Anyone ever read this wonderful series? It’s got multiple sagas to it.
I’ve got a copy that I’m waiting to get my kid into. She’s a little young, but she likes the cover already, and we’re trying to read her parts of it while explaining everything that’s going on. It’ll be a nice transition from pictures to mental images. I grew up reading them too, and they’re the reason I first got into real trouble. I was stealing batteries and flashlight bulbs so I could stay up reading all night.
Haha, nice they’re the reason I got into reading 📖 in the first place.
Loved them as a kid, though I’m pretty sure I didn’t read the whole series
Totally worth the read
I recently listened to book one with my six year old son. Great adventurous stuff, with terrible villains. But I must admit I was sometimes uncomfortable with the level of violence. The good guys don’t just win, they cleave their enemies in half, heads roll and blood spills. I suppose it goes without saying that my son loved it.
What the Author said is that it’s meant for kids and the stories are about everything wrong with humanity and his real life interactions. Loved this series growing up and they even have a Cartoon on Redwall, Martin The Warrior and Mattimeo.
I read most of these when I was young and don’t really remember them being overly violent. What I do remember are long descriptions of food.
I’m reading the series right now! I’m sure I read Redwall and maybe Mossflower as a kid, but I think my introduction to them was probably the cartoon. They certainly hit different as an adult.
I’m reading in publication order, and I’m on the third book now - Mattimeo. There’s this bit I enjoy where we’re told several times that Martin’s sword is just a sword. While it might be a symbol, it isn’t magic - and although it can be used for good it could just as easily be used for evil. Matthias is taught this when he recovers the sword during Cluny’s siege, and Martin is told this when the blade is originally forged.
Anyway, early in Mattimeo one of Slagar’s gang floats the idea of stealing the sword. Slagar says they better not - it’s almost certainly a magic sword, and if someone who wasn’t a mouse tried to use it they’d surely be cursed.
I find it interesting, because apart from the fact that these are woodland creatures, Redwall is fairly low-fantasy. There is sometimes a supernatural element with visions of ancestors and prophecies and such, but it’s not the fantasy fare I’m used to of wizards slinging fireballs at skeletons. But it does make me wonder: could the sword be magic after all? Martin certainly has a touch of the divine to him, and his spirit does come to the aid of Redwall several times.
Maybe the magic comes from having a good heart and living your life to protect your friends. These days I feel we could all use a little more magic in our lives.
It’s so good. Read it as a kid, and his descriptions of feasts and banquets were so vivid it would make me salivate.
They made a childrens TV show out of it, and none other than Tim Curry himself voiced Cluny the rat!
Well now I have a new show to seek out.
I read the first one as an adult, and loved it. After I finished, and was thinking about it,I realized it was actually a book about all the various ways that an army would try to beat a siege, and breach the castle walls. Brute force, over, under, using spies and traitors, lone operative, etc., all under the guise of a children’s story. Fascinating.
is it like the rats of nimh?
No idea.
I’ve never read the books, but I remember liking the show a lot!
Wow this brings back some good memories. Loved those books.
His last name is pronounced like “Jakes”. I had to learn that and so you have to too.
Redwall had a sweet early 90s website. There was a little sound clip of Brian Jaques introducing himself and welcoming you to Redwall Abby (on the internet).
So I GOT to learn that from the man himself.
I figure that .wav file must exist SOMEWHERE still. It belongs in a museum.
But, I didn’t spell it wrong 😑, and I know that 😉
wdym 160+ likes, 40+ comments in a day for Redwall series in this community? Where’s my daily link to random title from Anna’s Archive or at least something about CIA, Stalin or US politics?
I love these books so dearly! My older brother and I both read them as kids and then again as teens. The world building and lore goes surprisingly deep, with Mossflower feeling akin to Tolkien’s Silmarillion. There was even an animated series that was broadcast on public television that was surprisingly good! It’s all available on YouTube now. The quality of the animation is questionable at times, but they capture the whimsy very well.
These were a cornerstone of my childhood, and I remember getting through Mattimeo all by myself, and feeling like I had really crossed a threshold in my reading development.
“Now I’m reading the big books!”
It was also the first and blessedly not the last time that I finished a book and had this almost sad feeling that it was over combined with the awestruck feeling of having just shared in a monumentally good story.
One other funny thing about the books is something I discovered much later in life when I was talking with a friend about them: The friend marveled at the fact that I read them as a child and did not grow up to be a furry. So there’s that.
Gonna age myself but I was growing up as they were coming out. So for many birthday parties you could expect whomever to get the newest one (and then the argument over who would borrow it first would break out.)
I will still use ‘The Long Patrol’ as a name for any kind of group or organization I need to name in a computer game 🙂
They’re my comfort books, I’m almost 40 and still read them fairly regularly.
Nice
I recently re-read many of these after enjoying them as a child. Worth it!
Love these books 📚
Phenomenal books, and a damn hard thing to convince people to read em, which is a shame.
They’re sturdy, whimsical tales of bravery and harrowing adventures… With pages and pages of descriptions for feasts!
And the folk songs? I have several that live with me even now, even though they’re fake. Perfect series.
Guisom dig yore paddle deep, Hurly-burly river wide’n’curly, There’s no time to sleep.
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