Literature / Star Wars: The Princess and the Scoundrel

You are cordially invited to the wedding of Princess Leia Organa and Han Solo.

"The Death Star is destroyed. Darth Vader is dead. The Empire is desolated. But on the forest moon of Endor, amongst the chaos of a changing galaxy, time stands still for a princess and her scoundrel.

After being frozen in carbonite, then risking everything for the Rebellion, Han is eager to stop living his life for other people. He and Leia have earned their future together, a thousand times over. And when he proposes to Leia, it's the first time in a long time he's had a good feeling about this.

For Leia, a lifetime of fighting doesn't truly seem over. There is work still to do, penance to pay for the dark secret she now knows runs through her veins. Her brother, Luke, is offering her that chance–one that comes with family and the promise of the Force. But when Han asks her to marry him, Leia finds her answer immediately on her lips…Yes..

But happily ever after doesn't come easily. As soon as Han and Leia depart their idyllic ceremony on Endor for their honeymoon, they find themselves on the grandest and most glamorous stage of all: the Halcyon, a luxury vessel on a very public journey to the most wondrous worlds in the galaxy. Their marriage, and the peace and prosperity it represents, is a lightning rod for everyone in the galaxy–including Imperial remnants still clinging to power.

Facing their most desperate hour, the soldiers of the Empire have dispersed across the galaxy, retrenching on isolated worlds vulnerable to their influence. As the Halcyon travels from world to world, one thing becomes abundantly clear: The war is not over. But as danger draws closer, Han and Leia find that they fight their best battles not alone but as husband and wife."

Star Wars: The Princess and the Scoundrel is a 2022 novel in the Star Wars Expanded Universe, written by Beth Revis.

The novel is set in the immediate aftermath of Return of the Jedi, covering Han's marriage proposal to Leia, their wedding, and honeymoon in the wake of the Battle of Endor.

Like Delilah Dawson's Star Wars: Black Spire, it's also another tie-in to Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge to promote the new Galactic Starcruiser attraction.

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Tropes in this book include:

