Star Wars: Mace Windu: The Glass Abyss
Jedi Master Mace Windu travels to a dangerous, remote planet on a mission that challenges even his deadly prowess—all to fulfill Qui-Gon’s last request.
The Jedi are reeling from Qui-Gon Jinn’s sudden death at the hands of a Sith. Jedi Master Mace Windu’s feelings about Qui-Gon have always been complicated, and have not been made any simpler in death. While they often disagreed, Mace valued Qui-Gon’s unique perspective, and their shared dedication to the Force made them allies. Without Qui-Gon and his unorthodox views, Mace feels out of balance.
While considering his fallen friend’s legacy, Mace is surprised to receive a final message from Qui-Gon, marked to be delivered to Mace on the event of Qui-Gon’s death. The message contains a last request: a plea to help the Outer Rim planet of Metagos.
Many years ago, a violent solar flare transformed the surface of the desert planet into a landscape of irradiated glass–as beautiful as it is dangerous. Now most of the surviving inhabitants live underground, where rival clans fight to control the planet’s limited resources. As a young Jedi, Qui-Gon protected the Sa’ad farming clan from the planet’s less scrupulous factions. The Sa’ad practice the art of dream-weaving, retaining their waking minds upon sleep in order to communicate and coexist with the wild creatures around them. Qui-Gon vowed to return if they ever required his aid, but now it falls to Mace to fulfill that promise. The Sa’ad’s leader, KinShan Nightbird, has begged for the Jedi’s help in freeing Metagos from the crime lords who threaten to eradicate her people’s way of life.
Intent on fulfilling Qui-Gon’s final wishes, Mace travels to Metagos and infiltrates the enemies of the Sa’ad. But as the Jedi Master investigates the intricate web of adversaries and allies, Mace finds himself pushed to the boundaries of the Jedi code, challenging his beliefs and his relationship to the Force itself.
Author: Steven Barnes
Release date: 15th October 2024
Page Count: 416 pages
ISBN: 9780593723432
When you think of the name Mace Windu you’ll likely think of Samuel L. Jackson, who brought bringing his unique aura to the prequel trilogy, but Mace is also a key component of The Clone Wars and the classic Legends novel Shatterpoint by Matthew Stover, right up to more recent canon appearances like his 2024 Marvel four-parter by writer Marc Bernardin and The Living Force by John Jackson Miller.
His latest adventure is Mace Windu: The Glass Abyss by Steven Barnes, which pulls together these differing versions of Mace into a new adventure that explores the breaking points (both physical and emotional) of Windu and the Jedi Order he holds so dearly.
Set shortly after the events of The Phantom Menace, we follow Mace as he receives a posthumous holographic message from Jedi master Qui-Gon Jinn, sent to Mace in the event of his death. Jinn asks Mace to honour a pledge Qui-Gon made to someone on the Outer Rim world of Metagos, a planety which survived a cataclysmic solar flare disaster but fell to become a criminal playground, far from the eyes of the Republic.
This book opens with Mace introducing himself to the locals of Metagos as a stranger looking for employment, and as the story unfolds through a series of flashbacks we learn more about Windu’s mission and the comolications that are set in his path to completing Qui-Gon’s final wish.
Author Steven Barnes does a fantastic job of not only bedding the reader in the post-Episode I era, but also explores the clear differences between life inside the Republic and beyond. The culture of Metagos is fascinating, a diverse world full of threats and problems as Mace many of the principles he lives by are constantly challenged by the choices he makes, while his time with the people of Metagos that he is there to protect gives him emotional connections he never expected.
It’s deeply satisfying to see Mace to star in his own novel after so long, one that that honours the many and varied aspects of his personality. The mysticysm of the Sa’ad and their connection to their world through dreams was particularly interesting, one of many elements that makes this standalone a reader friendly book that is an easy jumping on point for new visitors to the galaxy far, far away.
- Hardcover Book
- Barnes, Steven (Author)
- English (Publication Language)
- 416 Pages - 10/15/2024 (Publication Date) - Random House Worlds (Publisher)
