Ahsoka By E.K. Johnston - Young Adult Star Wars Novel But Should Appeal To Any Fan

Ahsoka by E.K. Johnston

One of my favorite characters in the Star Wars universe is Ahsoka Tano, a young Togruta woman who was assigned to be  Anakin Skywalker’s Padawan learner. Most of her adventures are presented in the Clone Wars animated series. During the last four episodes of the fifth season of that series, Ahsoka is falsely accused of murdering a key suspect in a bombing at the Jedi Temple on Coruscant that resulted in the death of five Jedi and several others. Even though Anakin knew that Ahsoka was innocent, She was nonetheless banned from the Jedi Order and handed over to the Republic for trial. She manages to escape fled to try to prove her innocence, which only served to deepen the suspicion against her. Eventually, Ahsoka is exonerated of guilt, but the experience has left her disillusioned and she makes the decision to leave the Jedi Order. After this, there is very little known about what she has been about until she shows up in the Rebels animated series as an agent for Bail Organa’s Rebel Alliance.

Ahsoka is a novel that bridges some of the gap in Ahsoka’s story following her departure from the Jedi Order leading up to her meeting Bail Organa and becoming the manager of his intelligence network for the Rebels. The novel was first released on October 11, 2016, published by Disney-Lucasfilm Press and considered to be canon in the Star Wars universe. The events of this story begin one year after the establishment of the Galactic Empire, Anakin becoming Darth Vader, and the downfall of the Jedi Order.

While hiding out on the planet Thabeska, Ahsoka wants to stay out of the limelight and avoid being discovered by the Empire. When Imperial soldiers arrive on the planet, Ahsoka, under the name ‘Ashla,’ decides it is time to move on because one of the missions of the Empire is to hunt down and kill any Jedi that may have escaped Order 66. She finds an Outer Rim moon called Raada where there is no Imperial presence and, as Ashla, establishers herself as a mechanic repairing farming droids for the local workers. Preferring to be reclusive, she reluctantly establishes relationships while on Raada, all the while pondering the past and wondering about the fate of her former friends including Anakin.

As time passes, she becomes the village mechanic and a part of the community. Eventually, the empire shows up to exploit the moon’s agricultural value by more or less enslaving the inhabitants and forcing them to plant crops that grow quickly with high yields. The Empire’s crops also have the tendency to deplete all of the nutrients in the soil, making the farmland useless. Ahsoka is appalled at the injustice of the situation and she builds and leads a resistance movement on Raada. Her activities cause a bureaucrat to suspect that there is a Jedi presence on the moon and Ahsoka is forced to escape once again, but promises to return.

Ahsoka returns to Thabeska where she works for a while as a smuggler. When she is discovered as a Jedi there, she once again has to flee and learns that an Inquisitor is on Raada. She meets Bail Organa and learns that Raada is more or less uninhabitable because of the Imperial activity there and that the population has to be rescued. She returns there to face down the Inquisitor. She is able to kill him and uses the kyber crystals from his weapon to make herself a new set of lightsabers. With the help of Bail Organa, Raada is evacuated and Ahsoka is convinced to join the growing rebel movement against the Empire.

Ahsoka is a young adult novel because of the main theme, but any Star Wars fan would enjoy it, especially if the reader is familiar with Clone Wars. In the television series, the character quickly becomes endearing as she has some interesting witty exchanges with her master, Anakin. He almost immediately gives her the nickname “Snips” because of her snippy comebacks. So she has a fast wit, but she also can think well on her feet. One of her main influences in learning how to command troops comes from Captain Rex, a clone trooper that has seen many battles. He helps to shape the woman that Ahsoka will eventually become.

In the novel, Ahsoka is completely on her own. She has no clue of the fate of her friends. She doesn’t know that her friend and master, Anakin has become Darth Vader, or that Padme birthed twins before she died, that Obi-Wan is on Tatooine watching Luke grow, or that Yoda has exiled himself in seclusion on Dagobah. But she has learned her lessons well and is able to lead a small scale, but effective resistance movement on Raada.

When she leaves her home with the Jedi Order, she has no direction. She is also very confused and disillusioned because she wasn’t believed and, she believes, forced to go on the run to prove her innocence of murder. So, under an assumed name, she moves around from place to place trying to make sense of everything and find her place in the big picture. Fortunately for her, Ahsoka has her Jedi training to help her through the process of sorting out her life.

There are some other characters in the story that are also well fleshed out and become important to the main character, and thus the reader. I also enjoyed the descriptions of the places that Ahsoka encountered during her travels.  I can see why this story should appeal to young people in particular as it addresses problems that are common to them today. But as I did, I think that any Star Wars fan would enjoy this story.

Well, there it is…

Qapla’!

Edited by Benjamin Arrowood