Star Wars: The Essential Chronology delivers on the promise of its title, but it bogs down doing it. Projects like these are a balancing act between summary and storytelling--the writer must communicate a certain amount of rote information, but present it in an entertaining way. Unfortunately, there's precious little new material here, and the authors err on the side of too much detail rather than too little. A more readable, less exhaustive treatment would have been better.

Details about events during Episodes II and III, however, are unsurprisingly scarce. When this point in the narrative arrives, the historian mouthpiece quickly shuffles onto the scene, muttering about historical archives destroyed during the Clone Wars. He claims, "It is hoped that new information on this era will soon come to light." Give it about five years, history buffs.

In addition to better storytelling, a glossary of names would have helped to keep the cast of thousands sorted out, especially later in the book when several characters are running around with the name "Solo."

The black and white art varies from decent to poor in quality. The illustrator, Bill Hughes, has good technical skills, but his character likeness is sorely lacking. One drawing depicts the marriage of Han Solo and Leia Organa, but only the timely intervention of a caption makes that fact clear. The portrait of Darth Maul looks like a bulldog who had a terrible accident with his spiked collar.

Probably the most useful part of the book is the timeline at the end. It doesn't quite double as a bibliography, but net-savvy readers can use the information to track down the original stories if they're intrigued by what they read.