Journey to Star Wars: The Last Jedi: The Legends of Luke Skywalker

By: Ken Liu

Narrated by: January LaVoy

Length: 6 hrs and 42 mins

Publisher's Summary

As a cargo ship rockets across the galaxy to Canto Bight, the deckhands onboard trade stories about legendary Jedi Knight Luke Skywalker. But are the stories of iconic and mysterious Luke Skywalker true or merely tall tales passed from one corner of the galaxy to another? Is Skywalker really a famous Jedi hero, an elaborate charlatan, or even part droid? The deckhands will have to decide for themselves when they hear The Legends of Luke Skywalker. A collection of myths and tall tales about the legendary Jedi Luke Skywalker, written by Nebula, Hugo, and World Fantasy Award-winning author Ken Liu.

©2017 Ken Liu (P)2017 Listening Library

Not the Luke Skywalker story I was looking for...

I had a lot of hesitation in getting this one. But with The Last Jedi arriving next month I wanted to make sure I didn't miss anything revolving around Luke. The stories told in this book do not help lead up to the next chapter of the saga in my opinion and do nothing to build the legend/myth of Luke Skywalker. January does a great job presenting this one so that is the one bright spot.

15 of 16 people found this review helpful

Feels like Disney can't commit

These are "Legends" - the Legends of Luke Clodplotter and Han Shooter. Yes, that's right Han Shooter. Various characters in cantinas, long haul shuttles and the space equivalents to the bonfire tell tales they've heard of the heroes of the New Republic. Overall it's lame and poorly told.

The first story is the worst and most grating but compared to what this book 'should' be, it's really disappointing. It does get better and at various points some of our Ep 1-6 Heroes do appear but not nearly enough to make this book worth reading.

The entire premise of this novel is that it's "legends" but it comes off as an entire book that's being put out there because Disney can't commit to a story for Luke (or anyone else) and they don't want to be trapped when making future movies or other media.

This is the result and I don't recommend anyone spend any time reading it (or listening to it as the case may be).

9 of 11 people found this review helpful

Lazy and Irrelevant

A series of lazily written first-person short stories telling canonically irrelevant stories about Luke Skywalker. What was advertised as a book that filled in the years between ROTJ and TFA is more of a children’s book of cartoony tales including one of a talking flea that saved the witless Luke from Jabba’s rancor. Yes really. This book is the literary equivalent of clickbait. January LaVoy does the best she can, but the book itself is poorly written and adds nothing to the epic narrative of Star Wars.

12 of 15 people found this review helpful

Wow. Just Awful.

At no point did this book feel like Star Wars. In fact, at no point was this book even a fun read. Very much a grind to get through it. Those looking for an enjoyable Luke Skywalker adventure will have to keep waiting.

Would much rather that Lucasfilm released fewer books if it meant higher quality. This was truly awful.

7 of 9 people found this review helpful

terrible

I hope books like this aren't considered Canon. stories were boring and belittled the characters.

4 of 5 people found this review helpful

Boring and soulless

This feels like L.A./Disney was just trying to put out a book for the sake of putting out a book. It had no feeling, no life, and no suspense. It felt totally meaningless. One of the worst yet.

9 of 12 people found this review helpful

A dumb idea

I guess they thought this would be fun? So put into a children's book meant for toddlers. This doesn't deserve to be a Journey book. Ridiculous.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Disappointing

I generally enjoy stories from different perspectives and unreliable narrators. It's fun when stories keep you guessing, or when you can see a character's natural tendency to exaggerate and impress. One or two of Ken Liu's legends of Luke Skywalker hit this mark for me, but most were too dull or too disassociated from Luke to make me care. The flea story (much-maligned in other reviews) was a flat-out mistake that should never have been included. When we are presented with a story with no "one truth" and only opinions (like the great Rashomon), it's interesting to hear many tales on the same story, even when they are obviously exaggerated. In the case of the flea story we are being told a story that we personally witnessed. It's completely ridiculous to try to retell a witness an event which is so vastly different than what they witnessed that it can't be true. I kept thinking of a drunken boor blathering on about how he went to the moon and is a billionaire and is best friends with all of your heroes. It's not cute, or funny, or even entertaining. Most people get up from the bar and walk away... which is exactly what I did with the second half of that story. It's too bad that there were so many misses as I do think there are some interesting stories with some potential interesting insights into the force, and maybe even (very vague) hints about the direction of the upcoming movies and books.

Performance was very good, as is typical of January Lavoy. I wish she had more to work with.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Meh....

Don't expect to gain any insight on Luke's story. All of these stories are "i think Luke did this...", tall tales, fishermen stories. Caught a minnow, but story got hyped until it was a whale. Narrator did good exept any male voices. You know how mocking someone for saying something stupid sounds? All male voices are like that.

The story is so vague that it was a waste of time. I hate to be so harsh and negative, but 22bucks for this drivel? i had to make myself finish it.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Could have been better

The stories were okay. It wasn't very engaging or deep. Some light stories from various sources. I was left wanting more. More stories, better stories, more meaning, more insight... Just more.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful