Meg Cabot is writing a “Star Wars” book, and we’re not freaking out about this enough
Since A New Hope premiered in 1977, Star Wars has been an important part of pop culture. In fact, it’s hard to find someone born in the last forty years, who hasn’t been impacted by the Star Wars franchise in one form or another. The galaxy far far away has even served as inspiration for people who’ve grown up to work in a variety of fields from science to special effects. Star Wars introduced us to iconic characters including, Obi-wan Kenobi and Yoda, Luke and Leia, Han Solo and Chewbacca, and even Jabba the Hut.
Now, to celebrate forty years, Star Wars is celebrating the characters from the franchise we never got to meet with stories by some of our favorite writers, including The Princess Diaries author Meg Cabot.
The Star Wars universe is crawling with fascinating background characters with stories to tell from Greedo and other patrons of Mos Eisley’s cantina to the Jawa scavengers. To celebrate forty years of Star Wars, an anthology, Star Wars: From a Different Point of View is being released, featuring forty perspectives from minor characters in A New Hope each written by a different author.
Cabot fans shouldn’t be surprised that she’s taking part in this anthology. Having written books about strong, badass princesses, it’s not a shock to find out that Princess Leia was an important role model, growing up.
In 2015, Cabot told the Miami New Times that Star Wars and Princess Leia inspired her to write about strong women. Cabot even revealed that she wrote Star Wars fan fiction as a kid, until her mom taught her about copyright laws.
“I was very obsessed with Star Wars, I still am. I collect Star Wars action figures and all that stuff. I’m such a geek, it’s so embarrassing but I don’t care because I love Princess Leia. She was such a feminist. She was a huge role model, Cabot said. “She actually brought down the Galactic Empire while leading the Rebel Alliance! Some people forget that. I wrote reams of fan fiction about her and Han and going through Jedi academy school — she was the best shot, by the way — and then it morphed into my own kingdom after my mom told me about the copyright thing….So I invented my own kingdom, which is Genovia, and my own princess….I think I fell for the whole empowerment thing. A lot of people say “oh it’s because you want to be rescued, and I was like Princess Leia wasn’t really into the rescue thing, she really wanted to get those battle plans.
We love how Leia actually inspired Mia, from The Princess Diaries. We can’t wait to read Cabot’s story in the From a Different Point of View anthology. We know it’ll be an amazing ode to Star Wars franchise.
