Greetings,

Z9484 said I could add some posts of my own, I’m afraid mine will be less computer based, but a wide variety is good right?

Well anyway, I recently went on a Redwall binge. Meaning I read every single one of the Redwall Series by Brian Jacques I could get my hands on. Again. Sixteen of them. That was not my first intention. I originally just picked up Mariel of Redwall because I had been thinking about it, but then I had to read the Bellmaker, because it has the same characters, and then I read Marlfox, because I wanted to see how much Mariel and Songbreeze are alike. And it just snowballed from there.

But this was meant to be a review of the whole series. They are a series of comic but dramatic anthropomorphized animal fiction, most of which centers around the Abbey of Redwall, it’s inhabitants, and its founder Martin the Warrior.

Jacques is a gifted author, especially in how he deals with so many different types of characters. As in, if a character is an otter they will swim and use their rudder as a weapon, as opposed to a hedgehog who would rather curl up in a spiky ball and hide. Maybe that sounds obvious, but I think he does a good job making sure a squirrel doesn’t act or talk like a hare.

However, one of his big faults is similar to that strength. Throughout all of his books all the shrews (or the respective animal) have the same character traits. Every shrew is argumentative but brave, every hare loves to talk, eat, and fight, and every otter is tough and fit. In fact a lot of times it hardly matters the characters name because it could just as easily be one of the same animals from a previous book. Also dibbuns, are always dibbuns, and almost all of them act alike. This is not always true, but it does happen far too often. One shining example when he did not do this is in one of his first books, Martin the Warrior, where Brome can not bring himself to fight or kill, he is a Healer. No other character in the whole series has found that he can not kill a living creature. Many have qualms but they all get over it quickly.

Also, Jacques is poor at writing emotion. For instance in the Bellmaker there is a scene where an otter who has lost all memory suddenly regains it when he hears his mate call him by name, and do we care deeply? Not really, and then the battle continues. This is not to say that we never care about the characters, and never have emotional connections, its just that that is the exception rather then the rule.

Another difficulty I find is that the plots are remarkably similiar. In more then two thirds of them it rests on several adeventurers going forth to or from Redwall on some quest, known or unknown. While they do this, some group of Vermin attack the abbey.

Other things that bother me in the series, but are more inconsequential are inconsistencies between books (in characters and geography), lack of character development, major use of cannon fodder (especially shrews) and the never ending description of feasts. And he obviously believes in the nature side of the Nurture vs. Nature debate (all vermin are vermin).

Despite all these weeknesses I still enjoyed (most of) them. They are carefree, suspenseful, and filled with good triumphing over evil. I also enjoy finding the connections between books, in the relationships of charcters, places and things, such as the Joseph Bell and Slagar the Cruel. Of course part of my affection for them comes from reading them for the first time at the perfect age. I am no longer at that age, (late elementary early middle school for me) so I can see much clearer the things lacking and more clearly criticize them. Still if you have never read them I recomend reading a few of them. Two of my favorites are Martin the Warrior and Taggerung. My least favorite is Loamhege.