What’s a wookiee to do when the daughter of the Emperor’s advisor has taken his partner hostage and will only free him if said wookiee goes on a dangerous assignment for her? Complete the mission, of course! The Mighty Chewbacca and the Forest of Fear by Tom Angleberger is a middle grade book that teams up everyone’s favorite wookiee with a young woman who’s trying to help her people and the galaxy’s snarkiest KX security droid.
Angleberger has a delightfully wry yet fun style of writing, providing direct commentary on the story as the narrator. Writing Chewbacca can be a challenge since his words are traditionally not translated directly but given vague meaning. Angleberger finds a way to make it fun and feel logical. The narration is really what makes the book veer more towards special and away from “this is fine” and I actually found myself laughing out loud once or twice.
Star Wars, as of late, has seemed to have fun pairing Chewie up on his solo missions with a spunky and relatively young girl to be a foil. That girl also usually has her own agenda that just happens to somewhat line up with Chewie’s own mission but they end up doing good and becoming friends at the end. It could have very easily been tedious this time around but Angleberger found a way to keep it interesting. When in doubt, toss in the K-2SO wrench apparently. (I love that droid so much, I really do.)
The Mighty Chewbacca and the Forest of Fear is a book that kids in the middle grade age range will likely find delightful but may be less appreciated by the older ones/teenagers. It’s a fun little adventure with Chewie that could be an amusing divertissement for adults or a great journey for kids.
Thank you to Disney Lucasfilm Press for providing a copy of the book for review purposes.
