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Master and Apprentice
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April 2021 Canon Group Read: Master and Apprentice by Claudia Gray
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Rebecca
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May 02, 2021 04:25AM
It is explained later on. Whether or not you buy the explanation is another thing entirely. I liked how unJedi Rael was the first time I read the book. This time around he's more frustrating.
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Rael was Dooku's Padawan first, then Qui-gon.
Pax, Latin for peace, is in his own way extremely sweet and thoughtful.
Mod
I'm oscillating between feeling sympathy for him and wanting to smack him. I understand why he doesn't know how to "people" - but after a while it gets annoying.
Hailey, what chapter are you reading?
I'm in the middle of chapter 12.
Why is it that in every continuity Qui-gon and Obi-wan struggle with communication? To be fair Qui-gon is trying, and Obi-wan is being passive aggressive. I don't get why the Republic let's Czerka work in their territory. I enjoy this book, but at this point I just want to punch multiple characters for not doing anything about the slavery and telling Qui-gon to get over it because reasons.
So in the last few chapters we get an explanation of the laws concerning what constitutes a minor on their world, and all I can say is what the kriff were these people thinking? The age and characterization of Fanry now seems like nothing but a plot device to teach Averross a lesson and vilify an entire form of government rather than addressing the fact that what happens is the result of placing a minor in the position Fanry is in. If this is vague, its because I'm trying to avoid spoilers.
I am enjoying Master and Apprentice so far. I have not read the Jedi Apprentice books as some of you have, so I have no comment on how this compares. I like the dynamic between Qui-Gon being a bit of a realist when dealing with situations and not so by the book and Obi-Wan being a bit of a “company man” and more by the book.
I also like the discussion of the prophecies and how Dooku and Qui-Gon have alternated between strongly believing them and then not so much. The current Jedi seem to have different opinions about the value and meaning of the prophecies.
I like the glimpses of Dooku we get to see. Looking forward to Dooku: Jedi Lost for more Dooku (and Asajj Ventress).
The Jedi Rael Averross is an interesting character and a Jedi outlier. Since the Jedi Council seem to discourage the Jedi being in a position of governing, it is unclear to me why they allowed him to be Lord Regent of Pijal.
(view spoiler)
I like the characters of Pax and Rahara who give the perspective of “regular” people in the Star Wars universe. So who had it worse, Rahara raised as a slave or Pax raised by 3PO units? (haha)
Hailey wrote: "I’m only at the start of chapter 5 so maybe this will change but...Rael Averross seems like some playboy hot shot wannabe masquerading around as a Jedi. He isn’t a sarcastic scoundrel like Han or t..."Those are good points about Aveross. He's kind of gross and venial. And I agree with you about the Jedi aiming to avoid long-term entanglements with politics.
I think Claudia Grey shows how this in itself becomes a problem. Because the Jedi have removed themselves from the rest of the galaxy, and cluster together in a tower on its richest city, they have become out of touch to the problems of the people. By positioning themselves so close to the center of power, they end up being the club of the political agenda of the Republic. Therefore the corruption within the Republic has begun to affect the Jedi.
Mod
After chapter 23.
I agree with whoever pointed out that we don't need a minute description of every room and dress. It was interesting at first to illustrate Pijali culture and how it manifests in architecture and fashion, but 2/3 in it's just annoyingly repetitive.
I was right about Obi-Wan riding the varactyl. He's supposed to be good with animals. I remember the TCW episode where he "charmed" the bloodthirsty beasts during the battle of Ryloth.
This book kind of explains Obi-wan's hatred of flying, but I think it's a week explanation.
Mod
I laughed while reading that scene, but mainly because it felt like I was suddenly watching a Loony Tunes episode.
Now that at least one other person is finished, I may type my entire rant about how Fanry was written. But that is something I'll post later today.
Mod
I'm done, too.
I agree, it was extremely weak. Why put it in the book at all if all the room you have for it are two paragraphs? Some other author might have explored it in their book much better.
I expected to find out something really traumatic. Maybe somebody died while Obi-Wan was piloting? But we got a comedy scene instead?
Mod
Mod
The ending (the political resolution) was so abrupt and frankly a weird choice. There is nothing wrong with constitutional monarchy as far as I can tell.
My incoming rant will be a more in depth look at how Fanry is objectified by the author as a plot device to make the story happen rather than logic character choices and communication driving the story.
Mod
Hailey, I also agree with you that adding to Fanry's age would resolve some problems.
To me personally seem much more tragic when an intelligent thoughtful adult person is corrupted by the allure of power than a precocious child that misunderstands and misinterprets some history and politics lessons, decides that being an absolute monarch is much cooler than having one's power limited by constitution and gives into her daydreams of becoming the second coming of Jesus by turning into a bloodthirsty maniac for a couple of hours.
