The Mystery of the Rebellious Robot

Star Wars: The Mystery of the Rebellious Robot is a children's storybook released in 1979 and published by Random House. It was both written and illustrated by Mark Concoran. It is one of three such children's Star Wars storybooks released that year, along with The Wookiee Storybook and The Maverick Moon. It takes place shortly after Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope.

Publisher's summary
Luke Skywalker and his companions are puzzled by the sudden bizarre behavior of their robots and the malfunction of their machines.

Plot summary
Han Solo and his Wookiee first mate, Chewbacca, are on their way to Tatooine aboard the Millennium Falcon when R2-D2 suddenly shuts down. Chewbacca oils the droid, who then goes berserk and hijacks the ship. Luke Skywalker arrives from Tatooine in his X-wing starfighter and uses the Force to guide the smuggler's craft to safety in a Rebel hangar on the planet.

Upon arrival, Luke asks Han and Chewbacca to report R2-D2's behavior in a Rebel conference being held to discuss the mysterious acts of sabotage Captain Egoreg's super-vaporator project was suffering. The planet was having a severe moisture drought, and the ambitious Rebels decided to help the residents out by building a super-vaporator in order to pluck more water from the dry desert air. However, the mission was being beset by all manner of strange failures involving faulty machines and erratic droid behavior.

During the meeting the conference room was wracked by a mnor explosion. No one was hurt except C-3PO, who was shuttled down to Maintenance for some repairs. After emerging from an oil bath, the protocol droid could no longer talk! The oil had been contaminated, and was the source of the rebellious droids that the Rebels were having trouble with. Luckily, a nearby maintenance droid noticed and cleaned both R2-D2 and C-3PO's systems of the fluid. The trio rushed to tell Egoreg that they had found the source of the malfunctioning robots.

However, en route they bumped into the true source of the problem—Jawas! A small group of them had infiltrated the Rebel hideout and began stealing items for the super-vaporator, damaging machinery and spoiling the oil supply. In the ensuing scuffle C-3PO and the maintenance droid were knocked down, but R2-D2 managed to send a distress signal. Han and Chewbacca were the first to show up, and Chewbacca roared a primal Wookiee yell to frighten the small bandits into submission.

When asked why they were doing damage to the Rebel plans, the Jawas stated that they figured damaged machinery is thrown out faster, after which they could take it easily. The Jawas were punished afterwards, and Chewie was presented with a medal for saving the day.

Behind the scenes
There are several internal inconsistencies between this book and its own illustrations. For example, although the Rebel base is said to be on Tatooine, the reader may be led to believe that it is in fact the base on Yavin 4 as the interior looks very much like the Massassi Temple. Trees are visible through the hangar in which the Millennium Falcon is docked as well. Also, the story calls the maintenance droid that assist R2-D2 and C-3PO an R2-series astromech droid, but the picture of it resembles an R5-series model.