Timothy Zahn is writing a new Thrawn novel

Lucasfilm and Del Rey Books revealed today that Timothy Zahn is writing a new Star Wars novel: Thrawn: Treason. It’s a sequel to 2017’s Thrawn (which covered the villain’s origins) and Thrawn: Alliances, the sequel that brought Thrawn and Darth Vader together for the first time. This new book is set in the aftermath of the demise of Thrawn’s Tie Defender project in Star Wars Rebels, after it’s killed in favor of the Empire weapons project that becomes the Death Star. The new book follows the titular character as he grapples with an impossible choice: heed a warning from his former aide de camp Eli Vanto, who brings word that Thrawn’s home world is in danger, or remain loyal to the Empire he pledged to serve.

Zahn’s character is enormously important to the Star Wars universe. Heir to the Empire and its sequels helped revitalize the franchise back in 1991, and kicked off a massive publishing project that became the Star Wars Expanded Universe. While much of that was rendered non-canon with Disney’s acquisition of Lucasfilm, Thrawn was brought back as a primary villain in Rebels, and Zahn has used his subsequent novels to tie other pieces of the Star Wars universe together, revisiting the Clone Wars in Thrawn: Alliances, and introducing the planet that will be center stage in Disney’s upcoming immersive theme park, Galaxy’s Edge.

Thrawn: Treason will be available sometime next summer. It will join several additional tie-in novels coming out next year: Alphabet Squadron, written by Alexander Freed, Queen’s Shadow by E.K. Johnston, and Master and Apprentice by Claudia Gray.