The plot of the new ”Star Wars” movie was officially revealed yesterday, as the novelization of ”Episode 1: The Phantom Menace” arrived in bookstores.
The 324-page book, by fantasy writer Terry Brooks, was doing out-of-this-world business within minutes after hitting the shelves of booksellers across the city.
At Barnes & Noble stores in Manhattan, diehard fans found themselves buying four copies of the book – when they discovered there were four different covers.
”Some fans were really agonizing. They kept trying to choose between the Obi-Wan Kenobi, Darth Maul, Queen Amidala and Anakin Skywalker covers,” said one clerk at the Third Avenue and 47th Street outlet.
”And when they couldn’t [decide], a few just walked off with all four.”
The hardcover book, published by Lucas Books and Ballantine Books and selling for $25, is based on the screenplay by director George Lucas.
It’s filled with action from Page One, which begins with 9-year-old Anakin Skywalker zooming around the barren desert of the planet Tatooine in a ”podracer” spaceship, racing other kids:
”It was all so quick, so instantaneous. One mistake, one misjudgment, and he would be out of the race and lucky if he weren’t dead. That was the thrill of it. All that power, all that speed …”
Anakin, a slave boy, dreams of one day becoming a Jedi Knight and traveling the world to win freedom from captivity.
In another part of the galaxy, Jedi Knight Qui-Gon Jinn and his apprentice, Obi-Wan Kenobi, are charged with the protection of Queen Amidala as she seeks to end the siege of her planet, Naboo, by enemy warships.
It is this quest that brings the duo to Tattooine, where they have a fateful meeting with Anakin that sets in motion Anakin’s transformation into Darth Vadar.
The book ends in a breathless battle between forces of the Federation and good-guy androids.