Star Wars

This book is a 3 star in terms of enjoyment, but seeing it as a middle grade book, I really liked what its doing. It's also such a Ken Liu book, which maybe explains the low rating because Ken Liu does not write in a style that screams Star Wars, hahaha. This is a Canterbury Tales-style story about a bunch of people on a ship who trade stories about Luke Skywalker. I think this book handles the concept of hero-worship and stories we tell about figures and how that shapes us collectively (something Liu always delves into), and whether the story someone tells about us is more important than what actually happened, very well. It's something that I don't feel a lot of media for younger audiences really gets into, especially in a fun and lighthearted way, and I think this book has a lot to offer to kids and teens about how the world can be viewed differently by others, and how stories shape our entire worldview.

I will say though that this book definitely peaked with the first story for me, which is about a conspiracy theory where the entire original trilogy events were propaganda put out by the rebellion and that Luke Skywalker was actually a part of a band of thieves and con artists who accidentally became mascots of the rebellion. This story was absolutely hilarious, and none of the other ones held as much magic for me as this one.