Also, I’ve only read the first book of the Guardians of Ga’Hoole series, just as extra info.
Book One: Lone Wolf
Book One deals with the wolf pup Faolan. Due to his deformed front paw, he is left to die on a river, only to be adopted by a lone grizzly named Thunderheart. When hibernation season comes, the now grown pup sets out on his own, and eventually ends up traveling all over the Beyond, meeting an owl named Gwynneth and finally becoming part of a wolf pack.
I am not going to lie. I did not care for this one. The writing style was bland and forgettable, something I didn’t think the first Guardians book suffered from. The world building is good and has a lot of potential, but it all goes by so fast and is never fully realized, so it doesn’t leave much of an impact. There’s a lot of made-up words the author uses that are usually explained only once, and there is no glossary of wolf terms, which definitely is necessary if you insist on using this many fake words. It’s also obnoxious that words are often explained already long before the main character knows what it is.
There’s bigger issues, however. First of all: the lack of dialogue. Throughout most of the book, it’s just the description of events, very little actual talk and dialogue between characters. This made everything feel dull and one-sided to read. Then, when we get to the end and do finally get some dialogue, it’s too little too late. This book feels unbalanced because of it. It makes sense that Faolan wouldn’t often be talking to himself when he is alone throughout the large portion of this book, but we also get little to none inner monologue from him. This is our main character, we are supposed to know how he feels and what his thoughts are, but things are just described rather than outright “said” mentally by the character.
Speaking of Faolan, he is an incredibly weak protagonist. He’s pretty much the textbook definition of bland. There’s so little personality to this husk of a character that I had trouble staying invested into him. There’s very little other characters, too. The only ones I finally thought to have some potential were Gwynneth the owl blacksmith and the Sark of the Slough, an interesting witch-type wolf. But, again, they came in so late and had such a little presence that it’s too little too late.
There’s of course also the whole ableism aspect to be addressed. It sucks that one of the major themes throughout this series is massively abandoning any children that may be deformed or unhealthy, but what’s worse to me is that somehow the wolves that do this look at other wolves in the Outermost and think of them as “uncivilized”. How is mass infanticide of your deformed or sickly children not worse than a bunch of cannibals? I just don’t get it, it’s really wrong and I wish more characters would actually stand up and do something about it rather than see it as normal everyday wolf life.
There is also not a real plot to the book. It’s just kind of Faolan going all about the place until he finally joins a wolf pack. It’s kind of just a chain of events that don’t lead to something grander so far.
This wasn’t a good start to the series. It could’ve been fixed with more dialogue or at the very least more inner monologue and of course a better main character, but for what we have, it doesn’t do its job well. The world building also doesn’t feel fully realized, but perhaps that’ll be fixed in the next books. I hope the other problems are, too.
Rating: 1/5
Book Two: Shadow Wolf continues to follow Faolan. Now that he’s been assigned to a pack, he is a lowest ranking wolf, a gnaw-wolf. There’s an opportunity for him to working himself up the ranks to eventually join the Watch by partaking in a series of games called the gaddergnaw, but a murder mystery of another malcadh pup causes other wolves to think that Faolan is the killer, all the while the yellow gnaw wolf Heep seems to be up to no good.
This was just another big disappointment, unfortunately. Let’s get the good elements out of the way first: there’s more dialogue, the world building still feels lacking but at least more realized, and I like the idea of these games. However, that’s really where it stops.
Faolan is still a horribly uninteresting protagonist. He’s the generic do-gooder hero who of course is proven right time and again. I was just so disappointed with him. He didn’t even try to save the malcadh pup, he just accepted yet another case of practical infanticide of a disabled wolf. He’s not remotely engaging and I kept being more interested in pretty much any side character, even our main villain.
The other characters aren’t super great, either, but at least better than Faolan. I quite enjoyed the elaboration we got on the characters of the Sark and Gwynnethm, plus it was kind of cool to see them team up to solve the murder mystery. Like said previously, I found Heep to be more interesting than Faolan. Does that make him a good character or villain? No. But he at least has more going on than our bland excuse for a hero.