So by the end of this book we end up with a villified 13-14yo child, who committed some atrocities. But who should be responsible for that? The child or the adults around that child?
Both. The adults for failing her, and her because according to their laws she is legally a monarch. She made choices. Honestly the consequences don't seem harsh enough to me. She goes on a bloody rampage and is put under house arrest in her own palace, doesn't have to face long term consequences beyond not being Queen, gets to go to college and they hope she learns not to be a killer because while she can be a monarch at 14 she is a minor in every other way legally. They also need to punish her councilors for neglect. Most of her lessons seemed to be about fashion not politics or how to rule a country. And they really need to rethink laws that allow minors to rule but can't be held to the same standards as an adult doing that job because they are minors. Also, I hate that her entire character is simply to teach Rael a lesson and be his therapy. How is any of this okay? She is being asked to do the job of an adult. This book doesn't question that at all. It just goes monarchy bad. Jude Watson's books do a better job of looking at monarchy than this, and those were middle grade books. Though both are far to forgiving of a crown prince or queen getting lesser consequences for villainous deeds than they deserve.
Mod
This. And yet Rael as former Regent goes back to Coruscant and the minister lady becomes head of government.
Also, Fanry going free at 18 is not as urealistic as you think. Do you remember those two British boys who killed a toddler in 1990s? It was a heinous crime, yet they were released at 18 & got new identities. I bet CG was "inspired" by that.
I get that its realistic. But I think it's to soft. Teens, even young teens, are old enough to know killing is wrong. And it's more irritating in this fictional world where the teen in question is in a position of power. What is ridiculous is that Fanry can declare War, sign laws, shape policies, ect., but she legally cannot drink, give consent, or be held responsible for her actions as a monarch to the extent that others would be.
Mod
I absolutely agree. That's my main reason for not liking SW trend to put children into positions of power. It might seem cool on the surface but is in fact quite rotten.
One of the few things done right by the Jedi Order is how long the apprenticeship usually lasts. Well into the Padawan's adulthood (Obi-Wan was 25 when knighted). In the EU the youngest Jedi Knight ever was Anakin Skywalker, knighted under special circumstances (the Clone Wars) at the age of 19.
But as with many established EU facts Disney canon decided to mess with that. So in the High Republic we have a 15 year-old Jedi Knight who at the age of 16 takes on a 14-15yo Padawan. In another HR work we have an 18 yo nice but in no way special Padawan who is knighted out of the blue. So Anakin's early knighthood was retroactively made into nothing special in Disney continuity.
Why Disney, why? They also keep shortening the timeline, making the world feel smaller than in Legends. I understand some of the changes Disney Lucasfilm makes, but at other times it just reads like no one did their homework before writing the books.
Mod
For some strange reason Claudia Gray's style works for me eventhough I can and do rant about certain aspects of her books. It's like junk food, you know it's not particularly good and certainly not good for your health, but you can still enjoy it (once in a while). ;)
And for the record, I really enjoyed her Lost Stars.
Mod
So Qui-Gon had a Force vision. He decided that his Force vision was true. (Interestingly enough, Yoda points out to the Council that some of the visions are indeed true, but it's hard to recognize which ones.)
Hence Qui-Gon's conclusion is that all of the prophecies are true.
Do you see how questionable it is?
1/ First of all, in no part of the SW canon was established that Force visions = prophecies. So he's comparing apples to oranges.
If prophecies are verbalizations of visions, then it means that a prophecy is a verbal interpretation of a vision that itself might or might not be true, made by a person who most probably didn't understand the full meaning of the vision (demonstrated by Qui-Gon himself). So in addition to the vagueness of the vision you have it filtered by personal bias and possibly lack of understanding of the person who put it in words.
2/ One vision bearing out =/= all the visions being true.
3/ The prophecies are so vague, that they can be applied to any number of events - past, present and possibly future.
4/ The prophecies are so vague, that in some cases it's impossible to recognize whether they are referring to something that would be beneficial or harmful. Pursuing something (the Chosen One prophecy) when you don't know and can't know what it will bring is quite reckless. Rael pointed it out to Qui-Gon with no effect.
At this point I just wanted Qui-Gon to admit that he made a religion out of the Holocron prophecies and decided to worship them. He had studied the prophecies for years, he wanted to believe them, his vision was just a flimsy excuse to go full in.
Mod
It's an in-depth look at characters, relationships and plotpoints of Master and Apprentice.
There are not many authors willing to be as open about their work as Claudia Gray. I like that about her.
