Star Wars: Lando Calrissian and the Mindharp of Sharu (Book Review)
Welcome my next read of the Star Wars Expanded Universe/Legends:
Cover image by William Schmidt. Image courtesy of Reddit
L. (Lester) Neil Smith makes his Star Wars debut here, having been brought in by Brian Daley to pen another series of short novels similar in vain to his own Han Solo Adventures. Much like those adventures, the Lando Calrissian Adventures are set in the years before A New Hope as a bit of pulp background to a newly popular character Lando, introduced in The Empire Strikes Back. According to L. Neil Smith himself, the experience of writing the novels was not a good one, nor was the pay or treatment, though I’m unsure if that was because of the publisher (Del Rey), Lucas’ company Lucasfilm, Ltd. or Lucas himself, the story isn’t clear. The Lando Calrissian Adventures were not Smith’s first publications, having gotten his start selling The Probability Broach to Del Rey in 1977 (published in 1980), but this was his first and last foray into another’s branded story universe. Outside of Star Wars, Smith had a modest career and was well known in Libertarian writer circles, culminating in a lifetime achievement award from the Libertarian Futurist Society before his passing in August of 2021.
Released on June 12, 1983, Lando Calrissian and the Mindharp of Sharu arrived a month after the last installment of the first Star Wars trilogy with Return of the Jedi. Much like Daley’s Han Solo Adventures, this clutch of novels follows the adventures of the smooth gambling con artist named Lando Calrissian, made popular with Billy Dee Williams’ portrayal in The Empire Strikes Back. Unlike the Han Solo Adventures, Lando is more of a loner than Han (where Chewbacca is ever present at his side). As with Han Solo and the Lost Legacy, William Schmidt continues his cover work, and the imagery is cinematic and evocative except for the droid Vuffi Raa, described as a starfish-like design rather than an astromech droid with tentacles about its dome. Regardless, this is one of the better covers we’ve seen since McQuarrie’s beautiful work in Splinter of the Mind’s Eye. The in-universe timeline of this novel has been revised a few times — from 10 BBY (Before Battle of Yavin in A New Hope) to 4 BBY, then 2-3 BBY. We know from the novel a couple of hints—Lando, though of an indeterminate age, is young though still knowledgeable. He’s also in possession of the Millennium Falcon, which certainly puts this story well before the Han Solo Adventures. Also like HSA, we spend more time in the universe outside of anything dealing with Jedi, Sith and the Force.
Regardless of the timeline, the novel starts with Lando on asteroid Osean 2795 in a sector run by the Centrality—another sector not exactly under the jurisdiction of the Galactic Empire, as with the Corporate Sector Authority in HSA. Lando is deep into a game when he hears of a valuable treasure in the Rafa system. He cleans out at least one player, but not before getting a less than mediocre piloting droid to get him to the Rafa system on the MF. Lando is a poor star pilot, still learning the ropes of how to operate the newly gained MF. This is a nice contrast with Han Solo, and sets him apart as a character that’s less of a shoot-from-the-hip smuggler and more of a cool con artist. Also, much like HSA, Lando gains a companion, Vuffi Raa, a rather unique droid. Against the grain of the established SW universe, he has a name that is not an alphanumeric (C3PO, R2D2, R4D5, etc.) or a nickname thereof (Threepio, Artoo). He is also a Class II droid, which in Smith’s universe parlance means it is a sentient droid, though he is required to follow programming as any SW droid should. He’s also unique in design, neither a trashcan style nor anthropomorphic, but more like a short walking robotic starfish. Both qualities give him character and some ability beyond the normal SW ken.
What I like about this novel is Smith’s approach to Lando. It’s set well before the events of ANH and long before we see Calrissian in ESB, but Smith strips away from Lando a bit. He’s not the pilot he is in RotJ he’s younger and as interested in seeing the galaxy as he is in making a score. It delves deep into some world-building, spending time in alien systems and seeing interesting pieces of galactic industrialization. There’s very little Star Wars lore here, except a card game called sabacc. Smith expands upon this lore, adding to the shape of the cards their ability to change faces based on a game field over the table. Later, Lando uses them as a Tarot deck to guide his own future and luck.
Where many take issue with Smith’s license is where the novel goes off the rails deep into the metaphysical. Star Wars is space fantasy, so seeing Lando wander through an ancient alien structure and deal with things beyond the normal space-time continuum is antithetical to Star Wars as we know it. In parts, this was interesting, but poorly executed and hence why reviews are scathing. Smith is quite capable, though I found his use of every different term to refer to his droid beyond inane and bordering on old man speak. Your own experience may be just as existential as mine.
May the Force be with you.