The ebook edition of the Rogue One junior novel I wrote came out on the same day as the film, back in December, but the print edition is finally shipping today! It’s a snazzy little hardcover with eight pages of color photos from the film tipped into the middle of it, and it tells the full story of the film, with additional little tidbits added here and there.
I’m pretty thrilled about this release because while lots of adults read ebooks, most kids still seem to prefer getting their hands on an actual book. This is when they’ll finally be able to find the story in libraries and at book fairs and really dig into it.
I want to thank the folks at Lucasfilm for asking me to write this book, especially Jennifer Heddle, Sammy Holland, and Michael Siglain. They were a true pleasure to work with and gave me every bit of support I needed along the way to make the book the best it could be. I hope every kid who reads it enjoys it as much as I did writing it.
While I have your attention, I’d like to also reveal that I slipped into the book a tribute to my pal Jeff Mackintosh, a brilliant graphic designer who died of brain cancer (glioblastoma multiforme) last fall. With the approval of Jennifer Heddle and the Lucasfilm Story Group (to whom I’m extremely grateful), I named one of the characters Toshma Jefkin in Jeff’s honor, making him forever part of Star Wars canon.
A well-veiled (as in hardly at all) spoiler below.
In the film’s final scene (and page 185 of the book), a rebel hands a data card through a door that’s stuck cracked open. We barely see the unnamed person on the other side, but he carries that card on and delivers it to the captain of that ship, making him a vital link in the stealing of the Death Star’s plans and that station’s eventual destruction. That’s Toshma Jefkin.
May the Force be with him. And, well, with us all.
