The first novel of the Thrawn Ascendancy prequel trilogy will hit shelves on September 1st, but, you can read the Prologue of Chaos Rising right now on StarWars.com.
If you don’t feel like clicking the link above and reading the whole thing, I’ll give you a breakdown of what is happening and what we can expect to see in the first book of this series.
The prologue opens up with a quick attack on the Chiss Ascendancy homeworld of Csilla, and while the attack was taken care of relatively quickly, the ruling families of the Ascendancy are worried that this could be a precursor to a larger scale attack on Csilla or some of the other worlds under the Ascendancy’s banner. Enter Supreme General Ba’kif, the Chiss Expansionary Fleet’s top ranking military official. He gives what little information there is on the attack to the families, but as with most nobility, a simple and accurate description of the events and what is known is not enough.
More conversation and introspection goes on, and Ba’kif comes to the realization that the attack itself was not merely an attack, it was an attempt to hide some other act that had already happened within Ascendancy space. While the enemy and the end goal are now known, the purpose for this incident is clear. Now, Ba’kif needs Senior Captain Mitth’raw’nuruodo, aka Thrawn, to figure out the mystery that threatens the safety and security of the Chiss Ascendancy.
For those of you who have read the new Thrawn trilogy, you can likely gather that the unknown enemy who attacked the Ascendancy homeworld is likely the Grysk, new canon’s version of the Yuuzhan Vong. At this point in his life, Thrawn is much younger than he was during his Imperial officer days, but he is still as intelligent, and controversial as he was in the Empire. I assume there will be little to no interaction with known space in this novel, but it will be interesting to see if/how Zahn treats the other players in the galaxy throughout this trilogy. Either way, I’m excited for more Thrawn material!
