On the desolate mining world of Bandomeer twelve year old Obi-Wan Kenobi is trying to set aside his deepest desire and bend his own will to the will of the Jedi Council. Having been rejected as a padawan by Qui Gon Jin, he is attempting to follow his destiny and accept his part in reclaiming the agriculture of Bandomeer through the Jedi Agricorp. It’s a role even Qui Gon knows that Obi-Wan is wasted in, but Qui Gon’s stubborn refusal to come to terms with his own past is denying Obi-Wan his future. However, Obi-Wan does have a champion who does see his true destiny, and in his quiet and wise way Yoda is maneuvering his recalcitrant Jedi master to face his failures and fears. But time is running out for Obi-Wan. In three short weeks he must have a master or lose forever his chance at knighthood. A catalyst is needed and one arrives in the guise of the dark Jedi, Xanatos. Xanatos is Qui Gon’s deepest regret and biggest failure. Xanatos is Qui Gon’s former padawan. Having betrayed Qui Gon and the Jedi Order, Xanatos now not only seeks to turn Obi-Wan against Qui Gon, but to betray him as well, to his death.

This first foray of Jude Watson’s into the Jedi Apprentice series follows seamlessly on Dave Wolverton’s The Rising Force in picking up the story of how Obi-wan becomes Qui Gon’s apprentice. As with a lot of Star Wars, it is the how that is intriguing since the what is already a known, and Jude Watson continues that how in clever fashion. She prolongs the process of the right master and the right apprentice coming together in a fashion whereby both master and apprentice must face their fears and failures, grow and learn until each of them is worthy of the other.

Along this journey to master and apprentice, Obi-Wan is kidnapped, enslaved and sentenced to death. Qui Gon, who has persistently ignored both Yoda’s counsel and the nagging voice of the Force, is almost not there in time. Qui Gon’s surrender to what is right and good is a long path, and he must learn that not all angry, young boys fall to the darkside, just as not all master-apprentice pairings are right. It is in discovering what makes the pairing right that Qui Gon finds his truth and his salvation from failure.

As Qui Gon says when he formally asks Obi-Wan to be his padawan: when the master learns from the apprentice, then the pairing is right.