Hello, everyone! Today I’m reviewing Defy the Storm by Tessa Gratton and Justina Ireland, the most recent YA installment in the High Republic series. I’m a huge fan of The High Republic publishing initiative, and I get excited anytime a new book in the series drops. I really enjoyed the last YA Star Wars book that Gratton and Ireland wrote together. So, I’ve been looking forward to this one for a while.

Star Wars: The High Republic, the New York Times best-selling series, continues. . . . For light and life!

One year after the fall of Starlight Beacon, the galaxy is in chaos. An anarchistic group known as the Nihil has taken over a section of space now known as the Occlusion Zone. Jedi Knight Vernestra Rwoh and scientist Avon Starros team up in an attempt to find a way through the Nihil Stormwall to save those on the other side.

But what are the Nihil’s real plans? And what of the nameless creatures that can destroy the Jedi Order? The battle has just begun. . . .

I’m just going to start this review off with the things I didn’t like about Defy the Storm. Mainly, it had too many POVs and plot threads. It seemed like the authors wanted to include every character they created in phase one and wrote an unnecessarily complex plot to shoehorn them all into it. I think it would have worked better if the story focused on Vernestra, Avon and Imri. The inclusion of Sylvestri, Jordanna, and Graf just felt like overkill that took away from the more intimate story of the other three characters. It didn’t help that all of the things happening in this book barely moved the story of phase three forward.

Parts of Defy the Storm had me scratching my head. It made no sense that Avon would be allowed to go to school on Coruscant no matter how much of a tantrum she threw. I also do not see how her mother would be able to sweep all of her actions under the table. She caused A LOT of trouble for the Nihil. Graf’s setup was also strange. He was a prisoner but could also travel and had an ongoing relationship with someone who wasn’t on his space station. The ability of these kids to figure out how to cross the stormwall also lessened its impact for me. There were just so many odd choices that left me perplexed.

All that being said, where Defy the Storm succeeded for me was in its character development. Vernestra, in particular, had such a great journey. She started out defeated by the destruction of Starlight Beacon and the supposed death of her padawan and former master. Over the course of the story, she came to terms with her grief and figured out how to accept loss and move forward with her life. I really loved how the authors portrayed her development. I just wish they would have focused even more on her and her introspection.

I was a little disappointed that Imri didn’t have a bigger role in Defy the Storm. I enjoyed seeing how much he’d grown into a confident and capable Jedi, but I was bummed that the reader didn’t get to experience the journey alongside him. I also found it odd that he and Vernestra never discussed the threat of the Force eaters since their impending arrival on Imri’s planet was what prompted the attempt to rescue Imri in the first place. I guess it was just another plot mishap that didn’t quite add up.

I’ll definitely give the authors credit for making me care about Graf and Jordanna in Defy the Storm, though. I didn’t really like these characters in Ireland’s YA book from phase one, but their stories in this book helped me get to know them better. I became invested in Jordanna’s search for her family and found her character much less frustrating when she was away from Sylvestri. Graf was also a little less insufferable in this story. I liked that we got to see him actually have a heart even if he was still mostly a self-serving pile of bantha poodoo. lol.

Overall, Defy the Storm was a solid, but seemingly not critical, entry to the overarching High Republic story. The character development was good, and I found so many of the POVs to be compelling and relatable. I just wish the story had homed in even more on the emotional journey of the characters with a tighter focus. The plot attempted too much while simultaneously achieving very little. It suffered from bloat and some odd choices that didn’t really work for me. Therefore, I give Defy the Storm a rating of 3.75 out of 5 stars.

Have you read Defy the Storm? What did you think of it? You can find even more of my thoughts on previous entries of the High Republic by Ireland and Gratton in my reviews of Path of Deceit, Out of the Shadows, and Mission to Disaster.