Revelation starts off continuing the non-Sith plots from Fury, begins a Ben + Shevu arc where they search for clues that might incriminate Jacen for the murder of Mara Jade. The Imperial fleet is introduced and is a key factor in Jacen's struggle to gain allies and win a battle. The relationship between Jacen and his "pet" (for lack of a better term {at least at the beginning}) Tahiri is thickened, and Tahiri requisitions the services of Admiral Pellaeon. Add Niathal and her navy to the equation + an old friend of Pellaeon's who has a super powered fleet and who is backed up by a small Mandalorian fleet who happen to have the Jedi-Mando in training hybrid Jaina with them, shove all those assets at a planet crucial to winning the galactic war, and then smash them all together and crumple them up in confusion, chaos, and turmoil + betrayal and uncertainty from within, and you basically have Revelation.
Revelation focuses on the Ben side-story for most of the early pages, and then switches to revolve between Niathal and Pellaeon as fleet commanders. There's a bit of Luke in there, some Fett, and quite a bit of Tahiri, all thrown in for good measure. The two main plotlines, however, remain Jacen Solo/Darth Caedus as fleet commander and Sith mentor, and Jaina Solo/Sword of the Jedi as Mandalorian Jedi in training. The Mando group ends up being a huge part of the story so be prepared to read about them a lot.
Without spoiling anything detailed and major; Jacen has completely severed his ties with all who were major players in the previous books. He now corresponds with Shevu and Niathal regularly, and is training Tahiri. I really like Tahiri as a character and personality, and because of this I didn't feel that she was in the book enough. You never really got to read through her eyes more than once (or maybe not at all), and she wasn't a prominent character in enough sections for her to begin to grow on the average reader (in my opinion). Doubtless, in the coming books she is going to be very important, so Denning needs to get her fleshed out.
Jaina is away from the rest of the Jedi/Solo gang for most of the book and is training with Mandalorian soldiers, specifically Fett and his cronies, if you will. I found these sections to be, for the most part, more exciting than before and genuinely looked forward to continuing this arc. Traviss has been the only author in this triumvirate that has included the Mandalorians so far, but the arc there was pretty well closed off. I'm not sure how Denning will handle that in the following book. Jaina really grows as a character through these parts and is definitely being built up for something dramatic in the ninth installment.
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The book progresses along nicely, with the building stage holding the combination of fleets, forming of battle plans, and allaying of priorities and objectives. The progression stage reveals intense struggle between the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Imperial Admiral, as well as a turning point for Ben, and an elimination of that subplot for the rest of the book. The grind stage blows massive amounts of space combat through Jacen, Niathal, and Pellaeon's eyes onto the water in a colossal and confusing battle. And the epilogue ties things up nicely with Jacen and his apprentice alright, his loyal fleet safe at a retreat, Niathal allied with Fondor, and Pellaeon dead. Ben and Shevu have wrapped things up nicely, and Jaina seems to be finishing training with Fett and developing excellent relationships, and Fett has been coming along somewhat smoothly with his wife (now out of carbonite freezing and recalling memories of her tramatic past) and granddaughter.

The next book is definitely going to see Jacen or someone very important dying. There just isn't a way around that. Well, unless%u2026 I guess they could expand that into another series, but my guess would be that the series is going to be nicely topped off with a dramatic and tear jerking ending leaving someone on dry ground and the galaxy still in turmoil, which, in turn, will leave this galaxy of far, far away wide open for a follow up series. Exciting and futuristic!
Things that I disliked about this book can be summed up in a few short sentences, I think: Jacen once again seems hopeless outdone, but will doubtless be portrayed at the start of the next book as dashing and ready to try out yet another plan with resources coming from?.... Tahiri definitely needed to be fleshed out more. I liked the idea of here, but didn't get to know here as well as I would have liked throughout the course of the book. Probably because I haven't read as many of the previous post classic books as I should have, but I was a bit confused as to whom Daala was. She fit in nicely enough, if only to hand a whooping to someone. I was disappointed that there were no epic lightsaber duels, although the adrenaline does get flowing at the end. The homeboys at Endor were downplayed as well, meaning we didn't see too much of Han, Leia, Zekk, Jag, or Luke. That'll be in the next book though. We didn't see anything of Allana (who had been an extremely important character in the last book) or Tenel Ka, likewise. There aren't really a whole lot of situations that would make you sweat, more just page turning to see what unfolds next. Lastly, someone needs to at least try to tell Jacen that he's being an idiot.
I have to give credit where credit is due, and the ship to ship and battlefield commander scenes flow seamlessly together and are very coherent, easy to digest, fun to read. It's also really nice not to have Alema around anymore! The Mandalorians were expanded just to the sweet spot, and they're pretty bad dudes! The transformations that Jacen is experiencing due to the accumulation of his evil aura are pretty cool. And lastly, the adaptation of Tahiri to Sith apprentice is pretty cool. She may prove to be worth more than anyone originally thought.
It will most definitely be interesting to see how the ninth plays out. I'm guessing that it's just going to be one huge epic combustion of all the important main characters, which will be awesome and which will also be vital to the story-telling nature of this series. Jacen is definitely going to get into some nasty fights. The alliance between Daala and Niathal as well as the Jedi Council has to be expanded upon, otherwise there isn't anyone to fight Jacen, until those Corellians that used to be so important magically reappear. A lot of the characters have really changed and matured as the series, specifically this book, have come along, but it will be interesting to see if anything from the last few books, like Inferno and Fury, get dredged up to shake things up and make some interesting twists. I really hope that the dream of his mother coming to kill him in Exile wasn't just a dream and that something happens between Jacen and his parents, but I have doubts as well.
Anyways, make sure to keep an eye on the release date for the next book, watch out for Shevu and his backstabbing ways with Caedus, and may the force be with you.