Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back is a novelization for younger readers, presented in paperback form, of Star Wars: Episode V The Empire Strikes Back. Its debut occurred on May 4, 2017, commemorating four decades since A New Hope first appeared in theaters.
This book serves as an updated version of the Star Wars Legends junior novelization of The Empire Strikes Back, originally penned by Ryder Windham. Emil Fortune, an editor at Egmont, revised the book to align it with established canon.
According to Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, Luke Skywalker had not encountered the voice of Obi-Wan Kenobi following the Battle of Yavin. Conversely, Kenobi's voice reaches him in The Weapon of a Jedi: A Luke Skywalker Adventure, Choose Your Destiny: A Luke & Leia Adventure, Star Wars (2015) 1, and Star Wars (2015) 14; all of which are situated chronologically between those two points in time.