The plot of this book was at least more coherent and flowed better than in the last book, but I still couldn’t bring myself to care about much of it when the conclusion was so obvious. Of course Faolan didn’t kill the pup, of course it was Heep, the only hint of a main villain we’ve gotten so far. It was just so uninteresting when you can tell the conclusion of a book chapters away from the climax already.
The games, despite being a major element of the book, also weren’t as thorough as one’d expect. They gnaw bones and take place in a hunting formation, but they really don’t do that much else, yet there’s so many more things they can do. How about a competition of who can jump the best or see from the farthest away, skills they’ll need at the Watch. Or a treasure hunt where they’ll have to locate something using scent, or a howling competition? You have this interesting species you can do so much with, yet the games are just very bland.
Bland seems to be the keyword for these first two books. I hope it gets better in book Three, but so far the signs aren’t looking good. I’ll grant this book one star more than book One, but it’s far from being actually good.
Rating: 2/5
Book Three, Watch Wolf, is where things start to get better. In this installment, Faolan and Edme are sent to their new lives at the Watch of volcanoes, while the Beyond is on the verge of a war between the bears and the wolves.
In this book, I somehow felt the world building felt a bit more “real” and tangible than in the other books, where it just was a bit glanced over. I like the Watch. I like how everything functions, the ranks the gnaw wolves have, the Fengo. It’s not quite on par with some other books I’ve read, but it feels more flashed out than before.
Faolan is still as bland as ever, but it does help that we have a decent portion of non-Faolan POV in this. We get Edme, who is actually quite a good character with a strong arc. Characters like Gwynneth and the Sark are also highly enjoyable. One flaw I have noticed by now in these books, though, is that many characters are introduced and named and then just fade into the background. Characters appearing and fading doesn’t have to be bad, but naming them and then only having them around for one or two scenes is just kind of pointless.
The whole concept of the war with the bears was interesting, though I do think the MacHeaths, our real villains for this book, are noticeably flawed as a big bad. They seem to be motivated by the will to do evil only, nothing more. They’re sexist, because of course they are, too. They’re just boring villains and need more to them. I do wonder if they’ll return in later books, as they’re now banished to the Outermost.
Probably one of the best Wolves of the Beyond books there is, I think. At least the best one so far. Still not exactly very good, but decent.
Rating: 3/5
Book Four focuses once more on Faolan and Edme as they face a new conflict: the Beyond is changing. Despite it being summer, it’s snowing and storming as if it’s winter, and most prey has either died out or fled the land. Wolves are starving en masse, and the appearance of a mysterious wolf known as the Prophet leads to a wave of religious fanaticism among the packs, with wolves literally dancing themselves to death in the hope of relieving themselves of the suffering of life.
This was a very dark book. Like, this series already dealt with some dark subjects, but I did not expect them to go here when I first picked up these books. There’s major examples here of religious fanaticism, suicide cults, false prophets, etc. So yeah, don’t read this if you’re too faint of heart about these subjects.
The darkness aside, how does it hold up? Kind of well, if you ask me. Still not as much as I’d want it to, but I do feel like these books are slowly but surely improving.
The characters: still not much changed. Faolan has pretty much become a full-on Gary Stu at this point, with it being revealed that he’s some kind of re-incarnated bear spirit or something along those lines. But the other characters make up for it. Edme and Gwynneth are great, and the Sark is by far my favorite character by now. Any scene she’s in is bound to spark joy, and her bond with Gwynneth is really neat.
The villain is only so-so. Liam MacDuncan’s motivation still isn’t really clear to me, and he had a very weak presence in this and the book he appeared in before. He just left no impact, and when he was finally unmasked I just had a minor “oh”-moment, nothing more. I also wonder how it’s possible for Liam, a huge dire wolf, to wear the mask of a small owl like a Masked Owl, Gwyndor. It’s just never addressed, and the art depicting Liam makes it seem like the owls in this universe are huge, which clearly isn’t the case.
But despite this, I did like the darker tone, even though the execution isn’t perfect. The major characters that aren’t Faolan are really just saving this series for now.
