5 little known facts about Star Wars novelists Alan Dean Foster

When it comes to Star Wars authors, it makes sense to start at the very beginning. Alan Dean Foster has been contributing to the Star Wars universe since the 1970s, helping to expand the universe in its earliest days.

Here are 5 facts about Star Wars author Alan Dean Foster that you may not know. 

1. He wrote the very first Star Wars book

Alan Dean Foster is known as the first person to ever contribute to the Star Wars expanded universe, writing the Star Wars novel Splinter of the Mind's Eye. The book was published just a year after the original Star Wars was released. This is the first book to expand the story of Star Wars beyond the movies, but it technically isn't the first book. The official novelization of Star Wars had already been released, making Splinter of the Mind's Eye the second Star Wars book ever published. The only thing is that Alan Dean Foster wrote that first book as well. While the cover of the novelization, titled Star Wars: From the Adventures of Luke Skywalker, states that George Lucas wrote it, Lucas has never been shy about saying that Alan Dean Foster actually ghostwrote the novel. His work on the original novel likely led him to get the opportunity to write an original novel set in the Star Wars universe that was based largely on ideas that appeared in earlier drafts of the movie.

2. He wouldn't write another Star Wars book for over two decades

While Foster's work with early Star Wars no doubt was important for his career, he wouldn't return to the franchise until 2002, when he wrote the novel The Approaching Storm. The novel's events take place just before the events of Attack of the Clones, which was released a few months after its publication. Foster would return to Star Wars once again in 2015 to write the novelization of The Force Awakens, mirroring his work on the novelization of the original Star Wars movie all those years ago. This means that Foster has worked on novels that take place during all three Star Wars trilogies: the prequels, the sequels, and the original trilogy.

3. He's written more Star Trek books than Star Wars books. 

While Alan Dean Foster is well known for his work in the Star Wars universe, it isn't the only sci-fi franchise that he's contributed to. In fact, there are other series that he's done a lot more work for. While Foster has written three or four different Star Wars books (depending on how you count the original Star Wars movie novelization), he's written a total of 13 Star Trek novels. Ten of his Trek novels make up the Star Trek Logs series, a series of ten books that adapt the episodes of the Star Trek Animated Series from 1973. Across the ten books, all twenty-two episodes of the series are adapted, making Star Trek: The Animated Series the first English-language TV show to have all of its episodes adapted into books. The other three books include the movie novelizations of the first two movies in the Star Trek reboot series, as well as an original novel set in the Kelvin timeline. 

4. He has written the movie novelizations for plenty of other sci-fi movies

Anybody who has movie novelizations for both Star Wars and Star Trek on their resume is already a big success in terms of geek culture. But for Alan Dean Foster, that's just the tip of the iceberg. In addition to those two franchises, he's also written the novelization of the first two Transformers movies, The Chronicles of Riddick, The Last Starfighter, the original Clash of the Titans, the first three Alien movies, Terminator Salvation, and John Carpenter's The Thing. However, he did NOT write the novelization of the original Star Trek: The Motion Picture from 1978. Foster did come up with the story for the movie and is given a story credit. However, the book is credited as written by Gene Roddenberry, the creator of Star Trek. Because Foster is the known ghostwriter of the original Star Wars novelization and knowing that he did work on the story for this movie, some people have assumed that the same thing happened with Star Trek, where the franchise creator got credit for Foster's work. However, by all accounts in this case, Gene Roddenberry did actually write the book. 

5. He has his own science fiction universe as well. 

While Alan Dean Foster may be best known for his work in other popular franchises, that hasn't stopped him from creating his own massive interconnected franchise that has continued to grow over the years. Foster's series Humanx Commonwealth takes place in a future where two different species, humans and an alien species called Thranx, have formed a Commonwealth of planets as they explore the universe. Foster began publishing stories set in this universe back in the 1970s, and he continues to add to the universe to this day. Currently, there are at least 28 books in the saga, which are made up of multiple interconnected series. The action takes place over six hundred years of history, including prequels that tell of the foundation of the Commonwealth.