– Spoiler Review –
A Crash of Fate is a young adult novel written by Zoraida Córdova as part of the Galaxy’s Edge tie-in program, taking place primarily at the park’s in-universe location, following two old friends who cross paths again in a romantic and danger filled day-long adventure. The romance is never too heavy handed, the adventure that weaves them across Black Spire Outpost is engaging and fun, and the characters are relatable, but sometimes the park aspect gets a little too on the nose, though overall it results in an enjoyable and unique little tale.
Jules Rakab and Izzy Garsea are the best of friends when growing up on the quiet backwater planet of Batuu, but when Izzy’s parents whisk her away mysteriously in the middle of the night, they seemed destined to never meet again. 13 years later, both of them 18 now, fate seems to have other plans, as they find themselves on a crash course with one another for a day’s worth of adventure, romance, and danger while they figure out who and what they want next in life. Jules and Izzy are extremely relatable characters, as their search for purpose and/or love feels inherently human, so much so that I know I’ve had similar thoughts as they did despite them living in a fictional universe. I particularly enjoyed the script’s flip on the gender roles common in this type of story, as Izzy is the one who went and had a life of adventures while Jules is the one left behind, pining for more and his long, gone friend. And just like Lost Stars, another romantically inclined Young Adult novel, the lovey-dovey aspect isn’t overbearing, as the rationale the two characters go through is logical and their feelings develop naturally from their prior friendship. I was genuinely invested in them both, which made their crisscrossing trip of Black Spire Outpost all the more fun to watch unfold, from the successes to even the failures in their journey, giving the book a swift pace befitting the day-long length of the story. Their journeys do occasionally end up in area outside of what constitutes the park, but when they’re within the Outpost’s walls, it really gives the area a vibrant, living feeling, from how the First Order’s presence is changing attitudes even within such a small, backwater community, while introductions to many aspects of the park help cement their place in the fiction of the universe and prepare visitors for what they might see.
I really appreciate A Crash of Fate’s scale, both in regards to stakes and timeframe. With the stakes, considering the focus of the novel is about two star-crossed lovers finding each other again and takes place solely near or in Black Spire Outpost (BSO), keeping the story grounded and mainly about the two characters and those whose lives they’ve touched or affected on their day-long journey helps keep the characters in focus and make the events feel plausible. If this suddenly became another galaxy-saving adventure, it would’ve felt out of place and ruined the intimacy Córdova weaves between Izzy and Jules. And for the timeframe, I love the idea of it being set across a single day, both for in-universe and meta reasons: in-universe, it only accentuates the intimacy of Izzy and Jules reunion and the strength of their connection, and keeps with small town feel of Batuu/BSO. Meta-wise, technically the park resets itself every day and repeats the same events, à la Groundhog Day, so this highlights how crazy and exciting a single day at the Outpost can be, potentially in an attempt to get readers even more exhilarated about a chance to go. Even if this last bit isn’t intentional, the implication is there, so I like how it worked out to fit with the day-long experience of the park itself.
My feelings towards Crash get a little complicated when you take out the great characters and exciting story, and start to consider all the details about BSO the book contains. As someone who has read a lot about the park, from the reveals of the food/drinks, watched copious amounts of videos of people walking through the park, be it interacting with the troopers, Vi Moradi (more on her soon in the Galaxy’s Edge: Black Spire novel!), or even Kylo Ren, the Falcon-related ride, and the shopping ‘experiences,’ it was blatantly obvious when the book began naming actual food and drink items, or even the shops visitors to Galaxy’s Edge will experience. In fact, to me it felt like product placement, and it was bizarre to read Star Wars fiction with it within, as even though I know these are technically in-universe items, they are also ones I could buy or consume if I went to the park. It didn’t take me fully out of the book, but it did sometimes feel like items being checked off a list to include, because while we’ve always been able to buy facsimiles of lightsabers, helmets, etc., from the universe, never has it been an item meant to literally be the same in-universe, and I guess I just wasn’t prepared for it despite knowing it was coming.* But my experience will not be the same most readers will have, especially those who went to the park already. Getting to read a book and see references to things you ate, drank, or even physically visited will likely be rather exhilarating for those who’ve visited Galaxy’s Edge, while those didn’t read/watch everything about the park might not even spot the references until they go to the park itself or find articles/Wookieepedia pages revealing them for what they are. Overall, I don’t feel like it detracted any significant amount from the overall book, but for me at least it definitely felt odd for there to be product placement, no matter its goodhearted intentions or not, but it’s unavoidable now there’s a park so it’s time to get used to it!
Here are a few other things:
- *While we’ve been to Batuu in other material already, none of them were so specific in their references or included purchasable items: Thrawn – Alliances had Thrawn and Anakin Skywalker getting into a fight at Oga’s Cantina, the resulting blaster marks visible to visitors today; and the Galaxy’s Edge miniseries has been revealing fun, intriguing backstories for a few of the non-purchasable items in Dok-Ondar’s Den of Antiquities, as well as the tension the First Order/Resistance conflict brings to the area.
- Córdova interviewed with the official site, where she reveals some of the process of writing about the park before it opened, incorporating Dok-Ondar, and romantic inspirations coming from Anakin and Padmé, of all people.
- It’s a little thing, but I really appreciated how the prologue and epilogue contained both Izzy and Jules’ POVs seamlessly, because the majority of book they are apart so they have separate POV chapter/sections, and whenever they are together their POV is contained together.
- In the interview above, it’s revealed A Crash of Fate takes place only a few days before the day, in-universe, when visits to Galaxy’s Edge technically take place, as the Resistance is only beginning to make themselves known in ACoF. The next book, Galaxy’s Edge: Black Spire (August 27) will dive more into the Resistance’s role at BSO, though I haven’t heard when that takes place in respect to the events you experience at the park.
Zoraida Córdova’s A Crash of Fate is young adult romance to its core, but like previous YA novels in Star Wars canon, it transcends the moniker to make an entertaining day-long tale with solid characters and an inside look at the in-universe version of the park experience at Galaxy’s Edge.
+ Izzy and Jules are easy to connect with
+ Day-long timeframe
+ Scale of stakes appropriately small
– Having to square with product placement feel
Ryan is Mynock Manor’s Head Butler. You can follow him on Twitter @BrushYourTeeth. You can follow the website @MynockManor.
ALSO BY ZORAIDA CÓRDOVA:
“You Owe Me a Ride” – From a Certain Point of View (novel)
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Galaxy’s Edge (comic miniseries) | Black Spire (novel) | Thrawn – Alliances (novel) | Star Wars Resistance: “Fuel for the Fire”
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