Splinter Of The Mind's Eye - Novel - Rise of the Empire - Post Episode 4

Stranded on a jungle planet, Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia found themselves desperately racing Imperial Stormtroopers to claim a gem that had mysterious powers over the Force.

Luke Skywalker expected trouble when he volunteered to follow Princess Leia on her mission to Circarpous to enlist their Rebel underground in the battle against the Empire. But the farm boy from Tatooine hadn't counted on an unscheduled landing in the swamplands of Mimban hadn't counted on any of the things they would find on that strange planet.

Hidden on this planet was the Kaiburr crystal, a mysterious gem that would give the one who possessed it such powers over the Force that he would be all but invincible. In the wrong hands, the crystal could be deadly. So Luke had to find this treasure and find it fast.

Accompanied by Artoo-Detoo and See-Threepio his two faithful droids Luke and the Princess set out for the Temple of Pomojema and a confrontation deep beneath the surface of an alien world with the most fearsome villain in the galaxy!

Luke and Leia's adventure really shows how at the beginning of the Star Wars Saga not much was known about how the story would develope.  The attraction between Luke and Leia was very evident although there were no actions on their thoughts, majority of it being Luke's.  Vader plays a small roll in this novel but is crucial to the story, very worth reading.

Written as the follow up to Episode 4 New Hope, Alan Dean Foster originally wrote Splinter of the Mind's Eye to be a low budget movie sequel in the event Star Wars was not a hit on its original release.  Since Star Wars was such a hit, Lucas wrote his own sequel hence the birth of the expanded universe in Splinter of the Mind's Eye.  There is also a comic adeptation to the novel which can be collected in 4 different comics, Early Victories Omnibus, and also a collection of all 4 comics. 

"The boy is dangerous. They all sense it. Why can't you?"

Star Wars Hitchhiker