Brian Jacques

The mousemaid Mariel achieves victory at sea for the animals of Redwall Abbey, fighting the savage pirate rat Gabool the Wild, warlord of rodent corsairs.

Mariel of Redwall

Sarah Sammis

I decided to stop reading the series after this one.

Redwall Abbey is always a wonderfully cozy place to revisit, no matter the plight facing its inhabitants.  However, I have to confess that those plights are beginning to blur together in my mind, because each book is so formulaic.  Almost without fail, the Abbey will be under some sort of siege by unsavory characters looking to enslave those within its walls and steal their home and resources.  As this occurs, those most warrior-like from the Abbey are off on a quest far from home to defeat someone or win back an item that in some way correlates to the happenings back home in Mossflower forest and Redwall.  And this tends to be under the guidance of the spirit of Martin the Warrior.  Do I have any problem with this plot line? Not at all.  But I have to admit that it’s becoming a tad redundant this many volumes into the series.

One thing I did really appreciate about this book as compared to those preceding it was the fact that the titular hero was a female.  Mariel is brave and fierce and feisty and determined and terrifically skilled with a weapon for one untrained.  I found her journey an interesting and intense one to witness.  But there were a couple of things about this installment in particular that bugged me.  First of all, I found the central villain fairly unbelievable.  His level of obsession with this bell, to the point of no longer sleeping and then falling prey to madness, made no sense to me.  He went from sly to completely mental over the course of a scant few chapters, and it simply didn’t feel believable to me.  Even in a story about anthropomorphic animals running an Abbey and waging wars, this bell-induced insanity was where my skepticism couldn’t be kept at bay.  There’s also a place near the end of the book where a couple of creatures fight over who has the right to kill another character.  This is such a stupid discussion to me, whenever I happen to see it in media.  Who cares who can claim the kill, as long as the beast in question is put down in the end?  It’s utterly nonsensical and baffles me any time I come across it.

I might’ve had qualms with this volume, but I still enjoyed the story and the setting.  And, of course, the food.  Jacques wrote food descriptions like no one else I’ve ever read, and they never fail to make me hungry for things I’m pretty sure would actually be vile in real life.   I also love knowing that everything is going to work out all right in the end, which makes this series perfect for children just getting into fantasy and adults looking for something cozy and nostalgic to provide a brief escape from the darker world of most adult fantasy fiction.  Even if this wasn’t a perfect book, it was a fun one, and I’ll definitely be continuing on with the series.

Celeste Richardson

Redwall Abbey is always a wonderfully cozy place to revisit, no matter the plight facing its inhabitants.  However, I have to confess that those plights are beginning to blur together in my mind, because each book is so formulaic.  Almost without fail, the Abbey will be under some sort of siege by unsavory characters looking to enslave those within its walls and steal their home and resources.  As this occurs, those most warrior-like from the Abbey are off on a quest far from home to defeat someone or win back an item that in some way correlates to the happenings back home in Mossflower forest and Redwall.  And this tends to be under the guidance of the spirit of Martin the Warrior.  Do I have any problem with this plot line? Not at all.  But I have to admit that it’s becoming a tad redundant this many volumes into the series.

One thing I did really appreciate about this book as compared to those preceding it was the fact that the titular hero was a female.  Mariel is brave and fierce and feisty and determined and terrifically skilled with a weapon for one untrained.  I found her journey an interesting and intense one to witness.  But there were a couple of things about this installment in particular that bugged me.  First of all, I found the central villain fairly unbelievable.  His level of obsession with this bell, to the point of no longer sleeping and then falling prey to madness, made no sense to me.  He went from sly to completely mental over the course of a scant few chapters, and it simply didn’t feel believable to me.  Even in a story about anthropomorphic animals running an Abbey and waging wars, this bell-induced insanity was where my skepticism couldn’t be kept at bay.  There’s also a place near the end of the book where a couple of creatures fight over who has the right to kill another character.  This is such a stupid discussion to me, whenever I happen to see it in media.  Who cares who can claim the kill, as long as the beast in question is put down in the end?  It’s utterly nonsensical and baffles me any time I come across it.

I might’ve had qualms with this volume, but I still enjoyed the story and the setting.  And, of course, the food.  Jacques wrote food descriptions like no one else I’ve ever read, and they never fail to make me hungry for things I’m pretty sure would actually be vile in real life.   I also love knowing that everything is going to work out all right in the end, which makes this series perfect for children just getting into fantasy and adults looking for something cozy and nostalgic to provide a brief escape from the darker world of most adult fantasy fiction.  Even if this wasn’t a perfect book, it was a fun one, and I’ll definitely be continuing on with the series.

Mariel of Redwall

Reviews