• Actually Pretty Funny: Leia's reaction to Lando's Batman Gambit during her and Han's wedding (see below).
• Awful Truth: Leia is still grasping with Luke's revelation of their shared parentage — and it's weighing far more on her mind than Luke being her brother. Han is also grappling with the Internal Reveal, but he takes it better.
• Batman Gambit: Lando getting Han to actually wear a nice (and more importantly clean) jacket to his and Leia's wedding rather than his usual smuggler attire. Lando tells Han the jacket he's offering to loan him is originally from Alderaan. Han realizes how much such a symbolic gesture would mean to Leia, so he instantly agrees and dons the fine-wear for the ceremony.
  • However, it then turns out this was actually a decoy Batman Gambit to conceal the true Batman Gambit. Later during their honeymoon, the jacket comes up in conversation...and then Leia reveals it wasn't from Alderaan. Han belatedly realizes Lando conned him so he wouldn't be scruffy-looking (or smelly) at his own wedding. Han's not amused, whereas Leia thinks this was hilarious.
• Beware the Silly Ones: Han's opinion of the Ewoks after seeing firsthand what they did to the Imperial Stormtroopers during the Battle of Endor.
• Best Friends-in-Law: Luke and Han.
• Big Bad: The Empire, or rather the Empire as represented by Alecia Beck.
• Big Damn Heroes: Green Group led by Shara Bey swoops in to capture Commander Beck just as the Halcyon's attempt to capture her nearly ends with failure.
• Brick Joke:
  • During Return of the Jedi, Threepio mocked Artoo for thinking Endor was pretty. Now, during Han and Leia's wedding, Threepio has to concede the moon is pretty.
  • Han is pissy over Lando failing to keep his promise that the Falcon wouldn't get a scratch during the Battle of Endor.
• The Bus Came Back: Alecia Beck returns after the events of Smuggler's Run.
• Bus Crash: A minor example. Leia's ruminations of her losses from Alderaan confirm that her childhood droid Lola was left behind and thus was destroyed along with the planet.
• Bystander Syndrome: Both Leia and Han run into this quite a bit once the cruise. Most of the rich patrons of the Halcyon benefited from the Empire's existence and stand to lose very little now that it's gone, and were comfortable enough during the war to put the suffering of others out of their heads - Leia notes that many of them would likely celebrate with just as much fervor had the Empire won rather than lost at Endor, and while she Leia is forced to smile and nod in their presence she feels no camaraderie with them. Han, meanwhile, runs into an inventor who created weapons systems for the Empire, but "doesn't care about politics" and just did it for the money and prestige. A Lasat (victim of Imperial genocide) in the same room angrily points out not everyone has the same luxury.
• Call-Back:
  • Leia teases Han at one point my admitting that, as it turns out, maybe he is a nice man after all. Han indignantly insists she loves him for being a scoundrel, and she - still teasing - notes he's probably right.
• Call-Forward:
  • Leia fears how the galaxy will react if and when the truth of her lineage is revealed to the galactic public. She fears her political legacy and career will be dismantled and destroyed.
• Catchphrase: The surly unnamed Ugnaught engineer on the Halcyon has "pronto-ronto!"
• Character Development: Across the story Leia slowly comes to accept the terrible nature of her parentage, to separate the Force from Vader, and to open herself to learning about it without associating it with the terrible things Vader did with it.
• The Chessmaster: Mon Mothma either hijacks Han and Leia's honeymoon to fulfill a needed publicity move for the Rebellion, or hijacks the Rebellion's need for publicity post Palpatine's death for Han and Leia's honeymoon because she knows it's the only way to convince Leia to actually take a vacation. The truth is somewhere in the middle, and despite both of them knowing what she's up to she manages to sweet talk them both into doing it anyway. To punctuate this, she turns out to have the entire trip set up and paid for before either of them even say yes.
• Continuity Nod:
  • Various rebels from other stories, like Poe Dameron's father Kes and Lost Stars' Thane Kyrell, appear in the celebrations after the Battle of Endor and leading into to Han and Leia's wedding.
  • Halcyon stowaway Kelad was in the Republic Futures Program.
  • Leia reflects on events Han missed during the year he was entombed in Carbointe, from the hunt for Boba Fett to meeting Qi'ra, and her feud with Commander Zahra.
  • In the wake of Endor, Lando is concerned about Bespin - which is in the Anoat System, whose governor has begun denying the death of Palpatine and has seized draconian control over its citizens.
  • The unlucky tractor-beam specialist Kelad is implied to go on to be one of the minds behind the Starhawk.
• Dramatic Irony:
  • Leia reflects on how Luke lost his family on Tatooine to the Empire just as much as she lost Bail and Breha to Tarkin. She then wonders if Owen and Beru truly were her family as well. The audience of course knows they were the Skywalker Family in-laws thanks to Clegg Lars marrying Shmi.
  • Alecia Beck, despite being a member of the Imperial Security Bureau and with access to Imperial intelligence believes the reports from Endor are Rebel propaganda and that the Emperor wasn't killed.
• The Engineer: Zalma Trinkris, head engineer of the Halcyon, is sent down to Madurs to fix Han and Leia's shuttle after Leia "accidentally" ruins it beyond repair. He quickly becomes indispensable to the rest of their adventure, which requires a plan to disabling an advanced Imperial installation.
