The result is a really excellent look at how people dealt with the emergence of the Empire, why it was able to consolidate power so quickly, and how the fighting styles of people like Organa, Mothma, and Gerrera were so different and also so similarly ineffective at first at combatting the rise of tyranny. Obviously being an interquel book, nothing super canon altering can occur to the main trio of characters, but seeing how Mothma reacts to try and politically win back power for the senate, how Organa desperately searches for justice for the Jedi, and Gerrera looks to fight back with violence for his people really works well. Its aided by several other minor characters being excellent viewpoints even if I'm not sure they'll be back in the rest of the trilogy, most notably an old republic/Imperial spymaster looking for her old agents and a separatist cyborg who was trained to be their final weapon and now has no clear path forwards. This is an excellent novel on its own and is entirely stand-alone, but I look forward to seeing from here how the other two authors take what this book built.
Plot Summary:
It is the early days of the Galactic Empire and many around the Galaxy are only beginning to take stock of what this new government means for the Galaxy. The Emperor has begun by consolidating his rule, shortly detaining its opposition in the Senate before releasing them to make a point as to where true power lies and by taking steps to reunite the galaxy under his handpicked governors after the end of the Seperatist Civil Wars. And the people largely cheer these efforts after years of horrifying and traumatic civil war that touched people all across the Galaxy. And some others are trying to figure out the next steps in ensuring that the newly declared Empire cannot rule over the entire Galaxy as an unfettered dictator.
But some people are not content to sit back and let the Emperor increase his grip on power. For Mon Mothma, who was one of those detained and traumatized by the Emperor's detention, this situation must be dealt with politically and she begins an effort for a new bill in the senate that would limit the Emperor's powers...even if obtaining the votes for such a bill will require her to deal with criminals, aristocrats, and even former traitors. For Bail Organa, it means going on a quest to find the evidence that will exonerate the Jedi, whom the Emperor has accused of treason and who nobody seems to be willing to accept were wrongly accused and murdered. For Imperial Intelligence Agent Haki, it means using Organa's quest to go around the galaxy to find out what happened to and rescue her agents who were embedded within separatist lines. And for young Chemish, a civilian on Coruscant recruited by Haki, it means finding meaning in all that has happened and figuring out what's really behind the new unrest on Coruscant.
For Soujen Vak-Nhalis, a cyborg weapon created by the Separatists as a last resort, the new Empire presents a challenge on how to proceed from here. Rescued from a deep sleep, Soujen falls into the hands of Saw Gerrera, who aims to continue his fighting only now against the Empire and hopes to use Soujen's knowledge to find a Separatist weapon cache. But as Soujen works with Saw and others, he soon begins to have other ideas about how to enact his revenge...but what sort of revenge could be meaningful in the shadow of the Emperor's absolute power?
The Mask of Fear jumps around to the perspectives and plotlines of several different characters, although many of them intersect at various points. I mentioned before the jump that this book deals with 3 major characters originally introduced in the movies in Bail Organa, Mon Mothma, and Saw Gerrera, but it should be noted that Saw is never given his own plot-arc or perspective, instead he's a side character in Soujen's plotline who interacts with the others in that way. Still, the book really works by showing how different characters react to the Empire's origins and the Emperor's grabs on power and how they try to fight and/or survive throughout it all.
It's really done particularly well because each character has different ideas and motives on what to do next. Mon Mothma for example is absolutely traumatized by her arrest during the seizing of power (she was randomly thrown into a dismal cell) and responds by trying to deal with the Emperor through normal channels: legislation. She's obsessed solely with a bill to limit what the Emperor can do, knowing that it will be difficult to pull off given the Emperor's popularity and hold over various other senators, and is thus even willing to work with those she finds heinous or evil to get the bill passed. She doesn't think of herself as being an idealist like Bail (see below) but someone practical but as the book concludes - not really a spoiler since we know what comes out of it all - the Emperor is not actually going to consider himself bound by the legislation and seeing all the effort she goes through to get this bill a chance and to see it going to be for naught is heartwrenching and effective at showing her limits through this angle.
Mind you, Bail Organa's methods are only marginally better - he genuinely believes that by finding evidence the Jedi were framed and are innocent, he can get the public to rise up in support of the fallen Jedi and get justice for those responsible for their murder. But his quest to find such evidence repeatedly almost gets him killed and even if he was right, it would only lead to revolution that was bloody and may not actually get justice whatsoever. And more likely it would only lead to the people ignoring it as something they didn't care about, something he refuses to acknowledge.
Then we have the other characters just trying to survive. Haki is an intelligence agent over a hundred years old whose main goal is to protect her agents who entrusted her with their lives and to her the Empire/Republic distinction matters less than her own obligations. Unfortunately the Empire doesn't particularly care for those obligations. Chemish just wants answers as to the unrest that kills his cousin and as a result falls into an amateur spy role amidst a bunch of upstart revolutionaries trying to act in support of the Empire. And Soujen is a warrior from a war now over with no purpose other than to try someway to wreak vengeance despite there being no good to him or his people at this point.
It all works really well as the first chapter - a stand alone chapter - in this trilogy and I'll definitely be back for the sequel when it comes out later this month.
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