Queen Of The Empire
by Paul Davids and Hollace Davids

Published by Bantam Publishing

Scott's Rating:   1 out of 4

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The Alliance has a Chadra-Fan scientist build a droid that looks exactly like a human, but it shoots lasers from it's eyes. They make one that looks exactly like Princess Leia, which then proceeds to blow a hole in the scientist's chest with a nasty stare. Han, Leia, and the droids then take the scientist back to his homeplanet for surgery. Unfortunately, the planet has been ravaged by an enviornmental disaster. (Every book in this series has a loose environmental theme. They saving the whales, saving the rain forest, air pollution, and toxic waste.) Care to guess what environmental threatens to lay waste to an entire planet? Burping and farting bovines. No, I swear I'm not kidding. The methane they produce creates a greenhouse effect. Oh, man. After that romantic stop off, Han and Leia decide to elope with the droids to Hologram Fun World. Han, you romantic devil, you. However, their wedding plans are ruined by Zorba the Hutt and the return of Trioculus.

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Scott:

    Well, it's got a nice cover by Drew Struzan, as usual. I can't say much else about this book.

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Scott:

    Where to start? How about with this quote? It's discussing why the entire planet is covered by thick clouds:

"It's because of the Lactils. They've got so many of those smelly milk-producing creatures on this planet, the situation is now totally out of control." Han checked his Navicomputer to figure out the best angle for the Millennium Falcon's approach. "It may be good for Chad, from a business point of view, that they're now the dairy capital of the galaxy, but no one ever stopped to consider that Lactils exhale enormous quantities of methane gas. And too much methane is bad news for the upper atmosphere."

You tell it, Han! Why did the Emperor have to use a Death Star when he could have used burping Lactils to destroy a planet? How about this one now?

"Neither the passengers aboard the Millennium Falcon nor those on the Zorba Express had any way of knowing that at that very moment a large Imperial spaceship was orbiting the planet Tatooine. It was the Moffship, the official space vehicle of the Imperial grand moffs - the Imperial governors of the outer regions of space. The grand moffs were holding a secret conference - a Mofference."

Ooohh! If only ANH had started with a menaceing Moffship looming over the planet! And a Mofference! Who approved this? And can they read? Anyway, it's all equally bad. Leia giggle like a twit and agrees to the stupid idea of eloping to "Hologram Fun World". How out of character is that? Leia knows her duties to her people and wouldn't run off to some moronic amusement park to play. And she certainly wouldn't get married without her brother there. I could go on, but let's leave it at that, eh?

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Scott:

    The Sarlaac yaks up Zorba the Hutt like a hairball. Hmmm. Maybe that's how Fett got out, you think?

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