A notoriously bad work of fanfic, published shortly after the theatrical release of Return of the Jedi by a small, independent pulp printing house, under an anonymous byline. It is widely known as "the worst adaptation of movie characters to the printed page ever." The author is unknown, but rumors give credit to (among others):
- Tom Wolfe, after one too many Electric Kool-Aids,
- Hunter S. Thompson, with typical Fear & Loathing,
- Michael Jackson, in a bizarre Bubbles-induced phantasy,
- John Belushi, drugged to the gills after a private screening, and convinced that he had left Carrie Fisher at the altar,
- Salman Rushdie, bored out of his skull,
- Steve "Jar-Jar" Lucas, George's idiot savant brother, locked in the attic a la Boo Radley with a typewriter,
- Kevin J. Anderson, on a good day,
...and more.
For one brief shining moment in 1985, it was hip to be suspected as the author of this atrocious piece of work, so Christian Slater, Michael J. Fox, and the Coreys all took their turns claiming to be "the one" in Tiger Beat interviews. Local libraries were besieged with 10-year-old girls wishing to read this awful tale; there are, however, no records of anyone having it out longer than one day.
In literary scope, it has been compared favorably to books like "101 More Ways Not to Die in an Elevator," and "Allotheria: A Field Guide." In depth, it competes with "Plan 9 From Outer Space" and the backs of some cereal boxes--but usually loses. In terms of sheer enjoyment, one reader, who claimed to have made it all the way to page 75 before falling into a coma from severe internal injuries, compared it to "the worst Vogon Poetry ever published, only... novel length."
The plot, insofar as there is one, finds Princess Leia dating Han Solo, and losing control of her bizarrely feminine Jedi powers. She discovers that she causes any lightsaber she wraps her hand around to surge in power; this makes her a formidable opponent in training, but she soon finds that she has used too much Force on Luke's lightsaber, and it is rendered useless. Han Solo sees Luke defenseless and reveals that he, too, has a lightsaber--larger, and of sterner stuff than Luke's. Leia is overjoyed at first, but soon her overeager, Force-laden hands burn out Han's long, purple lightsaber, too. When she realizes she has left both of the men in her life without any symbol of their manly ability to defend her, she sobs quietly and retreats to Dagobah for some introspection. It is there, in the wet, dark cave that Yoda showed Luke, that she discovers that female Jedi were not meant to use a lightsaber on their own, but to recharge the lightsabers of other male Jedi. Her hands are too clumsy an outlet for such Force, and she must learn to focus her mouth, her tongue, and her throat toward producing... the Yodel of Life!
In every copy of the novel still in circulation, the pages that describe Leia's training are torn out or haphazardly glued together, possibly by overzealous fans, so, alas, we will never find out what exactly Leia must do to the lightsabers to recharge them. All we learn is that "...it worked! Oh, Leia, that's... amazing!" Unfortunately, even the speaker's identity is unknown.
Nevertheless, we know that on applying her newly-discovered powers to Luke's and Han's lightsabers, they spring back to life, stronger than before and throbbing with the Force, just in time for a fierce--and terribly-written--battle with a planet of Amazon female warriors and threaten the balance of the universe. That battle is followed by another scene in which Leia insists on recharging Luke and Han's lightsabers, but, like the first one, this one is missing or erratically stuck together, so even if you had the desire to get that far into the book, you will never know how it ends.