The Youtube link: https://youtu.be/Ise0NO3uGh0
This is probably the only Claudia Gray book I enjoy reading. It is the only one I have read more than once. Her style just doesn't click with me. But Pax, Rahara, and the flashbacks of Dooku and Qui-gon are quite fun.
Mod
So Czerka keeps slaves only because they can? I had to laugh at that.
Czerka is a corporation. Like all corporations (unless they are owned by the Siths maybe) they are governed by the law of profit. Does CG really believe that they would use slaves instead of droids if it was losing them money they would otherwise keep or invest into further development?! Especially when they go centuries back, in such a long time it would lose them astronomical amount of profit.
Honestly this just continued to show to me that she can't really write politics or grounded characters. She has interesting ideas and then goes with the most simplistic and least logical exploration of theme. Czerka has to be evil, so just have them used slaves simply because they can. Who cares if it makes no sense from a business perspective.
Mod
- Claudia Gray's favorite prequel movie is The Phantom Menace. She says it's because of Qui-Gon.
- Qui-Gon and Leia are her favorite SW characters. (IMO the reason why Qui-Gon is by far the most fleshed out character in the book.)
- When she was asked to write a book about Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan she hoped they meant their mission to Mandalore, i.e. Satine.
- When writing Master and Apprentice CG got to collaborate with Cavan Scott who was writing Dooku: Jedi Lost at the same time. They discussed Dooku, Qui-Gon and Rael Aveross so that their books "matched". They met through Project Luminous (the High Republic).
- CG and the interviewer had a lengthy discussion on prophecies. What I found interesting:
* CG says that Qui-Gon was over-interpreting the Chosen One prophecy (I agree).
* "The time of the prophecy is at hand." The interviewer points out that Anakin is already alive so the time of the prophecy has already arrived. CG admitted she didn't thought about it this concretely. (*eyeroll*)
* CG came up with all the prophecies in the book. Some of them were modelled after known events in the SW universe but most of them had no apparent meaning (i.e. she came up with some random vague stuff and stuck it in there)
* There is a prophecy that fans insist foretold Palpatine's return. CG said she had no inside intel and no way of knowing that's what was going to happen in The Rise of Skywalker. It was just one of the vague ones she came up with. Note: In another interview CG talks about the sequels and says that she isn't a fan of the last part of the trilogy.
* She references Nostradamus and his prophecies while talking about how they can fit any number of events.
* They discuss what the prophecies being true means for free will. Is everything in the SW universe pre-determined? They talk about it at length and yet they don't go too deep. My impression is that they don't like the idea of predetermination so they talk around it and come up with the explanation that prophecies present you with choices. They call it "Find your own adventure" and laugh about it.
- CG needed an evil corporation to be present on Pijal. She asked if Czerka (from the KOTOR game) was still around and TLF said yes, use it if you want.
- CG explains how she came up with the idea that droids are cheaper than slaves and that Czerka uses slaves simply because it's evil. (I disagree with her reasoning. I'll probably rant about it later.)
source: : https://youtu.be/Ise0NO3uGh0
Mod
Rebecca, in the What the Force podcast Claudia Gray tried to explain her thinking process - how she came up with the idea of slaves being in fact more costly than droids. And I thought she should have talked it through with somebody because while it seemed interesting on the surface level when you get deeper it immediately falls apart.
So her reasoning was that the droid labor has to be very cheap because in Ep 4 Lars who is by no means a wealthy moisture farmer doesn't make any fuss about buying not one but two droids.
Do you see the problem with this?
She absolutely failed to factor in the low quality of the goods (old banged up droids) and the fact that the droids were recognized as stolen goods (everybody knew that Jawas didn't buy those droids, come on).
It's like if I buy a stolen 10yo motorcycle on a black market for 600 credits. I need it to drive to work, i.e. twice a day to a town that's half a mile away. Then I find out that a new bicycle costs about 800 credits. And my (wrong) conclusion is that motorcycles are much more economical than bikes. If a local businessman asked my advice I would claim that it would be much more cost effective for him to buy 1000 new motorbikes for his employees (for their 0.5 mile long commute) than invest in bicycles (not to mention that we're disregarding the cost of fuel and maintenance).
Mod
- CG says Qui-Gon's relationship to the Force was more personal (I agree.), more akin to the Jedi of old (about 200 years before TPM - CG's hint at what's to come in the High Republic books).
- According to CG Qui-Gon couldn't read other people's emotions. (I noticed in the book she was making this point, I just don't agree. If anything Qui-Gon was shown to be more in touch with other people and their feelings. I prefer Jude Watson's take on this: Qui-Gon couldn't read emotions of people who he was close to (Obi-Wan, Xanatos, sometimes Tahl), he had no problem with strangers.)
- While critical of Yoda, CG concedes that he made a very good point when he insisted that the Jedi must not rule. He and the Jedi just took it too far and became too dependent on the Republic making all the decisions.
- Rael Aveross:
* is entirely CG's creation - the original idea was to have a Jedi Regent - to make him Dooku's first padawan occured to her later.
* Cavan Scott borrowed him for Dooku: Jedi Lost and wrote some great dialogue for him. CG jokingly says that she's jealous. :D
* she wanted for him to be a bit of a misfit (she succeeded)
* when she decided (and it was approved) that he was Dooku's Padawan before Qui-Gon she started to play with the idea of an unofficial mentor/older friend role for young Jedi knights towards new padawans of their old masters (I noticed she explored this idea some more in Into the Dark)
* the American accent for Rael (in the audiobook) was not her idea but she approves.
- Pax and Rahara: CG had in mind certain actors when writing those two:
Shaun Evans and Gemma Chan
- CG is the one who came up with the idea that the Jedi never for the last thousand years used lightsaber in combat against other lighsaber (I so disagree with this)
- it also seems that CG is indeed responsible for resurrection of the celibacy rule non-sense (It was debunked by Lucas after TPM came out. why come back to it?)
source: : https://youtu.be/Ise0NO3uGh0
Mod
That's what I thought would have been more plausible. The reason given in the book is so dumb. And the Uncle Lars reasoning is also stupid.
Mod
What bothers me the most is that CG has clout because of her reputation as the best SW canon author and it resulted in some of her worse ideas being perpetuated by other SW works to the point you just can't but accept that's how it's going to be from now on in the galaxy far far away.
The lightsaber vs lightsaber idea - made its way to Dooku: Jedi Lost and new High Republic books. There's no escaping it now. The same with celibacy. The same with how ubiquitous slavery is in the Republic - the original point was that it was there but because it was NOT so visible (mostly in outer rim teritories) people in power could pretend that was a non-issue (which was wrong). My question is what is the storygroup doing? They're there to make sure that everything fits together.
What's worse is that Timothy Zahn is the only writer from the Legends era who is still writing for the new canon, and his stuff doesn't really get to impact the main timeline much for anything outside of the Unknown Regions. Zahn isn't included in any of the large projects or short story collections. So it looks like there isn't really any mentoring happening for helping the new writers get used to writing in a franchise that isn't a universe you created. The story group doesn't seem to care about maintaining any form of continuity. When was Claudia Gray stated as the best canon author? Really, she's the best? Not Zahn, Luceno, or Christie Golden? She's passable but not great. Her books have serious pacing issues in part because of her over use of passive voice, passive verbs, the past plu perfect tense, and lack of varied chapter lengths. Her books are fun popcorn books. But she also struggles to show don't tell concerning her characters, and not doing well handling politics and slavery in her books.
For clarification: I think it is a missed opportunity to not include the old guard writers in projects like High Republic. It would be a great mentoring experience for new to Star Wars authors. It would also help make it feel like their work is connected to a much bigger picture rather than being canon fodder or to simply fix the mistakes in the movie. For instance Thrawm will be in the live action shows. He will finally get to impact the main timeline in a real way. I highly doubt that the shows will do much with what Zahn has been setting up in his books. High Republic also really doesn't matter beyond conflating a huge universe into a much shorter timeline than Legends and retconning things for no obvious reason. Claudia Gray bring back celibacy and HR making a big deal of it, how prevalent and open slavery is. It doesn't match the films, and the story group doesn't care. While I enjoy the stories, the books don't feel as big as they used to.
Mod
Is it because the comicbook runs are still going. Would it be better if TLF didn't discontinue the Legends line? We would have two SW universes going at the same time and everybody would be free to choose what is the best fit for them.
What do you think?
BTW I have a different measure of quality for SW books than literary fiction or other genres. It's because I haven't read any SW book that would qualify as a great work of literature. And it's fine. When I read a SW book I expect a popcorn entertainment. I want to have a fun time in a galaxy far far away.
I enjoy popcorn books. Claudia Gray's style just doesn't click with me. I realize me thinking she is passable versus great is relative to a certain extent. I do think it would be better to have both Legends and current timeline having new content.
Of the new canon books, my favorites have been the ones written by Legends authors, and even then I've noticed the quality in writing isn't quite what it used to be. I can't say I've found any new to Star Wars authors who's books I've thought of as well good Star Wars with the exception of the Ahsoka novel and this one is passable. Chuck Wendig's books were unreadable garbage. I have yet to get to any HR books. I liked Justina Ireland's original works. We'll see if that translates to her being a fun Star Wars read or not.
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