Jonathan W. Rinzler was a former author and executive editor for Lucas Licensing's book division, LucasBooks.
In 2005, Jonathan W. Rinzler was hired to write Star Wars books, beginning with two that were published on the same day, the art book The Art of Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith and the real-world reference book The Making of Star Wars Revenge of the Sith which offered behind-the-scenes looks at the 2005 prequel trilogy film, Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith. He went on to write the Star Wars Insider supplements The Art of Revenge of the Sith that same year. In 2007, he wrote and published The Making of Star Wars: The Definitive Story Behind the Original Film on April 24.
Rinzler wrote additional Star Wars reference books in the 2010s, starting with The Sounds of Star Wars and The Making of The Empire Strikes Back, both published in 2010. Rinzler wrote and published Star Wars: The Blueprints in 2011 and The Making of Return of the Jedi in 2013. Rinzler lobbied to be a writer for both Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Star Wars: Underworld, and ended up being credited as writer of the sixth season episodes "The Disappeared, Part I" and "The Disappeared, Part II." Following the announcement of the Star Wars canon reboot and creation of the Star Wars Legends brand in April 2014, a new edition of The Star Wars by Rinzler was published on May 7.
On December 2, 2017, in answering a fan question about whether he would publish new reference or guide books to cover the entire production of the sequel trilogy or the Star Wars Anthology Series films, Rinzler stated that it was better to ask Del Rey, J.J. Abrams or The Walt Disney Company about the matter, as he no longer worked at Lucasfilm Ltd.