Max Nocerino 
Star Wars: Master of Evil was a fun read, and the ending was chilling. It’s a tad morbid, but it really hits you with a dose of reality.
Star Wars: Master of Evil is a Darth Vader-centric novel, written by the very talented Adam Christopher, who penned Shadow of the Sith some years ago. I believe Adam is ideally suited to write Vader, and I must say he has done a great job, especially in capturing the dialogue and the Dark Lord’s mindset.
The novel really excited me with the plot summary, as Vader is once again seeking a cheat code for existence, using the dark side of the Force to resurrect his dead wife, Padme Amidala, whom he believed he had accidentally killed in the throes of his anger. Just for reference, this is actually the 3rd time in the new Canon that Vader attempts to revive Padme. The other two times are in the Charles Soule comics and the pseudo-VR video game Vader Immortal. Interestingly, Vader never tried to do this in Legends. If I recall, the closest was one of the Jude Watson books, where he contracted an evil scientist to perfect a drug to erase his memories of his wife altogether.
THE PROLOGUE
I was pleasantly surprised with the prologue of sorts. Count Dooku actually begins the novel by looking for a powerful dark-side artifact on a primitive world. What he finds is a vergence in the Force in the shape of a stone temple. He excavates it and literally puts it into an advanced, reconfigurable ship to deliver it to his Master. While he is doing so, he encounters a local shaman whom he tries to torture to get the secrets of what this thing is in the first place. Christopher did a bang-up job portraying Dooku. While he is evil, the Count is more of a pretentious narcissist than an outright psychopath like Sidious, and allows the shaman to live after finishing with him.
This whole sequence also confirms something that I have been wondering for years. Did Dooku ever aspire to usurp his Master? He hints at it when training Savage Oppress, but I always chalked it up to his usual lying to motivate Oppress. However, this book confirms it. On route to his Master’s, the ship is mysteriously destroyed, but Dooku does not live long enough to have his plot come to fruition.
THE B PLOT
The B story is very well-scripted, and I really like that there is an A and a B, but no consistent C. We briefly delve into a scene later in the book from Commander Appo’s perspective (a clone from Legends whom Vader was quite fond of), and I believe this focused approach really helped the plot flow smoothly. Our B plot is a new character: a man who happens to be the head of the Imperial Guard (Palpatine’s personal security), Colonel Halland Goth, and his “manumitted” TC-protocol droid, TC-99, or Nines for short.
What I really like about Goth is that while he is fiercely loyal to the Empire and among the highest echelons of rank, Goth is genuinely not an evil man. In fact, he is a very good man who has empathy for others and wants the Empire to restore peace and order to the galaxy. He also views the Jedi as traitors, as he genuinely believes they tried to overthrow the Republic.
His view is, of course, wrong, but he could not possibly be privy to the actual truth. Goth also has a terminal illness that he is hiding from his colleagues, and Nines frequently has to give him a shot of special medicine when he has attacks. Goth is living on borrowed time, as soon the shots will no longer be effective. Nevertheless, as he works with Vader and learns the secret of who he is and how he came to be in that life-support suit, he becomes desperate for Vader to share a way to keep him alive. It seems like a fool’s errand, but Goth has no other hope to save himself.
GOTH
Because Goth is such a sympathetic character and Christopher is such a talented writer, I actually felt anxiety and tension as Goth tried to hide his attacks and maintain his strength while chipping away at his mission. 99 is also a very human droid character, as Goth illegally manumitted him, releasing him from the shackles of his programming and allowing him to become self-aware (in a sense). As such, he is Goth’s closest confidante and only true friend.
RESURRECTION?
The plot of finding the shaman who could bring people back from the dead was a mixed bag for me. I got very excited by the concept, but I was also disappointed when it didn’t pan out. However, the ambiguity about whether the shaman could actually do what he said he could do was very cool, similar to how we never knew if Plagueis could really save others from death. But,. I did get my hopes up for something a bit more spectacular. However, I did gawk at the fact that the temple was anchored directly in hyperspace. That was a cool new piece of technology that I have ruminated on creatively for over 10 years now!
This book was about Vader, but I think it was really Goth’s story, as he realized at the end that Vader and the Empire weren’t the heroes he had first believed them to be, and that he had to stop running from the inevitable and accept his fate. It’s a tad morbid, but it really hits you with a dose of reality. As someone who has lost many people to cancer, Goth’s destiny hits hard.
VERDICT
The only awful part of the book was Vader’s vision upon entering the vergence. It was clichéd and anticlimactic, with some ridiculous dialogue that Christopher obviously intended to be impactful and meaningful but failed miserably. Despite all this, the book was a fun read, and the ending was chilling. However, there is one question buzzing around in my head that I need answered. Perhaps I will reach out to the author himself to satisfy it.
Star Wars: Master of Evil by Adam Christopher is available to buy now.
Max Nocerino is a regular Staff Writer for The Future of the Force. He is a passionate Star Wars fan and loves the literature of the galaxy far, far away. Follow him on Twitter where he shares his love of the Force frequently!
