Book Review: Bluestar's Prophecy by Erin Hunter (Warriors Super Edition #2)

The book we’re reviewing here is Bluestar’s Prophecy by Erin Hunter. It is a prequel to the first arc of the Warriors book series.

While I initially loved this book as a kid, I must also admit that it is among the first books I read in English that was well above my level when I first got it, so there were a lot of words I didn't know and plot points I didn't understand. But now, rereading it, let's see if I can still appreciate it all the same! Spoilers ahead.

Bluestar’s Prophecy focuses on the leader of ThunderClan, the Clan that is featured most throughout the book series. Bluekit is born as a kit in this Clan, alongside her sister Snowkit. She has a loving mother and a mostly neglectful father. Bluekit is soon made an apprentice, and after that a warrior. There is a prophecy about her that says she will be like a fire, and water will destroy her. As the title obviously implies, Bluefur eventually makes it to become Clan leader, becoming Bluestar.

This book just follows Bluestar’s life in her Clan, and shows the hardships she went through in her life and how she ended up as leader.

There isn’t too much “goal” going on, as in, Bluefur doesn’t really start to focus really actively on getting her leader position until later in the book. I’m not saying that the book is absent of a real plot, but I can say that it kinda reminded me of Bambi: A Life In The Woods. That’s a positive thing, by the way. It’s simply following the life of a character who would eventually become a leader from their birth to maturity.

There are of course side plots, such as a rivalry with WindClan and RiverClan, but the overall focus of the book is just where it should be: Bluefur and her hardships.

The characters were varying for me. Our protagonist is Bluefur is mixed. In the first arc of Warriors, she is presented as a calm and noble leader, spoiler alert, until she finally snaps. In this book, however, she’s portrayed as more sassy and hypocritical. At first I did like her more flawed personality, but there were also bits of her I couldn’t stand. A lot of the times when something went wrong, she just threw a big pity party for herself, which, in a society where everyone’s survival depends on one another, just comes off as really annoying.

I’m not going to be talking about her character as a whole in the later arcs here as I could go on for a long time in that case, but I didn’t fully enjoy her character in this book. In the past I’ve been neutral on her, then that grew to furious hatred, and now I’m mostly indifferent.

Her hypocrisy is probably what annoys me the most. She herself is being disloyal to her Clan because she’s with Oakheart, yet, when her sister is in love with a cat that’s from her own Clan, which is perfectly fine according to the warrior code, she makes a fuss. Yes, Thistleclaw did indeed turn out to be a lot of trouble and also a horrible cat, but I don’t think they knew that back then? Spottedleaf's Heart doesn't occur until quite a bit later. 

I’m also irked by her dumb decisions. She simply should have voiced her concerns about Thistleclaw to her leader, rather than mostly just keep them to herself. Giving up her kits is shown to be a noble sacrifice, but instead I think just talking could’ve solved a lot of the problem. I think she could’ve explained to Sunstar that there was a prophecy about her becoming leader. He doesn’t seem like one to ignore a wish of StarClan, even if it came from Goosefeather.

Also, her taking out her kits, on one of the coldest nights is just the worst decision. I still don’t see why she didn’t just ask White-eye, who was also in the nursery during that, to look after her kits while she took on her deputy position. I don’t know, but I just feel like her taking out her kits in one of the coldest of nights is just asking for them to die.

From what I recall, Tawnyspots, the deputy back then, was already sick when Bluefur mated with Oakheart. She simply couldn’t have done this, and all of her “give up my kits”-troubles would’ve been solved.

Her character in this book just irks me, especially her “holier than thou” attitude towards Thistleclaw. Yes, her suspicions about him being bad news were indeed correct. Yes, he was too violent and would’ve been an awful leader for ThunderClan. However, I think she’s just being such an annoying hypocrite when she says she’s better than him when she herself meets up with Oakheart and has his kits, thus breaking the warrior code. It just makes her look like an unlikable cat, in my opinion.

I think she’s a decently flawed character, but I just don’t find her likable, especially considering where she’s going in arc 1 of Warriors... but that’s a story for another day. Sorry for the little rant here, those are simply my thoughts on Bluefur’s character.

The other characters vary in my opinion. This book has a rather large cast with all cats in ThunderClan, as well as cats from other Clans.

My personal favourite characters were Sunfall and Thrushpelt. Sunfall is the deputy at the time Bluekit is born, and I feel like he’s definitely one of the best leaders we’ve had in the series this far.

Thrushpelt later falls in love with Bluefur, despite her not returning his affections. He’s just a really stand-up guy and, even though he knows Bluefur is silent about who her kit’s father. He just takes on the role of being their father figure anyways, and never becomes some kind of edgy boy who turns murderous just because the she-cat he likes doesn’t return his feelings.

Other major characters include Snowfur, who I just thought was kinda bland and Oakheart, who I greatly dislike. There are quite a few other characters, but they mostly have smaller roles.

The main villain, other than cats from other Clans, is Thistleclaw. I feel like he’s an okay character. Obviously there is some information about him not revealed yet here (such as him being a nonce and also training in the Dark Forest, aka cat hell), but I feel like he makes a decent villain for the story. He’s ambitious and violent, but also really cruel. I don’t really see a lot of motivation for him to be like this in this book, as it seems like he was born ambitious and with a liking to fighting, so I feel like he could be more developed. One could make the argument that Sweetpaw’s and Snowfur’s deaths caused him to become worse, but if that’s the case they didn’t do a bang-up job in showing it.

The pacing was all right. I didn’t feel like the book dragged in many places, which is a plus. It went fast enough to keep me engaged.

One thing I would like to touch at is the relationship between Bluefur and Oakheart. I thought it kind of came right out of nowhere and vanished way too quickly, too. Rather than them actually bonding deeply, their romance is based on superficial crushes for quite a big part. When they do finally have their one and only date at Fourtrees, it’s only a one night stand. And somehow, don’t ask me why, they had the genius idea to mate during their first night together? Why would they? They hardly knew each other and it was their first time really getting together to spend the time.

When Bluestar talked about her relationship with Oakheart in book 1, I thought they had a deep bond together. Instead, it comes kind of out of nowhere, with Oakheart liking her solely based on looks. Bluefur doesn’t even like him at first. I still don’t know why she went on that date with Oakheart in the first place. I thought she saw him as arrogant and annoying?

Either way, I think the whole relationship could use more development if they really wanted to have Bluefur have his kits.

So, overall, I think this book was just alright. For Warriors fans I think it’s an enjoyable enough read, though it may change your opinion on Bluestar's character. 

Rating: 3/5