Queen's Shadow

Main Review:

After my third ancient Greek adaptation in six months – I decided recently it was time to indulge in another of my favourite franchises. Trading the topless towers of Ilium for the immense spires of Coruscant in a galaxy far far away. As a proud lover of the prequels, I was over-the-moon to read a story completed centred around Padmé Amidala – one of the most wronged characters in all of cinematic history. Don’t @ me.

Queen’s Shadow seeks to right the wrongs done to the champion of Naboo, and it’s a fantastic way to expand the prequel experience. Even those of us who enjoyed the prequels can appreciate that they had issues (a certain ‘accidental’ mid-riff exposing comes to mind). In the years since the trilogy came out, there’s been a whole host of new elements, features and characters who have been introduced to round out the whole era. Whilst much of it is now only semi-canon, Queen’s Shadow is able to thread them all together in a positive and rewarding way. There’s a lot of tightening up – adding small details here and there to make the prequel-story in its entirety flow better, in much the same way thatRogue One explained the reasoning behind the Death Star fault. Many of these elements are large-scale, but they work all the better for that. You remember how Captain Panaka and Senator Palpatine were quite chummy in that one bit in Episode I? Well then you won’t be completely surprised to find out that Panaka becomes the first Governor of Naboo when the Empire rises. It’s little touches like that which really expand the universe, and I wish I could pull it off as well as Johnston does.

The references to the wider universe are everywhere, but even an ardent fan like myself must admit that they are a little shallow. Reading the book trying to spot them just leaves you sort of nodding along knowingly. There’s a particularly egregious moment where Padmé says she couldn’t imagine having twins, and of course this is funny because we know she does, and so you chuckle a little bit, but then that’s that. You just continue on. Where it does work really well is right at the opening, where the description of Padmé lying with flowers in her hair and her eyes closed will make many readers instantly think of her state funeral at the end of Episode III, only to reveal she’s lying in a pool of water having a break (which honestly, after 4 years of being Queen, I think she deserves). And as shallow as they are, it is fun to try and spot them all, even if I did had to rely on Wookiepedia a few times to see if I’d missed something.

The blurb of the book suggests that Padmé becoming Senator is her stepping out of the shadow of being the young queen (hence the title). But this is only half the story. Supporting her every step of the way is her band of loyal handmaidens – led front of centre by Sabé, the decoy queen from Episode I who, much like her leader was criminally underused in Episodes II and III. The partnership between the two is absolutely captivating thoughout, with such a deep unspoken connection that honestly I wanted them to end up together and forget all about Anakin Skywalker – the galaxy would likely have been a better place if they had. As part of the expanding of the narrative, we find out in this book that Padmé and Sabé together worked to try and help Shmi Skywalker, along with the other slaves on Tatooine, something that never got mentioned in the films themselves but shows the deep-rooted ‘goodness’ of the pair.

My main criticism is that the book never really hits a peak, the tension never builds anywhere, even when there’s assassination attempts and political friction, it never feels particularly hard to beat. It’s possibly part of the risk of doing prequel stories – she’s tied into a pre-existing narrative so she’s never in any real danger. Or maybe I’ve just been spoilt by a lot of time reading pulpy stuff where every issue is resolved by wading through the problem with a halberd. Either way, this is not a difficult slog of a book to get through, and it’s a nice enough journey all the same.

Queen’s Shadow is a wonderful starting point for a whole series of stories centred on Padmé and the people’s whose lives she touched. Padmé is (tragically) doomed by canon, but that doesn’t mean we couldn’t get a story centred on Sabé trying to figure out what happened to her closest friend, having to fight against Governor Panaka, the man who trained her to do it. Actually… that’s not a bad idea. If you’re reading this from Disney I’m open to offers!

I really want to try and get some non-fiction read soon, so send me any recommendations you may have. And may the force be with you. Always.