Scott's Rating:   3.5 out of 4

This is the eighth book in the Jedi Apprentice series. Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon, still attempting to patch their broken relationship, follow Xanatos to his home planet of Telos. Expecting it to be a simple apprehension, they are surprised to find that Xanatos wields significant financial and political power there. He's a hero among his people.

What the people of the planet don't know is that while Xanatos and the government have been distracting them with a form of gambling called Katharsis, his company has been pillaging the planet's resources. Not a nice thing considering the importance the people place on their environment.

Pursued by Xanatos' men, Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon soon hook up with a small rebellion. But what can they do to stop him when the entire planet thinks he's a hero?

Scott:

    This book features the inevitable final confrontation between Qui-Gon and Xanatos. I won't say what exactly happens, but it has been building up for a while. This was a good time to resolve it.

Watson continues to do a good job of digging into the minds of Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon. We see how Qui-Gon berates himself for bringing Obi-Wan into a dangerous situation. We follow Obi-Wan and he tries to overcome his own self doubt and win the acceptance of his master. And we see the bond so strong in the films slowly reforming. Pretty deep character stuff for a book that's supposedly for kids!

And I have to say that this is yet another eye catching cover by the artist, though they fail to give them credit anywhere.

Scott:

    The Jedi Apprentice books are slowly starting to fall into a pattern. Not that it is a bad thing, because it is a good pattern, but something needs to be done soon to really shake things up and make it interesting. What that is, I'm not sure.

Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon also run into Bruck's father (the Jedi that met his end in the last novel). The tension in the moment is only briefly touched on when it could have been more substantial. I always wondered what it took for a parent to allow their baby to be taken away and be raised by a bunch of lightsaber wielding hippies. I always wondered what went through a parent's mind when the child they barely knew was killed on another world. What do you do, as a parent, when the Jedi allow your child to fall to the dark side? Maybe that's more than you can delve into in this book, but hopefully it will be explored in the future.

For the above reasons I bumped the rating down slightly from a perfect 4. Otherwise it was a great read.

Scott:

    Acid lakes. Don't go skinny dippin'!