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racheln23's review against another edition
5.0
This is a great collection of short tales from the Ranger's Apprentice series. It was delightful to spend time with the characters on these quick adventures. Each short story was intriguing and satisfying and perfect for before bedtime reading. The only thing I did not like about the book was the introduction. The chronicles would have been good for me without any introduction.
sidneyellwood's review against another edition
5.0
[review from 2012]
I finished the Lost Stories. The last book in the Ranger’s Apprentice series. And wow, that must have been about the most painful experience of my life. Everyone has all grown up and gotten married and Will is actually aging correctly (I was worried he wasn’t for the past few books, but as it turns out by the time-skip he’s likely in his mid-twenties and after the time-skip he’s THIRTY; in fact, Will is probably the oldest protagonist I’ve seen because he’s really only a teen for the first four books). Anyways. The stories.
All of them were great. I cried because Horace and Cassandra got married. Halt. We got to see Halt as a young man, barely older than Will. (He must be in his sixties by the time the series is over. Dx) The worst part (both mentally and yeah, that was actually bad) was Tug. Tug got retired (when Will was 30 years old omfg my baby has grown up) … and they gave him a new Tug. No, really. They named Tug Bellapthron or something like that and named the new horse Tug and the old Tug was forgotten. That pissed me off. New Tug got to go to his wedding (WHICH WAS AMAZING) as best horse.
All in all, an amazing send-off to an amazing series, and I’m really sad it’s ending. I might pick up Brotherband; but to be honest I would rather have more Will, Horace and Halt than Hal.
I finished the Lost Stories. The last book in the Ranger’s Apprentice series. And wow, that must have been about the most painful experience of my life. Everyone has all grown up and gotten married and Will is actually aging correctly (I was worried he wasn’t for the past few books, but as it turns out by the time-skip he’s likely in his mid-twenties and after the time-skip he’s THIRTY; in fact, Will is probably the oldest protagonist I’ve seen because he’s really only a teen for the first four books). Anyways. The stories.
All of them were great. I cried because Horace and Cassandra got married. Halt. We got to see Halt as a young man, barely older than Will. (He must be in his sixties by the time the series is over. Dx) The worst part (both mentally and yeah, that was actually bad) was Tug. Tug got retired (when Will was 30 years old omfg my baby has grown up) … and they gave him a new Tug. No, really. They named Tug Bellapthron or something like that and named the new horse Tug and the old Tug was forgotten. That pissed me off. New Tug got to go to his wedding (WHICH WAS AMAZING) as best horse.
All in all, an amazing send-off to an amazing series, and I’m really sad it’s ending. I might pick up Brotherband; but to be honest I would rather have more Will, Horace and Halt than Hal.
kaiforest's review against another edition
2.0
As usual, this Ranger's Apprentice book was filled with decent writing and fun adventures that, while a bit trope-y, are definitely good material for kids. This book, however, had some major issues I can't overlook.
First of all, the Roamers, who are clearly based on the Romani, are portrayed as universally sexist, abusive, thieving, and cruel to animals. Usually Flanagan portrays other cultures as different, but with positives and negatives and, above all, people, just like the main culture featured in the books (England). The Romani have no such representation. There isn't a single good or sympathetic act performed by a Roamer, and the one sympathetic character associated with them was a Gallican captive. Besides producing flat writing (admittedly something of a problem with most of the villains), it encourages readers to believe racist stereotypes circulated about the Romani, who are actively marginalized in the real world.
Secondly, while I understand the distress caused by Tug's inevitable retirement, the solution is not to create a Tug-clone and pretend they're the same person. It's disrespectful to both Tugs, by taking away their uniqueness of character that real horses would actually have. It's like if someone pretended Harry Potter was James Potter - it's okay to acknowledge similarity and to start out with a bond from the shared heritage, but it's not okay to transfer the identity of the elder to the younger.
Thirdly, the dog died. Specifically, the wolf. Flanagan took the time to make the wolf a sympathetic character, outlining his struggle for survival, and then killed him. No one wants to see a sympathetic dog die. This isn't a real complaint, unlike the first two, but I'm personally offended in a not-very-sincere way.
First of all, the Roamers, who are clearly based on the Romani, are portrayed as universally sexist, abusive, thieving, and cruel to animals. Usually Flanagan portrays other cultures as different, but with positives and negatives and, above all, people, just like the main culture featured in the books (England). The Romani have no such representation. There isn't a single good or sympathetic act performed by a Roamer, and the one sympathetic character associated with them was a Gallican captive. Besides producing flat writing (admittedly something of a problem with most of the villains), it encourages readers to believe racist stereotypes circulated about the Romani, who are actively marginalized in the real world.
