“Lord Brocktree” by Brian Jacques

This story is the earliest one in the series, if you look at it chronologically. It starts with Russano, the badger baby from “The Long Patrol”, telling the story of Lord Brocktree to the hares and his family at Salamandastron. (Sidenote: this is the first that I’ve seen of the Badger Lord living with his family at Salamandastron, wonder if that pops up again in other stories…)

Lord Brocktree’s story takes place before Redwall was built, so in most ways, Salamandastron replaces it. There’s some connections to “Mossflower” again as Lord Brocktree is Boar the Fighter’s father and the wildcat attacking Salamandastron is the brother of the wildcat who will later become a tyrant in Mossflower wood.

It’s a bit different than the rest of the stories, since it deals primarily with badgers and hares instead of mice and rats. I actually enjoyed the change, it made it pretty interesting.

Dotti is a young haremaid who is another wonderful example of the strong female characters in this series. She is sassy and funny, and insists on calling herself a “fatal beauty” while being rubbish at cooking and cleaning and all those other things that young haremaids are supposed to do. I found her hilarious, I think she’s my new idol.

One aspect that could have been made clearer is that Lord Brocktree really changed the way that Salamandastron worked as a whole. He started the Long Patrol of hares going out into the countryside and reporting to him. But this is kind of glossed over and not made completely clear, other than Russano stating at the beginning what an effect he had on Salamandastron. It doesn’t affect the story, but it’s something to note.

Overall though, this was a great book, one of the better ones in the series I think. It changes up the tropes a little, but continues to give a good tale full of adventure.