Book Review: Star Wars - Poe Dameron: Freefall

 

Freefall is a young-adult Star Wars novel from 2020 written by Alex Segura. It tells the story of the early years of Poe Dameron as he was growing up and learning to be a pilot on his homeworld, Yavin 4, which was, of course, the moon where the rebels had their base in Episode IV. It is set sometime after Return of the Jedi, but the book does not clarify how long after.  It basically plays on the storyline from The Rise of Skywalker when Poe revealed he used to be a spice runner. The book details how he met Zorri Bliss (the character played by Kerri Russel in The Rise of Skywalker), and got mixed up with the spice runners. The book also details some of Zorri's background, and we find out the source of the tension between the two of them when her character was introduced in the movie. 

While this is a young-adult novel, it is long enough and written well enough that an adult can enjoy it too. The author does a good job staying true to the character that we see in the movies but also writing the character in such a way that he is not exactly as developed as he would be years later when he is introduced in The Force Awakens. It is not a difficult read, having a pretty simple story and only a handful of new characters, so it is pretty easy to follow. So, if you are a person who reads quickly it will probably take you a few days, give or take, depending on how much time you have to devote to reading, to get through it. It took me seven days to finish reading it for about half an hour before bed each night, then a couple of hours on a Saturday morning to finish it. 

Overall, it is a good story that provides some depth to the character of Poe, giving insight into who he was as a young adult. It also set up the possibility of other novels featuring Poe and/or Zorri in the future, as there is still a lot of time between when this novel ends and when we meet the characters in the movies. If you collect all the canon novels, then you will probably get this one automatically, but if you pick and choose which books to read, this one is definitely worth your time.