Secondly, while I understand the distress caused by Tug's inevitable retirement, the solution is not to create a Tug-clone and pretend they're the same person. It's disrespectful to both Tugs, by taking away their uniqueness of character that real horses would actually have. It's like if someone pretended Harry Potter was James Potter - it's okay to acknowledge similarity and to start out with a bond from the shared heritage, but it's not okay to transfer the identity of the elder to the younger.
Thirdly, the dog died. Specifically, the wolf. Flanagan took the time to make the wolf a sympathetic character, outlining his struggle for survival, and then killed him. No one wants to see a sympathetic dog die. This isn't a real complaint, unlike the first two, but I'm personally offended in a not-very-sincere way.
daffz's review against another edition
2.0
Since these are a bunch of short stories, I'll rate them individually. I'm not a huge fan of this format and I didn't really enjoy the book in general. What I did like was the glimpse into the future, I almost wish that had been explored more instead of the stories.
1. Death of a Hero. 2/5 stars.
We have basically heard this story already, the only thing that was suddenly changed was how Will's mother died, and honestly, I think it was a bad change. Not everyone has to die in a herioc sacrifice to save Halt's life. All in all, pretty boring.
2. The Inkwell and the Dagger. 2/5 stars.
Predictable. The twist where Gilan saves the day by being smarter than the bad guy was no surprise. Neither was the cowardly traitor, yet again, being a fat man. (This happens in this book in particular a lot, what does the author have against fat people? It's so lazy to think: "Well I gotta write a pathetic villain who is greedy and/or cowardly. Let's make him fat and then mention it 700 times.")
3. The Roamers 0/5 stars.
Wow. This was a terrible story. The only small thing that was positive was that Alyss had a role in it but that wasn't enough to save it from getting a big fat zero. I've had issues with the way Flanagan wrote different countries / groups of people before, but never as much as this. He wrote a race that was obviously based on the Romani people. Then, he took every single terrible stereotype that has been used to oppress these people in the past in real life and applied them to his fictional race. They are thieves, they treat animals badly, they treat women badly. Every single trait he assigned to these people was a negative one. It felt incredibly racist to me, not to mention that it was just plain lazy writing. The only person that was treated with any sympathy from the writer's point of view wasn't even really one of them. Will had a line at the end about how he should just lock every single one of them up in jail (even though most of them were obviously innocent of any crimes) but disinfecting the cell afterward would be too much trouble. And this is the good guy?! I hated this story so much, if it had been the plot of an entire book I would have stopped. I almost did already.
(Also, the way Halt said that they saw women was bad implied that the writer thinks they are treated pretty much as equals in Araluen. This is laughable. Of the four female characters that have had any plot significance, only two have been shown doing anything important. It has been implied in the beginning of the series that diplomatics being largely a women's job is a pretty recent thing. Where are the female rangers? Female warriors? Secretaries?)
4. Purple Prose 2.5/5 stars.
Not very memorable. The most annoying bit was how much Will talked to his horse, there's only so much suspension of disbelief I can muster for the horse talk. Entire, pages long conversations is too much for me.
5. Dinner for Five 3/5 stars.
I mostly liked this story because Jenny had a role in it, even if I dislike that she's seeminly randomly paired with Gilan. Still, wish it had been more interesting or maybe just that we could see more different sides of Jenny for once, it barely explored her character.
6.The Bridal Dance 2.5/5 stars.
It was alright. The wedding was cute but I really dislike the trope where the main character suspects something & is obviously right but everyone else dismisses it until its too late.
7. The Hibernian 3/5 stars.
Again, it was alright. It was nice to have some more insight in the rangers and how much has changed since the time when Halt became one.
8. The Wolf 1/5 stars.
This was really pointless. I literally can't understand why you'd write an entire story where a horse gets hurt and has to be replaced, only to replace it with basically an exact copy with the same name. I don't care if it's more realistic that the horse gets replaced after a certain amount of years. It's even less realistic that they can have entire, complicated, conversations with humans. If the author had really wanted to explore the idea of Will getting a new horse, he should've made it an actual new horse. Not a creepy copy.
9. And About Time Too . . . 3/5 stars
Sweet but largely uneventful.
End result: 2/5
1. Death of a Hero. 2/5 stars.
We have basically heard this story already, the only thing that was suddenly changed was how Will's mother died, and honestly, I think it was a bad change. Not everyone has to die in a herioc sacrifice to save Halt's life. All in all, pretty boring.
2. The Inkwell and the Dagger. 2/5 stars.
Predictable. The twist where Gilan saves the day by being smarter than the bad guy was no surprise. Neither was the cowardly traitor, yet again, being a fat man. (This happens in this book in particular a lot, what does the author have against fat people? It's so lazy to think: "Well I gotta write a pathetic villain who is greedy and/or cowardly. Let's make him fat and then mention it 700 times.")