Book Two: Shadow Wolf
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Book Two: Shadow Wolf continues to follow Faolan. Now that he’s been assigned to a pack, he is a lowest ranking wolf, a gnaw-wolf. There’s an opportunity for him to working himself up the ranks to eventually join the Watch by partaking in a series of games called the gaddergnaw, but a murder mystery of another malcadh pup causes other wolves to think that Faolan is the killer, all the while the yellow gnaw wolf Heep seems to be up to no good.
This was just another big disappointment, unfortunately. Let’s get the good elements out of the way first: there’s more dialogue, the world building still feels lacking but at least more realized, and I like the idea of these games. However, that’s really where it stops.
Faolan is still a horribly uninteresting protagonist. He’s the generic do-gooder hero who of course is proven right time and again. I was just so disappointed with him. He didn’t even try to save the malcadh pup, he just accepted yet another case of practical infanticide of a disabled wolf. He’s not remotely engaging and I kept being more interested in pretty much any side character, even our main villain.
The other characters aren’t super great, either, but at least better than Faolan. I quite enjoyed the elaboration we got on the characters of the Sark and Gwynnethm, plus it was kind of cool to see them team up to solve the murder mystery. Like said previously, I found Heep to be more interesting than Faolan. Does that make him a good character or villain? No. But he at least has more going on than our bland excuse for a hero.
The plot of this book was at least more coherent and flowed better than in the last book, but I still couldn’t bring myself to care about much of it when the conclusion was so obvious. Of course Faolan didn’t kill the pup, of course it was Heep, the only hint of a main villain we’ve gotten so far. It was just so uninteresting when you can tell the conclusion of a book chapters away from the climax already.
The games, despite being a major element of the book, also weren’t as thorough as one’d expect. They gnaw bones and take place in a hunting formation, but they really don’t do that much else, yet there’s so many more things they can do. How about a competition of who can jump the best or see from the farthest away, skills they’ll need at the Watch. Or a treasure hunt where they’ll have to locate something using scent, or a howling competition? You have this interesting species you can do so much with, yet the games are just very bland.
Bland seems to be the keyword for these first two books. I hope it gets better in book Three, but so far the signs aren’t looking good. I’ll grant this book one star more than book One, but it’s far from being actually good.
Rating: 2/5
Book Three: Watch Wolf
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In this book, I somehow felt the world building felt a bit more “real” and tangible than in the other books, where it just was a bit glanced over. I like the Watch. I like how everything functions, the ranks the gnaw wolves have, the Fengo. It’s not quite on par with some other books I’ve read, but it feels more flashed out than before.
Faolan is still as bland as ever, but it does help that we have a decent portion of non-Faolan POV in this. We get Edme, who is actually quite a good character with a strong arc. Characters like Gwynneth and the Sark are also highly enjoyable. One flaw I have noticed by now in these books, though, is that many characters are introduced and named and then just fade into the background. Characters appearing and fading doesn’t have to be bad, but naming them and then only having them around for one or two scenes is just kind of pointless.
The whole concept of the war with the bears was interesting, though I do think the MacHeaths, our real villains for this book, are noticeably flawed as a big bad. They seem to be motivated by the will to do evil only, nothing more. They’re sexist, because of course they are, too. They’re just boring villains and need more to them. I do wonder if they’ll return in later books, as they’re now banished to the Outermost.
Probably one of the best Wolves of the Beyond books there is, I think. At least the best one so far. Still not exactly very good, but decent.
Rating: 3/5
Book Four: Frost Wolf
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This was a very dark book. Like, this series already dealt with some dark subjects, but I did not expect them to go here when I first picked up these books. There’s major examples here of religious fanaticism, suicide cults, false prophets, etc. So yeah, don’t read this if you’re too faint of heart about these subjects.
The darkness aside, how does it hold up? Kind of well, if you ask me. Still not as much as I’d want it to, but I do feel like these books are slowly but surely improving.
