Finished my yearly reading of Splinter Of The Mind's Eye. Still dig it. Always love to go back to the simpler days. Thinking I was through with Zahn EU, I decided to go on to some Star Trek while I wait for Solo's 11.

Looking through my books, I noticed I'd somehow skipped over Survivor's Quest. For the life of me, I can not fathom a reason why I would have done that. ?? What the Hell, man? I completely forgot about it. Anyway, I went right to it.

No Spoilers.

I'd mentioned in my last two reviews how much I really dug the Hand Of Judgment characters, as well as how uninteresting Mara Jade is as a 20-year-old. Zahn does a great job with her as a young woman, if you dig a Pixeleen sort of girl. I do not. At all.

She's way too perfect and awesome. As a 20-year-old, with no flaws and no sense of danger, she comes across as very shallow. I gave her a pass because the rest of the story from Allegiance and Choices Of One was so well done.

Survivor's Quest, however, takes place several years after the Thrawn novels and deals solely with Luke and Mara after they've been married a while. Mara as a 40-year-old is infinitely more interesting than Mara as a 20-year-old. Honestly, I'm shocked at just how different Zahn writes her, considering it's the same person - a person he invented, no less.

Anyway, I'm several chapters in and really liking it. It's a Luke and Mara story, with the rest of the original Star Wars characters getting little more than a brief mention. That's very refreshing to me because Zahn really has room to stretch his Luke & Mara muscles.

They're both done really well and I'm very glad to be able to get back to deep and interesting adult Mara. Full review in a week or so.