...way back in Junior High School I read the first three books.
I recently discovered that they're not only still around, but a new one is published every year.
Reading them, I was a bit...put off by certain things I hadn't noticed as a kid.
Not just the further you got away from the earliest books, the more formulaic the plots became...but the implications of certain things.
Like how all the various characters have personality and morality determined by species.
Or how despite the claims of the author that the series has no organized religion, it's chock full of a religious order that seems powerful and well organized, even if it's vague on theology.
Or the endless emphasis on eating food as the greatest thing in life.
The books seem to be popular...I see an entire shelf devoted to them in the adult SF/Fantasy section of my local Barnes and Noble.
Am I just reading too much into certain things meant as a simple kid's story?
On the other hand, I also read book one of "The Mistmantle Chronicles"...a series obviously aimed at Redwall fans, and at a younger set of readers...yet it seemed to deftly avoid the stuff that bothered me in the more recent Redwall books.
Posted by SteveRogers (Member # 7130) on :
I read the first one in fourth grade. But I didn't like any of the sequels. Not any of them.
Another book that struck my fancy in fourth grade was The Neverending Story. Boy, I loved that book. The movie is cool too. But I liked the book a lot more.
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
Michael Ende's book is light years cooler than the movie.
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
Another thing that strikes me about the more recent Redwall books is how ridiculously easy the villains become to defeat. Not even much build up for them. They're like those generic ninjas in bad action movies...supposedly a threat, but easily defeated.
The earliest books managed a genuine sense of cunning and danger to the baddies.
Posted by SteveRogers (Member # 7130) on :
I wouldn't know. I couldn't muscle my way through the second one. I just couldn't. It didn't have the same charm to me. It was just terrible.
On another note, I am glad that when they did the movie that they only did the first half of the book. I don't think the movie would have worked if they had adapted the whole novel. And the second movie just wasn't that good anyway. And the easily forgotten third one was terrible.
The second half of the book was good though. It's too bad they couldn't make the movie any good.
[ March 26, 2006, 08:28 PM: Message edited by: SteveRogers ]
Posted by pfresh85 (Member # 8085) on :
I only read a few of the early books, and I didn't find anything too bad about them. I haven't read anything from the series in a long while though (I mean it may have been 8 years or more). So I'm probably not a good judge of the series.
Posted by Soara (Member # 6729) on :
My friend read the books in fifth grade and rather adored them...I made it through a few of them, but couldn't take much more than that. Puffy Treat, I hope you weren't serious when you said "a new one is published every year." That's kind of disturbing to me. There are already so many of them, and they're so long. Books that long and that in depth about <i>mice</i> just don't work for me.
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
I am serious. According to the author's official web-site, a new Redwall novel is released once a year, and has been since the early 90s.
I don't mind books featuring talking animals.
I love The Chronicles of Narnia, The Wind in the Willows, Watership Down, Charlotte's Web, Usagi Yojimbo...
Yet, I find the ones that try too hard to be "cute" (and the latter Redwall books try -very- hard to be ultra-super-cute) tend to rub me the wrong way.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
I read the first one; it seemed pretty generic stuff to me. OK for children, perhaps; but some children's books entertain adults as well. Redwall doesn't. Or not this adult, anyway.
Posted by Tatiana (Member # 6776) on :
I like the first one, but the things that bothered me were I couldn't get a feel for the scale of the abbey. Was it mouse-sized and built by mice? Or was it human-sized and built by humans, but later abandoned by them and taken over by ecclesiastical mice? Sometimes it seemed to be one, and sometimes the other. I have yet to read the second one because my friend who promised to send it to me keeps forgetting. Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
My kids enjoy them; I read a couple (the first and a middle-ish one) and found them unobjectionable. If they outgrow them, fine. If they continue to enjoy them, also fine.
*shrug*
Posted by James Tiberius Kirk (Member # 2832) on :
Fun books. Loved them as a kid-- got addicted, read all of them real quick, then lost interest because I had to wait a few months until the next one came out. Haven't picked them up since.
Some things though:
quote:Like how all the various characters have personality and morality determined by species.
I later read that it was intentional; he didn't want there to be any ambiguity as to who the "good guys" and the "bad guys" were. Even then I thought that was odd, though.
quote:Or the endless emphasis on eating food as the greatest thing in life.
I do remember that his books tend to build an appetite...
--j_k
Posted by Princess Leah (Member # 6026) on :
Mmm, october ale and cheese with walnuts. And many many puddings.
I missed the Redwall wave that hit my school when I was in third grade (so...hm...this is 1994/'95), but read the first one three years after that. I really enjoyed it. I had the same confusion as Tatiana regarding the Abbey, but as I am and have always been a hardcore escapist, I suspend disbelief as a matter of course and so it never really bothered me.
As to the sequels: Some of them I like (Mariel of Redwall and The Bellmaker in particular), but in some of them the formulaic, overly simple and predictability just kills them. I can't even read the newer ones. Legend of Luke was the last one I attempted, and failed, to get through. Partially because my literary tastes have matured as I've grown...but not exclusively. I think the sequels have gotten worse over the years.
I'm still a Brian Jaques fan, though. That book of scary stories (7 strange and ghostly tales, I think its called) he wrote still gets me. Also, I saw him speak once and they guy is delightful! Entertaining and intelligent and with a great sense of humor. He also recited from memory the second chapter of Redwall. That's the one when he waxes all poetic and Voice-of-Doom about Cluny the Scourge. He's a wonderful storyteller. However repetitive the books become, I think they'd still be great read aloud at bedtime while snuggling with friends/relatives, hot chocolate, quilts, and fuzzy slippers.
Posted by beatnix19 (Member # 5836) on :
I still enjoy the books. I personally own about 13 of them and just finished reading the most recent one, High Rulaine, the other day. But I must admit that yes, they are extremely predictable and formalaic. THey have become more so over the years. My favorites are still the earliest books. But there is just something fun about the stories. I Particularly love Martin the Warrior. When ever he is mentioned I get excited. He is still such a cool character, even if he is used in less exciting books, he himself is still an exciting character.
Posted by Shepherd (Member # 7380) on :
They were truly excellent at first, Mossflower was great, but they got sooooo incredibly formulaic I just stopped reading them.
![[Wink]](wink.gif)