The characters: still not much changed. Faolan has pretty much become a full-on Gary Stu at this point, with it being revealed that he’s some kind of re-incarnated bear spirit or something along those lines. But the other characters make up for it. Edme and Gwynneth are great, and the Sark is by far my favorite character by now. Any scene she’s in is bound to spark joy, and her bond with Gwynneth is really neat.
The villain is only so-so. Liam MacDuncan’s motivation still isn’t really clear to me, and he had a very weak presence in this and the book he appeared in before. He just left no impact, and when he was finally unmasked I just had a minor “oh”-moment, nothing more. I also wonder how it’s possible for Liam, a huge dire wolf, to wear the mask of a small owl like a Masked Owl, Gwyndor. It’s just never addressed, and the art depicting Liam makes it seem like the owls in this universe are huge, which clearly isn’t the case.
But despite this, I did like the darker tone, even though the execution isn’t perfect. The major characters that aren’t Faolan are really just saving this series for now.
Rating: 3/5
In book Five, Spirit Wolf, it is up to Faolan to gather survivors after earthquakes strike the Beyond, destroying most of the landscape. He, Edme and the others now seek a safe place to survive, and soon realize that leaving the Beyond is their only option.
On the one hand, this may very well be my favorite book out of the series. It has some aspects I really like, such as the land as we know it being destroyed and the characters being forced to find a way to survive in these harsh circumstances. But then there’s also some things I just really do not like.
First of all, healing the deformities/disabilities. Big no for me. After all the books so far proving that you’re not broken just because you’re born different, suddenly we get this weird mending thing? And it just kind of happens for no reason? There’s a prophecy that if the Ember is destroyed, all will be mended, yes. But it’s never really explained how that works, what kind of magic there is at work, and how these deformities are connected to the Ember. It may as well just not have happened at all and really not that much would be changed. It’s also just sending a bad message that if you’re disabled you can magically be healed and “complete” somehow.
Second, Faolan and his whole gyre soul thing. So it turns out Faolan is not just re-incarnated from a bear, but also from a snowy owl and another wolf, the first Fengo in fact. This is just… not something I really like. I don’t mind the concept of reincarnation, but the way it is handled just doesn’t really work for me. Faolan is already enough of a Gary Stu that lacks a real personality to begin with, and now he’s somehow reincarnated from not one but three major creatures, too? Come on.
Finally, the Sark dies. My favorites always seem to perish. The Sark was one of the characters that made me want to keep reading these books, because she and her chemistry with others such as Gwynneth were absolutely a joy to read. But now she dies, and I do not like it. We do get some backstory of her, which I guess is something, but I really wish she could’ve stayed around a bit longer.
Heep is also back as a villain, which is something I guess. I really liked him when I first read these books, but during my reread I came to the conclusion that he’s really not an engaging villain. Just evil for the sake of being evil. Killed a pup, now wants revenge for rightfully being banished. Not a whole lot to him. I thought it was kind of interesting how he lacked the means to properly communicate, but with his tail healed here even that gets taken away from his character, leaving only a boring shell of a villain. He also becomes somewhat of a leader of the wolves of the Outermost, which just makes me confused. All of his earlier presences indicated that Heep had no leadership qualities whatsoever, yet after being banished to the Outermost with no interesting philosophy or something to draw followers to himself, he somehow becomes their leader? Despite there being wolves who have survived in the Outermost for way longer. There’s also no longer any mention of the MacHeaths, who got driven into the Outermost in Watch Wolf. Wouldn’t it have been interesting to see them work together with Heep to get back into the Beyond and take down Faolan and Edme or something?
So, yeah, I’m very mixed on this one. On the one hand, I want to give it four stars for my bigger enjoyment of this book. But then there’s the gyre soul thing and the bad message about magically healing all disabilities for no reason, which really holds it back for me.
Rating: 3/5
We end this six-book long journey in Star Wolf. Now that they realize the Beyond is completely lost, a small group of survivors consisting of wolves, bear cubs and Gwynneth leaves the land behind, crossing an ice bridge to get to a new land called the Distant Blue. All the while this is happening, they have to deal with the treacherous ice and Heep and his followers, who are pursuing them.
