Oops. I was under the mistaken impression that the Thrawn trilogy was the first Star Wars novel. But Splinter of the Mind's Eye was published in 1978. I haven't read that one, but I will, and then hopefully I'll have some new material. However, I doubt it was nearly as widely promoted as Shadows of the Empire (which even had a graphic novel adaptation) so he wouldn't find it in a school library anyway.

Force persuasion was a very useful trick, and it the next summer, Harry used it to great effect in getting his aunt to back off and let him out of the house.

He was at the top of a sizable oak tree, the lowest branches still high enough that even a man as tall as Vernon would need a Force-enhanced jump to reach it. Dudley's gang had no hope of reaching him.

With this sanctuary, Harry had plenty of time to focus on the innate energy of the biosphere. To his eyes, it formed a network exponentially more complex than the whole of Earth's telecommunications network. Each cell was its own node, and organisms on a visible scale were practically their own civilizations. Strangely, some of Mrs. Figg's cats showed a level of responsiveness to the surrounding Force signatures than most humans he'd met lacked, except that one strange bloke two months back who randomly shook his hand while out shopping. Harry wondered if he wasn't the first to try the Jedi path, and maybe the Force had alerted this odd fellow to his own growing prowess. It was the best theory he could manage with his limited data.

Though Harry's data wasn't nearly as limited now as it had been in years past. First off, the Greater Whinging public library was within 45 minutes walking distance. On top of his latest find, Splinter of the Mind's Eye, he'd found his parents' obituaries. Rather than dying in a drunken car crash, his father worked in counterterrorism until one of his enemies threatened Harry's life. Obviously, their going into hiding didn't work.

Reflecting on this while up in the tree, Harry wondered what else the Dursleys had lied to him about, when the Force decided to answer his curiosity.

The door to his shabby bedroom opens and in steps a auburn-haired old man with a prominent beard. Behind the stranger, the bitchy matron of his orphanage tells him he has a visitor.

The following conversation explains so much about his power over the world.

He now steps into the old man's domain, years later seemingly to inquire about a teaching position. He's grown past being the helpless waif Tom, and is extremely irritated at the headmaster's refusal to acknowledge such.

He feels some consternation at his servant's getting caught before hearing more, but what Severus did manage to catch is intriguing.

"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches..."

And some very helpful information on finding his would-be adversary. Good.

"Couldn't you do something about it, Dumbledore?"

Harry can't see who is speaking, but recognizes the face from his parents' grown-up stuff.

"Even if I could, I wouldn't. Scars can come in handy. I have one myself above my left knee that is a perfect map of the London Underground."

Harry found his consciousness snap back to summer of '88, the scar on his forehead feeling as if someone had stuck a wire under it and vibrated a magnet over the surface. A knot on the branch that doubled as his seat was digging painfully into his tailbone.

Putting this string of visions into context would undoubtably take quite some effort. Harry had a bad feeling about this...