The world of children's lit dims today - Brian Jacques passes on

[Neroon]

Brian Jacques, author of the "Redwall" series of books as left for new worlds.

I never read the books myself, but my wife and kids did... and they so thoroughly enjoyed them. Another bit of childhood has gone onward and outward.....

 

[CaptainCanada]

Damn. The Redwall series were a huge thing for me in the mid- to late-90s; I read fourteen of his books.

He knew what made for good storytelling: relentless creature-on-creature violence. Seriously, if you compare the animated series from a decade ago to the books in terms of content, the difference is pretty remarkable.

 

[Venardhi]

I read at least dozen and usually plowed through them in an evening hiding from my family so they wouldn't bother me for dinner or homework or whatever. I always thought that the Redwall-verse would be a great setting for a story-heavy action-RPG. it was one of my first experiences with unforgiving death in storytelling, he really knew how to stick you where it hurt (hurt so good).

 

[CaptainCanada]

Yeah, he wasn't afraid to kill heroes (or villains, but that's less uncommon) in his children's stories.

Apparently he left a twenty-second book unfinished on his death. I stopped reading because the plots and character types get repetitive after a while, and I sort of outgrew it, but it's still an amazing canon of work, one that I treasure.

 

[Neroon]

I know of several people who have said that their children's reading skyrocketed with these books. That's part of what books are for, and Jacques' family can take great comfort in that knowledge.

 

[Theonethatis]

This is quite sad.

 

[Skywalker]

Damn, that's too bad. I used to love the Redwall books when I was a kid. Every year when a new one came out I'd be in a huge rush to get down to the bookstore and buy it. Unfortunately I kind of outgrew the books and stopped reading them, but I'll always have fond memories of them.

RIP, Mr. Jacques.

 

[Unicron]

Crap. I started reading Redwall in middle school and was a big fan of that universe, despite some elements being a bit repetitive over time. RIP.

 

[DigificWriter]

This is very sad news; I found the Redwall novels to be immensely enjoyable and entertaining, even though I didn't end up finishing all of them. Jacques was one of the few authors out there whose imagination seemed to be limitless, and he will sorely be missed.

BTW, does anyone remember the 1999 Redwall animated series? It was my first introduction to Jacques' world, and is what inspired me to read the novels in the first place.

Edit: Regarding the twenty-second book in the series that CaptainCanada mentioned, it is called The Rogue Crew, and it isn't unfinished; it just hasn't been released yet (it will drop on May 3rd).