Star Wars: Mara Jade - By the Emperor's Hand

Mara Jade Skywalker has had a hard life ,being taken away from her mom and dad by a team of stormtroopers at a early age then kept as a experiment by Emperor Palpatine as a private force-using agent not light nor in the dark side known only as The Emperor's Hand,then when the emperor died shes made redundant,went to work with Talon Karrade as 2 in charge,saved Luke's life,trains as a jedi knight(later to become a jedi master),marries Luke Skywalker,keeps Jaina Solo as an apprentice,picks up a mysterious disease,cured,helps fend off the Yuuzhan Vong.God I'm outta breath.These are the reasons shes my favourite character.This book is about her as the emperors hand.In this story the emperor orders her to take out the leader of the Black Nebula,the sort of replacment for the failed Black Sun.She does so but she starts thinking how easy it was,a bit too easy for her liking.Then unexpectedly the Emperor dies and in honour of him Mara will finish her last mission by getting into Black Nebula and taking out the real head of Black Nebula.This book is pure genius, its got great art work and its written by Timothy Zahn.I thought its about time Mara got her own story then this came along, AMAZING *****

Star Wars comics can range from exhilerating to, well, extremely disappointing. But it's hard to go wrong with Mara Jade. She is such a good addition to the SW universe -- first of all, a strong female character, and we all know that the SW universe is short on those. But what I love about Mara is that she defies the Star Wars clear-cut good vs. evil dichotomy which makes for great movies but can sometimes be too simplistic in novels and comics. In this graphic novel, Mara is on the side of the baddies, but she always has integrity, and we somehow end up liking her despite her flaws. And she is the perfect force to temper Luke's farmboy blond-haired unwavering *goodness!*The artwork is absolutely beautiful as well. Nice color, too. The only better Star Wars art, imho, is Star Wars Union which is also not to be missed!

By the Emperor's Hand is a prime example of how to write a good comic. The script is good, the plot well-done, the art good, and Mara isn't simply an illustration of the artist's wet-dream. This is a thoroughly enjoyable comic enabling us to get to know the light and dark of Mara Jade before she hooks up with Karrde. We see how quickly Isard was able to consolidate her power, and as a plus this book involves the #0 edition, which was previously only available online. My only minor gripe about this work at all is Mara's height. The character is supposed to be a bout 5'3", but in this she often looks 6 ft.+ Other than that, this is simply a fantastic, fun comic.

This is a great book. But you would not expect anything less from Zahn. I will warn you, though, that this book IS A COMIC. I bought it not knowing if it was a comic or not but when I found out it was, I was a little disappointed. To my surprise, it was well worth my money and ranked up high with novels I have read. I could not put this down. It was great! It gave a lot of history on Mara before Heir to the Empire and just what she did for the Emperor. I would strongly recomend this book to novel readers and comic readers alike! I loved it and I know you will too!

I really loved this book. I have always been fond of Mara Jade, so this was especially appealing, but I would also recommend this book to others not quite so familiar with her. I enjoyed the plot thoroughly and the visual rendering was appealing as well. I had always been rather curious about Jade's past, and I believe this is an absolutely fabulous peek into some of the details. I hope no Star Wars fan misses this one.