What do you call half a Splinter?

I’m about halfway through Splinter of the Mind’s Eye. It’s pretty OK. I’ve wanted to read it since, I suppose, it was first released. I was in… um… second grade, I think. The question that’s always bugged me about Star Wars is this: how, years before The Empire Strikes Back, did that kid in elementary school know about the volcano?

I always figured the answer was in Splinter of the Mind’s Eye.

This probably isn’t true, though it might be. I’m half way through the novel at this point. Luke and Leia are running around on a bog planet, evading some local Imperial entanglements, and have accidentally gotten themselves drawn into a search for the Kaiburr crystal. The crystal is a thing that focuses the Force for a Force-sensitive user. They are running around with a couple of hairy grunting creatures, which I imagine look like really, really big aardvarks.

There’s also an old woman who’s Force-sensitive, and who’s been hiding out from the Empire for the last 40 years. The novel came out in 1978, shortly after the original movie, and–though it’s still considered in continuity–it’s best not to think too hard about the details. (Note: very little of this novel is probably considered in-continuity these days, SM Jan. 7, 2018.)

Anyway.

I’m about half way through, and our heroes are being chased, albeit slowly, across the face of the planet, and, despite the promise of the cover, there’s no evidence of Darth Vader yet. The writing is OK. The plot is OK. The adventure aspects are pretty good, actually. Lots of running around and fighting and blowing things up, monsters, and falling down deep holes. There’s a lot of attention paid to things like charging the weapons and having food and water.

But it feels like kind of a lot of filler. Maybe that’s because I’m looking for that other thing about Darth Vader, and I’m just not taking the time to stop and smell the roses. Or the bog gas. There’s some back story about why the characters are the ones they are, and the setting is the way it is, and stuff, over at Wookiepeedia’s page on the book. I found it interesting, since I also remember getting into an argument with some other kid about what the sequel movie was going to be called in the early 1980’s when Empire was in production.

I’ll have more to say when I’ve finished reading the book.