The finale of Michael P. Kube-McDowell's Black Fleet Crisis is, unfortunately, the weakest outing of the series. The book heavily relies on a Wookiee counter-attack on the Yevetha, and the Wookiee storyline just isn't that strong. Although, to his credit, he avoided the Lassie-effect with Chewbacca and instead of having other characters basically repeat what the Wookiee says, he uses brackets and translates the Wookiee-speak into English. Nicely done.
Luke's search for the Fallanassi comes to a spectacularly disappointing end. He finds the adepts of the White Current, but learns that Akanah lied to him, that his mother was never truly a member, and that the Fallanassi basically reject him outright. Fortunately, as a means of tying up the storylines, the planet that the Fallanassi currently call home is in the direct path of the Yevethan conquest.
Chewbacca and his son mount a rescue operation to save Han Solo, and they pull it off. A member of the Fallanassi that the Yevetha had captured stays behind and creates a Force illusion that fools the Yevetha into thinking that all their prisoners are still in captivity, even though they've escaped.
The final battle between Republic and Yevethan forces is very nicely written, and probably one of the glaring bright spots of the novel. There's also a cameo by Cindel Towani, of Ewok movie fame.
Lando and the vagabond come around in somewhat of a letdown. The ship, it turns out, was a recovery vessel meant to restart life on a planet that had fallen into an Ice Age. The ship begins it's process after a little help from Luke Skywalker.
Overall, the Black Fleet Crisis is one of the best trilogies in the Star Wars expanded universe, but the finale falls just short of the mark set by the previous two novels.
Re-readability: 6.9
Final Grade: C+
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