3. The Roamers 0/5 stars.
Wow. This was a terrible story. The only small thing that was positive was that Alyss had a role in it but that wasn't enough to save it from getting a big fat zero. I've had issues with the way Flanagan wrote different countries / groups of people before, but never as much as this. He wrote a race that was obviously based on the Romani people. Then, he took every single terrible stereotype that has been used to oppress these people in the past in real life and applied them to his fictional race. They are thieves, they treat animals badly, they treat women badly. Every single trait he assigned to these people was a negative one. It felt incredibly racist to me, not to mention that it was just plain lazy writing. The only person that was treated with any sympathy from the writer's point of view wasn't even really one of them. Will had a line at the end about how he should just lock every single one of them up in jail (even though most of them were obviously innocent of any crimes) but disinfecting the cell afterward would be too much trouble. And this is the good guy?! I hated this story so much, if it had been the plot of an entire book I would have stopped. I almost did already.
(Also, the way Halt said that they saw women was bad implied that the writer thinks they are treated pretty much as equals in Araluen. This is laughable. Of the four female characters that have had any plot significance, only two have been shown doing anything important. It has been implied in the beginning of the series that diplomatics being largely a women's job is a pretty recent thing. Where are the female rangers? Female warriors? Secretaries?)
4. Purple Prose 2.5/5 stars.
Not very memorable. The most annoying bit was how much Will talked to his horse, there's only so much suspension of disbelief I can muster for the horse talk. Entire, pages long conversations is too much for me.
5. Dinner for Five 3/5 stars.
I mostly liked this story because Jenny had a role in it, even if I dislike that she's seeminly randomly paired with Gilan. Still, wish it had been more interesting or maybe just that we could see more different sides of Jenny for once, it barely explored her character.
6.The Bridal Dance 2.5/5 stars.
It was alright. The wedding was cute but I really dislike the trope where the main character suspects something & is obviously right but everyone else dismisses it until its too late.
7. The Hibernian 3/5 stars.
Again, it was alright. It was nice to have some more insight in the rangers and how much has changed since the time when Halt became one.
8. The Wolf 1/5 stars.
This was really pointless. I literally can't understand why you'd write an entire story where a horse gets hurt and has to be replaced, only to replace it with basically an exact copy with the same name. I don't care if it's more realistic that the horse gets replaced after a certain amount of years. It's even less realistic that they can have entire, complicated, conversations with humans. If the author had really wanted to explore the idea of Will getting a new horse, he should've made it an actual new horse. Not a creepy copy.
9. And About Time Too . . . 3/5 stars
Sweet but largely uneventful.
End result: 2/5
lumberjill314's review against another edition
3.0
3.5 stars. Did answer some loose ends, some well and others less so.
quitejessi's review against another edition
5.0
Makes me laugh and cry every single time I read it. If you're a Ranger's Apprentice fan, this book is a must read!
eleanorryd's review
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.0
This... I don't know where to start. It was formatted like a short story collection but the stories are too connected to function on their own while some of them are so out of place that they cannot function in immediate relation to the others. The order of the stories resulted in terrible pacing, to be honest, and most of it felt like filler content. The framing narrative of the archaeologists truly added nothing and was just kind of tedious, thank goodness those parts weren't too long.
I don't know if this is a spoiler but I'll mark it as one anywayThere was fighting and violence in pretty much all of the different stories. I'm not saying "violence is bad" or whatever but like. John. Buddy. Bestie. There are other ways of telling stories and demonstrating how cool and badass your characters are, they really don't have to kick someone's butt to prove themselves in eeeeevery frkn part. Getting scrappy is not a necessary part of every plot.
These next parts are definitely spoilers so:There was one story in particular that I thought was going to build on relationships between certain characters but no. Oh no. That was silly, of course it is about a woman (who is pretty, because of couse all of them are, god forbid a woman is not incredibly attractive) being a damsel in distress and needing to be rescued. Another story was so blatantly pure Romani/Traveller racism it made me really uncomfortable. What was the point of that. That filled absolutely no purpose other than to spread racism against these minorities and let the main characters "teach them a lesson". Disgusting.
I do have soooome nice things to sayThe explanation about how horses get retired was genuinely a question I have had about the books and it was really nice to get that explained. I did get a little bit emotional about that. That was nice. but that's it, that is pretty much the only nice thing I have to say. So many of these characters feel so two-dimensional and then got even flatter in this book - that is not a short story collection but also not a novel. This kind of format would have been so so so great to work on side characters and giving them meaningful backstories and relationships with each other - not just the main characters - but uh that did not happen. And that was disappointing. That one nice part previously mentioned and the fact that I started reading these books when I was 8 or 10 or something are the only things keeping me from giving this less than a 1. If you're not already emotionally attached to this series: don't bother with this book.
I don't know if this is a spoiler but I'll mark it as one anyway
These next parts are definitely spoilers so:
I do have soooome nice things to say
Content Warnings
Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Racism, and Violence
Minor: Death, Violence, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail