knowing the changes that were made to the final cut of this movie and also what this universe grew into, it's really amazing that it was able to become a phenomenon at all. if the movie had stayed much like this it wouldn't have grown into something

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away....Ah yes, Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope. The movie that started it all. But that was in 1977. Let's flash back to a time just before that, to where the story of this amazing book, and its sequel, began.1976Some guy named George Lucas (never heard of him, wink) commissioned author Alan Dean Foster to write two books. The first, Star Wars: From the Adventures of Luke Skywalker, would be a novelization of Lucas' upcoming movie, Star Wars. In case the mo...

I read this as a child over and over again. I loved the way it expanded Luke Skywalker's story and the appearance of Jabba the Hut (this doesn't happen in the movies until Return of the Jedi).

Star Wars is truly an empire unto itself. The eleven films of the series have grossed over $10 billion worldwide; and when one adds in television programs, action figures, soundtrack albums, video games, tie-in books, amusement park rides, lunchboxes, graphic novels, and other forms of licensed merchandise, one is looking at gross revenues somewhere in the range of $300 billion and climbing. And I find it interesting to contemplate how humble the beginnings of that empire were – a low-budget 197...

So I was 12 years old when the movie was released, and I remember being mesmerized. It’s one of the first movies I went to see alone with my little brother. So reading the novelization, I got to revisit this old friend many times over the years. The screenplay was written by George Lucas, along with the conception of the story before and the story afterward, but even though it’s his vision, Lucas didn’t write the novelization. Alan Dean Foster did and years later, he was given due credit for ans...

I'm giving this three stars because it's great fun to read aloud and do dramatic recitations. That is by far the best way to attempt getting through this (and I say this as a lifelong fan of the movie).

I read this just after the movie came out when I was 7 or 8 years old. I remember loving it but preferring the wonders of the silver screen. I curiously never went back to read it again. Perhaps I will someday...

It's May 4th! In honor of Star Wars Day... a long time ago (December of 1976), in a galaxy far, far away (Bluefield, Virginia)... I was home from college for winter break and spotted this weird little paperback on the spin-rack of the corner drug store. (I believe it was Goodykoontz Pharmacy, but I'm not certain.) It looked like a nifty little space opera; I was familiar with George Lucas from THX-1138 and American Graffitti, though I didn't know him as a novelist. I picked it up and enjoyed rea...

It has been a long while since I revisited this, the very first Star Wars novelization. Having recently read one of the Timothy Zahn Star Wars novels, a couple of things caught my attention, partially in contrast to the Zahn work:- It's remarkable how the use of high-quality language can make such a difference in my perception of a story. This book introduced me to words such as "lambent" and "actinic" when I was only seven or eight years old. I happily devoured these new words because I wanted ...

Usually novelizations of movies are not as good as the movies themselves. This is certainly true here. The Star Wars movie is fantastic; but it loses a lot when transferred to print.