Star Wars: Lost Tribe of the Sith: The Collected Stories

Lost Tribe of the Sith is much more than an interesting experiment in the Star Wars Expanded Universe. It’s more than a collection of short stories about villains. It’s more than the historical background on the antagonists for the Fate of the Jedi series. Lost Tribe of the Sith, much to my surprise, is an extremely well-crafted and knit-together fantasy epic set in the Star Wars universe. It’s as mythological as any Star Wars literature I’ve ever come across, and I loved every second of it.

I would easily rank this volume among my very favorite reads in the galaxy far, far away. That being said, I don’t think you can walk into it blindly. First, you’ll need a decent knowledge of Sith history, and at least a general idea of the plot direction for Fate of the Jedi. Don’t overlook this one just because it’s now “Legends,” because Sith backstory short stories is a weird concept, or because you aren’t planning on reading Fate of the Jedi.

I enjoyed this "series" much more than the Fate of the Jedi series it leads up to. John Jackson Miller manages to create a compelling history for the planet Kesh. While it does not achieve the complexity, subtlety, and scale of Tolkien's Middle Earth, it is still impressive considering the majority of the story is told through a single volume of short stories (if you don't include the five issue comic series, which I haven't read).

It was interesting to see how a colony of Sith cope with crash landing on a planet with no hope of escape. In this scenario my gut reaction would be that things are not going to end well, with various factions forming to destroy each other, infighting, and power grabs. While this does happen frequently throughout the history Miller has created, there are occasionally leaders that exhibit one of the Sith's most under underrated attributes, the ability to plan for the long game.

Before starting this review, there are a few things I would like to address about this book. Lost Tribe of the Sith: the Collected Stories was meant to be backstory for the Fate of the Jedi book series introducing this “Lost Tribe” and revealing its history leading up to its eventual meeting with Luke Skywalker. This book covers the tribe’s history between 5000 and 2975 years before A New Hope, condensing roughly 2000 years of time into one novel. Given these facts, it’s easy to tell Miller had huge creative constraints when writing this book: the ending is already set, the history has to be rushed to fit it all in, and it had to be written as a collection of short stories. Ultimately, however, I can say he still delivered.

After crash landing on the remote planet of Kesh, the Sith mining ship Omen is left marooned in unknown territory with no hopes of being rescued. As a result, the ambitious Sith are left to create their own society and survive off the desolate land. Fortunately, the natives have already fashioned several cities and are more than happy to submit to the Sith, believing them to be deities. Unfortunately, every Sith has his or her own agenda and will stop at nothing to achieve it. Some want to find a way to return to the Sith Empire. Others want to live in luxury in a stable society on Kesh. This conflict of interest is the main selling point of this novel and was what kept me turning pages. It becomes very clear this Sith civilization was built off betrayal, alliances, and manipulation.

With many different agendas it makes sense this book would have a diverse array of characters as well. The first major story arc revolves around Yaru Korsin, the captain of the Omen before it crash landed. Yaru comes off as a reasonable and clever man; he, very smartly, tries to learn everything he can about this new land while also eliminating threats to the stability of the tribe. He even had the foresight to know how fragile their society was and established backup plans for when all hell breaks loose. Another important character, Varner Hilts, also tries to keep the tribe together later in the story. Although as a twist, Hilts isn’t a warrior but rather a historian and looks to the past to help shape the future. Rather than fight battles with lightsabers like Korsin often did, he fought battles of knowledge which made for a great contrast. I could go on all day about each and every character’s motivations and personalities but 2000 years of history includes a lot of people. Suffice to say, this book has a cast of great characters that complement each other well.

There were a few problems I had with the book and all of them had to do with the creative constraints Miller worked with. Covering 2000 years of time in one book sets it up for rushed pacing from the get-go and I felt the events of the book zoomed by too quickly. There wasn’t any time to stop and think about the events happening and thus the book sacrificed depth for breadth. This even rubs off on the characters as one moment they’re large and in charge while the next they’re dead and the book makes way for the next story arc. It’s was hard for me to get attached to a character when, by the next arc, 100 years have passed and that character has faded away to make room for the next batch. However, if you’re a fan of fast-paced plots rather than deep characters, this shouldn’t bother you.

Lost Tribe of the Sith is good an example of a book one must read with the right mindset. Being a prequel of sorts made up of loosely-unified short stories prevents it from achieving a high level of depth and having to condense two millennia worth of time doesn’t help much either. Nonetheless, given those constraints the book does an excellent job of working with them by crafting a story with a diverse cast of interesting characters and a fast-paced plot.

ALTERNATE BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS: Fool’s Bargain by Timothy Zahn (short story/novella that came with Survivor’s Quest) and Darth Plagueis by James Luceno (novel). Both stories revolve around oftentimes uneasy alliances between different parties and their attempts to work around their hidden agendas. The former is more action-packed while the latter is more political thriller.

Good Read, but wished the story was a bit longer.

I've gotten into this era of Star Wars and finding it very interesting. The stories are give good insight to how the Sith operate. The only thing I could say is that the pages seem to duplicate. I'm reading this from my iphone4s and there has been multiple pages duplicated. I've also had chapters end where it seems like there's more. The story Sentinel ended very abruptly. Although I'm figuring out how things are leaving off, it would be nice to have the complete story.

Downloaded this book yesterday. Was already disgusted that the first 8 books were free but the long drawn out conclusion cost. When I purchase something, I expect it to be working right. I am into part 3 and several times the ends of the chapters have been messed up. Pages duplicated at the end of the chapter and a couple of them cut off by a 1/2-1 page. I have to go back to the original book to find out what it says. Disappointing quality.

The free stories have been good, and I am looking forward to the conclusion! Note that the final part is NOT available for free, only the first eight, so read some of those first to see if you want the end:)

Good series of short stories, but you can get them free on your iPad using the Kindle app...$5 is $5...