Review for The Ranger's Apprentice Series
After several recommendations, I picked up John Flanagan's 12-book The Ranger's Apprentice series last year. A pretty well-known series, popular amongst middle-school boys especially.
This is a really difficult series to review, for several reasons. First of all, it's almost two different series. Only the first four books are really connected; after that, the main character, Will, is suddenly in his twenties and the stories follow his independent adventures, for the most part. Secondly, Will is already 15-years-old in the first book. That threw me a bit, because you mostly see 10- to 13-year-olds reading this series, and it doesn't seem like a Young Adult sort of series at all. The protagonist of a kids' book is typically supposed to be around the age of its target audience.
Because I'm rather conflicted about this series, I'm just going to lay out the facts.
Violence
The violence was nothing terribly gruesome, just what you typical get with war and battles raging in a kids' book. There is mild beating. People are wounded and die.
Romance
Will and his childhood friend Alyss are in love, though when Will is transferred to another town as Ranger, he starts hanging out with another pretty girl who lives there. This girl disappears and is forgotten by Will once Alyss shows up again.
The princess, Evanlyn, and Alyss don't get along well for a while because Alyss is sure that the other girl has feelings for Will. This is eventually sorted out because Evanyln is actually in love with Will's friend Horace, and is merely good friends with Will.
Mature Content
In the third book, The Icebound Land, Will and Evanlyn are slaves in a distant country. Will is working in a yard with numerous other slaves who are gradually dying from malnutrition, exhaustion and the bitter cold of Skandia. Soon after his arrival in the yard, Will is introduced unknowingly to an addictive herb called warmweed, which dulls the user's senses and produces a synthetic warmth within them. This drug is used to control the slaves, as all they can think of is their next supply of the drug. Evanlyn eventually weans him off the stuff.
Also in the third book, Horace and Will's mentor Halt are traveling in pursuit of Will and Evanlyn's captors. During their travels, they pass through a town in another country where Horace notices several girls standing around in short skirts and skimpy clothing. He notices their legs and mentions that the girls "certainly look a lot better that way." The girls tease and beckon to Horace from a distance and Halt refuses to translate what they are saying. He tells Horace that they are couriers and wear less clothing to make running easier, a story Horace accepts. From Halt's point of view, however, we see that he is lying to Horace about the "seamier side of life" in order to protect the boy's "innocence." It may be concluded from this that the girls are prostitutes.
Writing Quality
Okay, it's going to get more personal here because I'm a harsh judge of writing.
The plots are quite unique and I found the first few books entertaining. However, the series is rather long and the later stories feel disjointed.
John Flanagan's writing is decent, but it's not stellar literature, and it's definitely not the kind of thing I'd want my younger siblings to consider a basis of good writing. It definitely is not the kind of writing you'd expect in literature written for older readers.
I found the characters two-dimensional, for the most part. The Ranger Halt was an exception with his dry humor and great personality, but Flanagan seems aware of this one shining character; Halt's presence and wit become almost overkill, in later books.
Overall, the age thing makes this series really hard to review. I'm not totally sure what age group John Flanagan is targeting with these books. If this series really is for middle-schoolers, why is Will so old and why does Flanagan allude to a topic most kids of that age wouldn't understand? If that scene is in there for older readers (which is, I think, still not a good reason to include it), then why is the series written as if it's for a younger audience?
On the other hand, I know lots of kids who've enjoyed this series. Our 14-year-old sister liked them a lot. We'll let the Book Ninja read them in a couple of years, but as always--it's best to give kids a good foundation in fantastic literature before exposing them to anything outside of that realm.