. They’re what inspire you to create, to innovate, to dream, to be.
It’s all fake and in space until it isn’t. It’s all hyperspace heroes and glowing swords until you remember that stories are told from human experience, and are meant to mold and shape us whether we mean for them to or not.
It’s the books you love in this faraway galaxy that define who you are meant to be when you close them, stand up, and face this uncertain world.
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