This was another kind of mediocre book. First of all, I lost all care about Faolan. He has no real personality to set him apart as a leader other than him being a Gary Stu and a reincarnation of the first Fengo. But I really don’t see why he should lead all these animals into the Blue over any others. Edme is still enjoyable, though, and I also still like Gwynneth. I also quite liked Abban, Heep’s son, his deserter mate Caila and Banja. There’s a lot of other characters that make the journey, too, but they’re really not getting that much pagetime or things to do.
Heep is back as our villain, but he’s still really boring. I didn’t feel any legitimate reason to care about him or his plan. He wants to kill Faolan, true, but he’s such a bland character that I literally could care less if he died. Heep also dies, of course, but his death is very unceremonious. Not a very intriguing sendoff to our excuse of a main villain.
The pacing in this book felt rather slow, and there is very little change of scenery. Pretty much all of it is the ice bridge until they arrive at the Distant Blue. There were very little emotional moments, though I did like the brief exchange between Faolan and Edme when they become mates.
The ending is also not a very good sendoff. They just kind of arrive at the Blue and it ends. There’s no epilogue of looking into the future to see what kind of society these animals build. No establishing of packs or a new way to have packs function, just them arriving and there being a horse that determines that Faolan has arrived (something I don’t really get, honestly). Just a very weak ending to this book series and our characters we’re supposed to care about. We could’ve gotten a look into a new and peaceful future where we explore the land and see future generations happen, but we unfortunately are robbed of that. I also wonder how they’re going to solve the problem of these animals surviving. There are no mentions of other wolves/bears/owls in the Distant Blue, and we know that our group of approximately fifteen animals, the majority of which are wolves, is way too small to establish a society that will continue to prosper in future generations without ending up having to partake in incest. So, yeah, they may survive for now, but there’s no guarantee that they won’t end up sadly passing away one by one until there’s little to no one left of them.
Just not a very good ending to this series. I do like some aspects of it, but not enough to give it more than three stars, unfortunately.
Rating: 3/5
The last books were definitely the strongest, despite the whole unnecessary “Great Mending” part. But overall they’re still not enough for me to recommend these to anyone, even wolf lovers.
Book Five: Spirit Wolf
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On the one hand, this may very well be my favorite book out of the series. It has some aspects I really like, such as the land as we know it being destroyed and the characters being forced to find a way to survive in these harsh circumstances. But then there’s also some things I just really do not like.
First of all, healing the deformities/disabilities. Big no for me. After all the books so far proving that you’re not broken just because you’re born different, suddenly we get this weird mending thing? And it just kind of happens for no reason? There’s a prophecy that if the Ember is destroyed, all will be mended, yes. But it’s never really explained how that works, what kind of magic there is at work, and how these deformities are connected to the Ember. It may as well just not have happened at all and really not that much would be changed. It’s also just sending a bad message that if you’re disabled you can magically be healed and “complete” somehow.
Second, Faolan and his whole gyre soul thing. So it turns out Faolan is not just re-incarnated from a bear, but also from a snowy owl and another wolf, the first Fengo in fact. This is just… not something I really like. I don’t mind the concept of reincarnation, but the way it is handled just doesn’t really work for me. Faolan is already enough of a Gary Stu that lacks a real personality to begin with, and now he’s somehow reincarnated from not one but three major creatures, too? Come on.
Finally, the Sark dies. My favorites always seem to perish. The Sark was one of the characters that made me want to keep reading these books, because she and her chemistry with others such as Gwynneth were absolutely a joy to read. But now she dies, and I do not like it. We do get some backstory of her, which I guess is something, but I really wish she could’ve stayed around a bit longer.
