The era of the old republic was always a dangerous time. Hestizo Trace, having failed to gain the status of Jedi knight, has been assigned to an agricultural station due to her ability to communicate with plant life. Her most prized possession is a black orchid, which is also being sought by Darth Scabrous, who wants to use it as his final ingredient for immortality. Captured and transported to Scabrous’s lair, Trace witnesses his attempts to live for ever. Unfortunately for Scabrous his plans backfire when the procedure creates an army of undead who hunt Trace and the remaining survivors of the Sith academy...

Star Wars: Red Harvest is a new paperback novel by Joe Schreiber.

Cutting across genres is nothing new and Star Wars has dabbled with force stealing Sith, which were barely disguised vampires, but full out zombies is another matter. Star Wars material usually has to be Ok’d by Lucas Arts; therefore I presume that they bought into this idea, regardless of the problems of logic that it causes for the greater Star Wars universe.

First off I found it difficult to take seriously the idea that a Jedi could talk to a plant. Unless your Lost in Space, carrots and plants in general, tend to be lower on the intellectual hierarchy than say animals, but we never saw Luke or Yoda, stopping to have a quick chat with a passing Tauntaun, though it would explain why Luke drops Yoda when he is training, having been distracted by the swamp asking him if that was his puppy.

So, if we accept talking plants, what about zombies? Well, once Trace is in the Odacer-Faustin Sith Academy, and the sickness is unleashed, what we have is a pretty average zombie story. As with most stories in this genre, there is a lot of running around, killing and screaming. I guess that the lack of any real horror, there's not enough here to disturb Poe’s sleep, comes down to the age group that the story is aimed at. I wouldn’t have any problem with a young teen reading this, but for an adult there is little novel or challenging, even the ending is a combination of The Lord of the Rings and Alien Resurrection.

Still, what do I know? Schreiber’s previous novel, Death Troopers, where zombies chowed down on stormtrooper brains, turned out to be very successful. So, if your thing is Jedi’s kicking seven shades out of zombies, this could be for you.

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Charles Packer