Mossflower (1988)

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00009994

Mossflower by Brian Jacques is the second book in the Redwall series. I'm reading this series in publication order.

This is such a fun book. I'm reading this whole series, and I just love the characters and the world Jacques created. I highly recommend it to anyone who loves talking animals in their fantasy. ( )

Summary:

Mossflower is about a strong-willed warrior mouse named Martin, with his friends from the woodland rebellion Gonff the mouse-thief and Dinny the mole. Under the reign of Tsarmina, a wildcat, the woodland mice, moles, otters, squirrels, and their badger leader, Lady Bella fight for freedom in Mossflower woods while Martin's group searches for the great mountain Salamandastron, and the powerful warrior badger that lives there, Boar the Fighter, Bella's father. The two plots intertwine as Martin, with his new sword forged by Boar, sails back to Mossflower woods to help fight Tsarmina with the army he has gathered while the woodlanders carry out plans to sink Kotir, Tsarmina's fortress. This ends in a great battle with Martin fighting Tsarmina. Martin killed Tsarmina, but was gravely wounded after the battle. It took weeks for him to heal, and he nearly died, but fortunately he was able to survive. the story ends with Lady Bella telling the ending to Gonff's grandson.

Opinion:

This book was one of my favorites when I was younger, and I decided I wanted to brush up on this old series. This story is geared more towards younger kids, but it still holds up as one of my favorite books. One of my gripes though, is that the book gives no idea of scale. For example, the book does not describe if the trees are scaled like in real life or are scaled down for the sake of the smaller animal sizes. This still is a great book though, as it has a good cast of characters and allusions to lore from Salamandastron's engravings. The main protagonist, Martin, is, although slightly boring, a fine character. His cave warrior past really intrigued me and made me exited to read the book about his backstory. I would recommend this to any reader interested in a simple and easy book.

R.I.P. Brian Jaques, you have given me countless hours of future reading and fun, thank you. ( )

Prequel to Redwall. Book 1-Kotir, Book 2-Salamandastron, Book-3 Of Water and Warriors. When the clever and wildcat Tsarmina becomes Queen of a Thousand Eyes and ruler of all Mossflower Woods, she is determined to govern the peaceful woodlanders with an iron paw, bringing every otter and hedgehog, every mouse and squirrel, whimpering to their knees.