This is the second Little Fur book. I'm not sure why I read it through, except that I was curious about the character of the fox. So- Little Fur the half elf/half troll sets off on another quest to save Nature. She meets with the wise owl and learns that the troll king is planning something terrible, and the owl wants to send spies into the troll kingdom to find out what. There's a hopelessly miserable fox who wants to die but hasn't been able to quench his instinct to live. He comes asking the owl for advice and is told to go on this quest- he can protect the spies (a pair of ferrets) and the mission is so dangerous he will probably give his life doing so, and meet his desire with purpose. Initially Little Fur is not supposed to be part of this expedition, but she feels so much compassion for the fox she volunteers to go along. There's also a rude rat and one of Little Fur's cat friends on the journey. And the crow, for part of it. Once again they cross the human city and then go into the underground maze that is the troll's domain (part of it is train tunnels). It's just as dangerous as they had been warned. It looks like they won't obtain their goal or make it out alive- but all comes right in the end. They'd been warned someone would betray them, but it didn't turn out the way anyone guessed.
Overall, I found it hard to keep my attention on the story- it's just a bit simplistic, written for younger readers, in spite of the serious tone and there's a lot of negative feeling. In this story, it's all nature = good, humans = bad. The cats are suspicious but I like their humor, the rat is snarky, the dogs they meet have been badly mistreated by people, and the fox was just as I expected- deeply scarred and tormented from having been experimented on in a lab. (They also met a monkey near the end. This seemed a more likely animal for such a situation than a fox. Hm). You really think the fox is going to die, but at the very end (literally, nearly the last sentence) he lives. So he must feature in the next book of the series, and I would read that one just for the fox (I liked his character) but I think I won't.
Borrowed from the public library.
Rating: 2/5 245 pages, 2006
I haven't heard of this series or the author. Although book two didn't work for you, I think I'll give book one a try.
ReplyDeleteI've recently updated my domain to just pussreboots.com.
I'd like to know what you think of it!
ReplyDelete(Thanks for the note on your update.)