Agents of Chaos II: Jedi Eclipse

Like in Luceno last's New Jedi Order tedium-fest, there's some potential here: Han and Droma trying to find Droma's family in the midst of the galaxy's refugee crisis. This plot is actually a lot of fun, with the usual hijinks you expect Han Solo to get into. Unfortunately, the rest of this novel consists of military and political posturing with absolutely no character hook to hang on-- it's just people with titles talking to/about other people with titles.

Even when there is potential for more in the politics, it is squandered: Leia goes to Hapes to convince them to join the fight on the side of the New Republic, but then just stands around while male characters fight over her. (Somehow, women can be marginalized even in the matriarchal show more society of Hapes.) Then, she has a vague vision of badness again and again, but does nothing about it... then something bad happens! Man, riveting. And, for the two people out there who considered the Corellian Trilogy the high point of Star Wars fiction, Luceno peppers the book with characters from that series so you don't have to miss them anymore.

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I think I'm getting ready to give up on the whole "Star Wars Expanded Universe" thing. It really seems like they're trying to stretch the story out as far as they possibly can, and deal with minutiae rather than fleshing out the main storyline and then resolving it in an interesting manner. When I see a story title like "New Jedi Order", I expect to see Jedi ordering shit around, not the adventures of Han Solo and the Space Gypsies!

The Yuuzhan Vong use an alliance with the Hutts to facilitate their next major conquest in their war against the New Republic. Han pulls farther away from Leia as he searches for the family of his Ryn friend Droma. This was a fun action-filled book, and a significant improvement over Hero's Trial.

It's a good read and definitely part of the overall storyline for this series. I enjoyed Han finding purpose and Leia once again taking on the role of protector of the innocent.
I'm really enjoying this as a simple Sci Fi series with familiar and not so familiar characters.