Nay, nay! Try thou not.

But do thou or do thou not,

For there is no “try.”

~Yoda, Act III, Scene 7

Apparently I was not the only one put off by the excessive use of the Chorus in Verily, A New Hope. Enough people complained that Doescher mentioned it in the acknowledgments of this book and talked about how the criticism shaped his narrative approach moving forward. The improvement is vast. Many thanks to my fellow complainers who came before me. The squeaky wheels really do get the grease sometimes!

I went into this with a little trepidation. Empire is my favorite film of the original trilogy and I wasn’t sure I’d be able to stop my inner pedant from being hypercritical. Fortunately, Doescher hit his stride after tossing aside his chorus crutches and there wasn’t much fault to find in this one. What little faults there may be are insignificant next to the power of Yoda speaking some of my all-time favorite Star Wars quotes in haiku. That was about a million times more delightful than I thought it would be (and I thought it would be pretty damn delightful).

I’ll leave you with perhaps my favorite line of this play, which is not a line at all, but stage direction:

[Exit, pursued by a wampa

I got Divine Madness, Dexter's final cut and Whalestoe letters as well the rest of the Shakespeare Star Wars books which were on clearance.   (So was monuments men, so they were a couple bucks a piece.)

I'm considering a couple other books, but I doubt I'll get anything more.   Possibly some more Irvine books, but they don't have Thor which is the one I want most.    They have Cap: First Avenger, and I'm not too eager to pick that up right at the moment.   Age of Ultron is a book I keep eyeing; I'd like to have that in hardcover for the prettiness and because it would be nice to have a collection of those that I choose to buy.   Hulk I'm really not that into, though.    Possibly America's Snake because I love snakes.   Heart of the Lion is something I keep going back to so I'll have to think about that.  I'm really digging some non-fiction now and I don't read much of it, so I think I'll stick to that when purchasing.   No non-fiction on clearance I saw that I really wanted.   There is one Johnny Cash biography that I eyed, but I really am not a Cash fan, so I think I'll pass on that.   Might pick up the Angjelica Houston hardcovers on clearance, though. 

We shall see.   

Loved it!. I liked that Boba had a more of a voice in the book since he doesn't get to say all that much in the movie. I enjoyed this one as much the first in the series.  It's a wonderful mixture of the Bard and everything I love about Star Wars.  Who doesn't love a sassy R2-D2?!  Eager to move on to the others book in the series.

1) City of Glass by Cassandra Clare

2) Mythology by Edith Hamilton

3) Guards! Guards! by Terry Pratchett

4) Whistle Stop by Philip White

5) Harry Potter and the Prison of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling (re-read)

6) William Shakespeare's Star Wars: Verily, A New Hope by Ian Doescher

7) Brave New World by Aldous Huxley 

8) Eric by Terry Pratchett

9) The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien (re-read)

10) William Shakespeare's The Empire Striketh Back by Ian Doescher

11) Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

12) Moving Pictures by Terry Pratchett

13) Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling (re-read) *started*

14) William Shakespeare's Star Wars: The Jedi Doth Return by Ian Doescher

15) The Once and Future King by T.H. White

16) Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett

17) A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin (re-read)

18) Washington: A Life by Ron Chernow

19) Mistborn: The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson

20) Witches Aboard by Terry Pratchett

21) Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling (re-read)

22) Facing Justice by Diane & David Munson

23) The Well of Ascension by Brandon Sanderson

24) Small Gods by Terry Pratchett

25) A Clash of Kings by George R.R. Martin (re-read)

26) Confirming Justice by Diane & David Munson

27) The Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson

28) Lords and Ladies by Terry Pratchett

29) Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling (re-read)

30) The Rise of the Great Powers, 1648-1815 by Derek McKay

31) The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson

32) Men at Arms by Terry Pratchett

33) A Storm of Swords by George R.R. Martin (re-read)

34) The Complete Sherlock Holmes, Volume One by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

35) The Art of War/The Prince/Instructions to His Generals by Sun Tzu/Niccolò Machiavelli/Frederick the Great (three-in-one book)

36) Soul Music by Terry Pratchett

37) Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling (re-read)

38) The Complete Sherlock Holmes, Volume Two by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

39) A Short History of Byzantium by John Julius Norwich

40) Interesting Times by Terry Pratchett

41) Legends edited by Robert Silverberg (includes re-read of The Hedge Knight by George R.R. Martin

Bonus- The Poetry of Robert Frost (reading a few pages a night)

The wonderful combination of Elizabethan theater and the Galaxy Far, Far Away returns in William Shakespeare's The Empire Striketh Back by Ian Doescher. Combining his love of the classic trilogy and the Bard, Doescher followed up the overwhelming success of his first crossover adaptation by bringing further the tragedy of Episode V in all it's glory in the form of iambic pentameter, prose, and even haiku.

Doescher continued his excellent translation of film dialogue to late 16th century English with the addition of soliloquies, speeches, and asides that add depth to all the characters Star Wars have come to love. Lando, Boba Fett, and Yoda being the newest major characters to the overall story are given lines to better understand their inner character which aren't allowed to come out in the film. This approached allowed for a better understanding of Lando in particular giving the audience an insight about his motives through the latter part of the book. Unlike his first book, Doescher breaks away from iambic pentameter for two characters: Boba Fett as a bounty hunter is "base" enough to just warrant prose speech while Yoda's unique manner of dialogue was but into haiku. The inner feelings of Han and Leia towards permeate their scenes, giving a better understanding of their romance throughout the book. Doescher used the Chorus drastically less than he did in his previous effort and instead had characters detail the action like Shakespeare also did in his plays. Even with the use of all these inner monologues, Doescher is able to give "that scene" at the end of the film a suspenseful and stunning air about it.

In a 172 pages, Doescher brings the epic nature of Episode V of the Star Wars saga to the Elizabethan stage to amazing results. If you're a Star Wars fan you've got to get your hands on this book.