• Fish out of Temporal Water: Han more or less thanks to the Carbonite freezing. From his perspective, only a few weeks rather than a full year have elapsed between Bespin and being thawed out in Jabba's Palace. Now that they all have time to breathe and slow down after Endor, Han's forced to grapple with losing a year of his life and how his friends have all changed (such as Luke going from the familiar young hotshot he last saw on Hoth to the now-seasoned Jedi who rescued him on Tatooine).
• Faux Shadowing: Kelad, the inventor Han meets early in the story, is established as an expert in gravity manipulation and tractor beam technology. He gets busted for trying to kidnap Leia and stowing away, but is specifically sent to work off his debt in the Halcyon's engineering department. Later, on the planet Madurs, Han and Leia come across a seemingly impregnable Imperial mining facility that is specifically noted to run on advanced gravity manipulation and tractor beam technology. The characters immediately think of using Kelad's perfectly aligned skillset to defeat it... and then, just as they send a shuttle for him, the Empire cuts all transport to and from the planet and Kelad is forced to sit the whole adventure out. He does, however, put his tractor beam knowledge to work in helping to stop the Big Bad from escaping and helping the planet afterwards.
• Foregone Conclusion:
  • Vader's helmet will not be destroyed by Luke's funeral pyre (or by an angry Leia when she stumbles across what's left of it the next day), as Kylo Ren will salvage it 30 years later.
  • Despite her agonizing, Leia will not reveal her parentage to the galactic public here and now, because she will be outed a quarter of a century later.
• From Bad to Worse:
  • Han isn't terribly happy that the Ewok shaman who nearly made him a Human Sacrifice is his wedding officiant, but is even less amused when the Ewok insists that his supposed deity Threepio perform the ceremony instead.
  • When they discover the Imperial mining presence on Madurs, Leia and Han are concerned about it polluting the planet's pristine landscape, and the greater scope problem of the Empire cutting off fuel lines across the galaxy. Then Zalma comes planetside to fix their ship, and immediately informs them of a bigger, much more immediate problem: the Imperial installation isn't just polluting, it's actively cracking the planet apart and will soon destroy it completely.
• Gone Horribly Right: Leia celebrating her honeymoon so soon after Endor is indeed a propaganda blow for the Rebellion by making them look unconcerned about the threat the Imperial remnants pose. However, she repeatedly feels guilt about how Innocently Insensitive it seems to people who lost Imperial relatives at Endor or have their home worlds facing bankruptcy due to no longer having production contracts with the Empire, with a Pompous Political Pundit publicly adopting that view.
• Here We Go Again!: The Falcon fails to start *again* when Han and Leia are about to depart on their honeymoon. Leia's as amused as Han is exasperated.
• Hero of Another Story:
  • Amidst the hordes of callow Bystander Syndrome sufferers on the ship, Leia also notices two Rebel sympathizers who secretly provided the campaign against the Empire starship funding and information respectively, but neither of them interacts with her on page.
  • A group of people on Madurs have spent some time resisting the Imperial occupiers with bold and clever acts of sabotage (although they do little more than inconvenience the garrison) and preparing covert messages asking for help. However, the protagonists only learn of their existence in the last quarter of the book.
• Indy Ploy: Han's initial plan for his and Leia's Honeymoon before Mon Mothma provides her own suggestions.
• Internal Reveal: Han learns that Darth Vader was Luke and Leia's biological father. He's naturally shocked, but takes it in good stride once he has time to process it. It doesn't change his opinion of Leia or her brother; they're not their father, after all.
  • Han also learns that Leia met Qi'ra while he was frozen in Carbonite.
• It's Personal: Beck is very intent on getting revenge for the promotion Han cost her during Smuggler's Run.
• Last Words: Defied. Leia refuses to let Luke tell her what Vader's final words on the Death Star were.
• Lethal Chef: While telling his wife about his and Chewbacca's plans to add a kitchen to the Falcon, a shocked Han learns that Leia, for all her many skills and talents, can't cook if her life depended upon it.
• Let Us Never Speak of This Again: Invoked and played for black comedy when Han and Luke, as impending Brothers-in-Law, have to confront the White Bantha in the corner: Realizing now that the latter was unknowingly making out with his own sister on Hoth. Smuggler and Jedi alike both quickly and mutually agree to never discuss this ever again.
• Loose Lips: Han plays cards with Kelad, an oblivious inventor who is due to sell valuable weapons tech to an apparent Imperial investor. The guy will not shut up as long as he has people to talk to, and blabs almost everything about the meeting, allowing Han to easily pump him for information.
• Motive Misidentification: Throughout the novel, there are several instances where Leia realizes or learns that Palpatine was diverting key or rare Imperial resources into a secret project in the year leading up to Endor. Given the timing, Leia quite naturally concludes it was for the Second Death Star...although some of the diverted resources don't make sense or don't quite sync up with the timing. Leia, of course, doesn't realize that Papatine was actually diverting these key resources towards Exegol and the Unknown Regions.