Heep is also back as a villain, which is something I guess. I really liked him when I first read these books, but during my reread I came to the conclusion that he’s really not an engaging villain. Just evil for the sake of being evil. Killed a pup, now wants revenge for rightfully being banished. Not a whole lot to him. I thought it was kind of interesting how he lacked the means to properly communicate, but with his tail healed here even that gets taken away from his character, leaving only a boring shell of a villain. He also becomes somewhat of a leader of the wolves of the Outermost, which just makes me confused. All of his earlier presences indicated that Heep had no leadership qualities whatsoever, yet after being banished to the Outermost with no interesting philosophy or something to draw followers to himself, he somehow becomes their leader? Despite there being wolves who have survived in the Outermost for way longer. There’s also no longer any mention of the MacHeaths, who got driven into the Outermost in Watch Wolf. Wouldn’t it have been interesting to see them work together with Heep to get back into the Beyond and take down Faolan and Edme or something?
So, yeah, I’m very mixed on this one. On the one hand, I want to give it four stars for my bigger enjoyment of this book. But then there’s the gyre soul thing and the bad message about magically healing all disabilities for no reason, which really holds it back for me.
Rating: 3/5
Book Six: Star Wolf
We end this six-book long journey in Star Wolf. Now that they realize the Beyond is completely lost, a small group of survivors consisting of wolves, bear cubs and Gwynneth leaves the land behind, crossing an ice bridge to get to a new land called the Distant Blue. All the while this is happening, they have to deal with the treacherous ice and Heep and his followers, who are pursuing them.
This was another kind of mediocre book. First of all, I lost all care about Faolan. He has no real personality to set him apart as a leader other than him being a Gary Stu and a reincarnation of the first Fengo. But I really don’t see why he should lead all these animals into the Blue over any others. Edme is still enjoyable, though, and I also still like Gwynneth. I also quite liked Abban, Heep’s son, his deserter mate Caila and Banja. There’s a lot of other characters that make the journey, too, but they’re really not getting that much pagetime or things to do.
Heep is back as our villain, but he’s still really boring. I didn’t feel any legitimate reason to care about him or his plan. He wants to kill Faolan, true, but he’s such a bland character that I literally could care less if he died. Heep also dies, of course, but his death is very unceremonious. Not a very intriguing sendoff to our excuse of a main villain.
The pacing in this book felt rather slow, and there is very little change of scenery. Pretty much all of it is the ice bridge until they arrive at the Distant Blue. There were very little emotional moments, though I did like the brief exchange between Faolan and Edme when they become mates.
The ending is also not a very good sendoff. They just kind of arrive at the Blue and it ends. There’s no epilogue of looking into the future to see what kind of society these animals build. No establishing of packs or a new way to have packs function, just them arriving and there being a horse that determines that Faolan has arrived (something I don’t really get, honestly). Just a very weak ending to this book series and our characters we’re supposed to care about. We could’ve gotten a look into a new and peaceful future where we explore the land and see future generations happen, but we unfortunately are robbed of that. I also wonder how they’re going to solve the problem of these animals surviving. There are no mentions of other wolves/bears/owls in the Distant Blue, and we know that our group of approximately fifteen animals, the majority of which are wolves, is way too small to establish a society that will continue to prosper in future generations without ending up having to partake in incest. So, yeah, they may survive for now, but there’s no guarantee that they won’t end up sadly passing away one by one until there’s little to no one left of them.
Just not a very good ending to this series. I do like some aspects of it, but not enough to give it more than three stars, unfortunately.
Rating: 3/5
Final Thoughts
Overall, unfortunately the Wolves of the Beyond series is a bit hit and miss for me. It had some things going for it, such as some strong characters (definitely not the main character, though) and a really cool wolf society and fun world building, the latter two which unfortunately don’t feel fully realized due to the relatively small among time we spend before all is torn apart by the disasters in the Beyond.The last books were definitely the strongest, despite the whole unnecessary “Great Mending” part. But overall they’re still not enough for me to recommend these to anyone, even wolf lovers.
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God, I really hated these books. The glaring factual errors really ruined them for me, and the mystical stuff in the later books made me cringe. Thanks for your very in-depth reviews!
ReplyDeleteThe factual errors bother me to an extent, but I can also accept that this is a different world where wolves possibly act different. But yeah, even that aside the books just overall aren't very good. Which is a shame because I wanted to like them, fantasy wolf books generally are up my alley.
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