Well!
That time has come again. Yes, THAT
time. The time where I look at the clock as soon as I start typing a review out
and say, “Holy crap, it’s 12:14 AM?”
Ah, the good times.
I apologize; my reviews stopped for
. . . well, a long time. I don’t feel like counting the months. And while I
feel the juices stirring for (1) a horror-type story that I aim to scare my
non-scare-able brother, and (2) that other one I’ve been working on for, say, a
month and only have eleven pages, I aim to hitch up my skirts, run full speed,
and jump back on this crazy train! So in those good spirits, I begin my first
interview after having stripped Suzanne Collins’ overrated post-apocalypse to its barest essentials and revealed what it’s REALLY all
about.
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| Am I the only one who noticed that this bear looks really baked? Must have been those funny mushrooms in the woods. |
My first review after having been
gone for so long? Erin Hunter’s Seekers:
Return to the Wild: River of Lost Bears. Because of course that title’s not
long enough when adding, “You know, the woman who wrote that kick-ass first Warriors series and then fizzled out? Yeah,
her. THAT Erin Hunter.” (Oh, and to reacquaint you with my disappointment, here
are the links to the first in this new Seekers
series: Island of Shadows, and The Melting Sea.)
River
of Lost Bears starts off with promise. Number One: We’re not on that
accursed ice anymore, where the bears have been since the end of The Last
Wilderness, which happens to be book four of the first Seekers series (making that five books we have to deal with
seal-fishing and Lusa and Toklo complaining about the ice and Kallik constantly
cajoling them to be quiet; oh, yeah, every reader’s dream). Keep this fact in
mind, now. It’s vital.
Number Two for a Promising Start:
Toklo runs into a bullied black bear named Chenoa and saves her and she starts
journeying with them, making it a point to build a black bear-to-black bear friendship
with Lusa. This point is also vital.
The story starts out with the usual
bear-banter and in way of relationship, Kallik has progressed to that of a
stronger female figure and actually banters with Toklo more than usual, which I
really liked. Yakone, however, was extremely
annoying. Since the bears are back in the forest, Toklo and Lusa feel at home
(which was really nice to see), and Kallik even felt comfortable, having traveled
on land herself until she even met Toklo and Lusa. Yakone voices his
displeasure often and loudly and makes it a hard point to drive home the fact
that he left his beloved Star Island to be with Kallik—which hurts her, by the
way, considering she nearly stayed with him there—and always “apologizes” in
the most contrived way until he does it again! What the hey-ho, Yakone?! Don’t threaten to leave, if you’re so hell-bent
on hating the forest and all it holds, just leave! Stop moping and DO
SOMETHING ABOUT IT. AUGH!
Anyway.
Another thing I noticed about the
characterization is that, yeah, Toklo’s starting to move on with his grief
about Tobi, Oka, and Ujurak, but
everyone else is flat. Flat. F-L-A-T.
Really, worse than a pancake. Pretty much, like this:
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| See those mountains in the distance? Waaaaaaaay out there? That's Toklo. |
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| Does it honestly look like four bears could free THIS??? |
And I couldn’t believe how
incredibly annoying Lusa turned out in this one! For a whole chapter she’s
dancing the jig on those cut logs, freaking out about the bear spirits that are
“trapped” within them. (Yeah, okay, we get it; apparently black bears inhabit
trees when they die, stop being so annoying about it, because OBVIOUSLY you can’t
do anything to get them out of the logjam. That’s why it’s called a JAM.)
Oh, and do I mention that fact that
*spoiler alert* they kill off the only promising prospect of the book? Yeah,
CHENOA DIES. The only companion that could have reasonably settled down and
made a friendship with Lusa, ends up dying. And not a reason is given as to why.
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| And if you say "to give the book its name because of the logjam of 'lost bears,' " I will reach through the screen and slap you. |
The adventure is pretty good, in
terms of action, but the facts and believability go the way of the Costa Concordia really quickly, starting
with the wolverine “pack-attack” and ending with Yakone’s jump onto a moving
train while possessed of a serious injury. That’s pretty much, oh, the whole
book. Let’s devise these fact-blunders, then, shall we? (Oh, yes, we shall.)
BLUNDER ONE: Wolverines attacking in
packs.
It
is a proven and well-known fact that wolverines do not, in fact, attack
anything in packs. They don’t even stay together after mating! They only linger a few days with the opposite sex, do their business, and
leave. And only recently has it been
discovered that wolverines “hang” with siblings or hunt together OCCASIONALLY. For
a wolverine, this is pretty nil, considering that scientists have JUST
discovered this fact about them. They do
not live in packs, therefore rendering a pack-attack on a group of bears in
wolverine territory, void. They have solitary lives and would not even think
about attacking a pack of bears together.
BLUNDER TWO: A black bear attacking
a grizzly.
Why would a black bear—weighing in at only 300 lbs.—once defeated by a grizzly the size of Toklo—a staggering 800 lbs.—even
think of attacking the grizzly
again??? It’s inconceivable! Not even for “vengeance” would this
be carried out in the wild. Besides, black bears are known to frequently run from possible threats and climb a
tree to get away from them. Hakan’s actions here are inexcusably stupid. (Read
this link, Erin Hunter, and be ashamed.)
BLUNDER THREE: Coyotes attacking four
adolescent bears.
Are coyotes vicious? Oh, yes. Are
they conniving? A thousand yeses. Deadly? Certainly. To bears? Let me think,
um, NO. First, when one of these aforementioned bears happens to be a grizzly—who
happens to weigh a whopping 800 lbs. compared to that of the coyote’s measly 15
to 25—I think this fight is a big no-no. Not to mention the fact that bears prey on coyotes. Not the other way around. And, by all means a law
of nature, when prey is presented with a predator, prey flees. Simple as that.
BLUNDER FOUR: Yakone, seriously
injured and barely able to move, jumps onto a train.
After having a bear trap snap two of
his toes off and the injury nearly putrefy by the end of the book, Yakone
manages, somehow, to pull Toklo and a cling-on coyote off a precipice and onto
a speeding train.
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| Yeah, no, that don't fly. |
BLUNDER FIVE: Bears do not sheathe their claws.
This was even noted in the Seekers Wiki. Bears never sheathe their claws, let alone unsheathe them.
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| Case in point. |
Tsk, tsk to you, author that is still
currently a favorite of mine despite recent blunders. I honestly don’t
understand what happened to your quality of writing since that first AMAZING Warriors arc with Rusty and Graypaw and
all the twists and turns we never saw coming. Now you’ve resorted to this,
Erin? Have you really? PLEASE, I implore you, return to your skill. Return to
what made you the writer we fell in love with way back when. I, sadly, am
addicted to your works because I have a problem with dropping collections I’m
in the middle of (curse you, OCD), but I see clearly now what’s wrong. Please. Stop
this crazy snakebeast.
River
of Lost Bears gets two torn pages out of ten.
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