Brian Daley

Star Wars: The Han Solo Adventures is a Star Wars Legends novel trilogy written by Brian Daley and published by Del Rey from 1979 to 1980. The trilogy includes the stories Han Solo at Stars' End, Han Solo's Revenge, and Han Solo and the Lost Legacy, which tell of Han Solo's early adventures with his Wookiee partner, Chewbacca, in the Corporate Sector. The stories are set prior to the events of the film Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope.

The fabled hoard of the mad tyrant Xim was beyond measure—it was also, as far as Han Solo and his Wookiee partner Chewbacca were concerned, strictly legendary. But the pleadings of an old spacebum who had once saved his life—plus the fact that a trifling misunderstanding had set the deadliest gunman in the galaxy on his trail, making a secret expedition to almost any place seem highly desirable—were enough to grab Han Solo's interest. But within hours of landing on the planet rumored to hold the treasure, Han's beloved spacecraft Millennium Falcon was hijacked, and his party had to content with assassins and an army of killer robots. This was no way, Han Solo felt, for a pair of honest smugglers to make a living…

Han Solo was a trampfreighter captain, a smuggler and a free-lance lawbender when it suited him. Together with his Wookiee pal, Chewbacca, he roamed the galaxy in the starship Millennium Falcon, owing nothing to anyone—human, 'droid or otherwise. If the Authority took a dim view of some of his activities, well, that was the Authority's problem. Or so Han Solo thought. Then the Authority informed him he would have to bring the Millennium Falcon up to certain specific technical standards. "Safety standards," they had said—but Han knew better. He also knew a safe planet where Doc fixed up starships—no questions asked—and turned a blind eye to super-sophisticated jamming equipment he might find on an old freighter. Unfortunately Doc had disappeared. Totally. His daughter Jessa was willing to make the necessary repairs on the Millennium Falcon; she was even willing to provide Han with the waiver that would keep investigators out of his starship for a long time. All Han and Chewbacca had to do was pick up some undercover agents at the Authority Data Center on Orron III and then find Jessa's father. Han wasn't particularly thrilled with the idea, but he didn't have much choice. Only the knowledge that as soon as this little pick-up-and-delivery job was finished they would be free for a long, long time made the mission bearable.

For once Han Solo was going straight. He and his Wookiee sidekick Chewbacca had abandoned interstellar smuggling for the safe, legitimate enterprise of running a holotheater for the insectoid natives of Kamar. They should have stayed illegal. When they put on the wrong show, the Kamarites destroyed the holoprojector and nearly did the same for Chewie and Han, who had to blast off in their starship Millennium Falcon seconds ahead of a raging mob. They were dead broke. But there's always work for a space-going freighter captain who doesn't ask awkward questions, and Han quickly got a job that would pay him a cool 10,000. It would also, he discovered when he made planetfall to pick up his cargo, earn him and Chewbacca summary execution. The Corporate Sector Authority could overlook many crimes, but the slave trade carried with it mandatory capital punishment. Thanks to the quick thinking of Blue Max, computer-partner of Han's work 'droid Bollux, Han was able to turn the tables on the slavers and free their captives. All the same, he and Chewie were still penniless. Figuring that somebody still owed him 10,000 credits, Han kept a rendezvous the slavers had arranged with their shadowy boss. They lovely girl who kept the date didn't fit his idea of a slave trader, and she wasn't. From Han's point of view, she was almost worse—for Fiolla was a full-fledged officer of the Sector Authority…most of whose laws he had broken or meant to break some day. But Fiolla needed Han and the Falcon for her secret mission to the distant planet of Ammuud, and she was prepared to ignore his past and future transgressions if he cooperated with her. Still in pursuit of the elusive 10,000, Han accompanied Fiolla to Ammuud, escaping a determined kidnapping attempt on the way—only to find himself pitted against a hired gunman in a duel to the death! It looked as if those 10,000 credits were going to be pretty hard-earned…

Tron, a living independent security program, allies himself with a program designer named Flynn who was captured into the computer by the sinister Master Control, the faceless force behind the Encom Computer System.

Star Wars is a 13-part (6½ hour) radio serial first broadcast on National Public Radio in 1981. It was adapted by Brian Daley from the original film, and directed by John Madden, with music by John Williams and sound design for Lucasfilm by Ben Burtt. The series fleshes out the storyline by adding a great deal of backstory that had probably been created but not used by Lucas. Examples include: Princess Leia obtaining the Death Star schematics and her initial encounter with Darth Vader; Luke Skywalker using his binoculars to observe the movie's opening battle and trying to convince his friends at Tosche Station of what he saw; the skyhopper race that results in Luke's vehicle being damaged (seen in the movie in the background of his Tatooine garage); and Vader's interrogation of Princess Leia (a controversial scene for its intensity). The episodes were entitled: "A Wind To Shake The Stars" "Points Of Origin" "Black Knight, White Princess, And Pawns" "While Giants Mark Time" "Jedi That Was, Jedi To Be" "The Millennium Falcon Deal" "The Han Solo Solution" "Death Star's Transit" "Rogues, Rebels And Robots" "The Luke Skywalker Initiative" "The Jedi Nexus" "The Case For Rebellion" "Force And Counter Force"