• No Endor Holocaust: The trope naming Fridge Logic is addressed here - it's observed that all the wreckage of Battle of Endor and the Death Star II that fell to Endor burned up harmlessly in the atmosphere, creating a series of meteor showers.
• Not So Above It All: Leia is shown to be just as uncomfortable in the superficial social setting of Halcyon as Han, though she weather is better by dipping into her diplomatic training. She also turns out to be similarly prone to chaotic impulsiveness as Han and Luke are when the need arises. One memorable scene has her and Han need to pretend their ship is malfunctioning while hiding their true intentions from the captain of the Halcyon. Han has to stop her from faking the malfunction by blowing the ship up at close range with a high explosive about half as big as she is, and only manages to convince her to use a smaller, much less suicidal explosive instead. When he calls her out on it, she jokes that she learned it from him.
• Omnicidal Maniac: The Empire utilizes a mining station on the planet Madurs that will essentialy crack the planet into pieces over time. While the Empire initially seems willing to let the people leave their doomed world in a subversion of the characters' expectation of them to Leave No Witnesses, once the Imperial commander - Beck, who already has an existing hatred of Han - discovers him and Leia on the planet she prevents anyone from leaving the planet, intending to kill everyone to ensure Han and Leia die with them.
• Opportunistic Bastard: When the planet Madurs needs his expertise to stabilize the planet from collapsing, Kelad suddenly proves Not So Harmless as he price gouges the citizens in need for his assistance. Though he gets threatened for it and gets a lower number than he hoped, his sheer audacity ends up getting him a cushy payout from the New Republic.
• Ramming Always Works: Just as Commander Beck is about to escape to parts unknown Han stops her personal shuttle by ramming the entire Halcyon - a shuttle vs a cruise liner - into it.
• Riddle for the Ages: The questions of who Kelad's possibly Imperial buyer for his thermal oscillator technology on Synjax was, on whose orders Commander Beck and much of her imperial garrison flees the battle on Madurs, and whether the two parties were one and the same, are all raised in the story but never answered. Given the timeframe (and the fact that thermal oscillators were a key component of Starkiller Base), it's hinted that the founding of the First Order is involved, but this is never confirmed.
• Rubber-Forehead Alien: Zalma, the Engineer, is a Nautolan - the same species as Kit Fisto.
• Sequel Episode: Ultimately becomes one to Smuggler's Run, as Beck and Han cross paths again.
• Single-Biome Planet: Madurs is an Ice World. Han expects it to be exactly like Hoth, but it turns out to be very different despite the similarity: while Hoth was a planet consumed by uninhabitable blizzard, Madurs has cool but calm weather and is a beautiful landscape of ice plates and mountains where people can live comfortably, making it a prime tourist destination... if not for the Imperial occupation intending to exploit the planet's fuel reserves.
• Speak Ill of the Dead: Leia when she stumbles across Vader's funeral pyre — and cuts loose.
• Stag Party: Lando and Chewbacca throw one for Han on Endor. It goes exactly as you'd expect it would.
• Summon Bigger Fish: During the final battle, in a desperate moment of the attack Leia instinctively reaches out to the force for the first time, and elicits the help of an enormous Giant Squid-like creature called an Edont that utterly destroys the Imperial station.
• Sweetie Graffiti: Han takes a moment to carve his and Leia's initials into a pipe on the Halcyon.
• Too Dumb to Live: Kelad, the witless inventor Han plays sabacc with on the Halcyon. It starts with him being unaware of how the other, more experienced players are taking him for a ride. Then he brags about inventing weapons for the Empire, completely oblivious to the fury this inspires in the Lasat (whose people were genocided by the Empire) playing with him, let alone Han - who tries but fails to maintain Tranquil Fury. He continues to utterly fail to read the room as Han uses his Loose Lips to squeeze information about a secret project he plans to sell to an Imperial buyer. And then to cap it off, he then on a whim comes up with the idea of kidnapping Princess Leia to cover his expenses - oblivious that he is speaking to Han, Leia's husband, who is blatantly simmering with rage. Once Han realizes Kelad's incompetent, chaotic plan might actually pose a risk in the hectic setting of the cruise, he nearly jettisons the guy out an escape pod.
• Troll: Jedi Knight he may be, but even Luke can't resist poking fun at his future brother-in-law as Han's Stag Party slowly and inevitably goes off the rails.
• Villain: Exit, Stage Right: Alicia Beck attempts to bolt and leave her soldiers behind as the battle on Madurs begins, on the orders of an unknown higher ranking Imperial - potentially the First Order or Project Cinder. She is blindsided when the Halcyon - a seeming luxury liner - instead swoops into battle and cuts her escape off.
• Workaholic: A major trait of Leia's that the story explores. She cannot fathom taking time off from the fight against the Empire - even when they've struck a decisive blow - and has to be sweet talked into it. Even once she's on her honeymoon, she plans to turn it into a working diplomatic mission.