“The Legend of Luke” by Brian Jacques

I really enjoyed this one! There’s two different stories being told here, one is the story of Martin the Warrior travelling north to find his birthplace, and the other is the story of his father, Luke the Warrior, defeating a sea rat. There’s loads of references to “Mossflower” which is an earlier book in the series as well.

Probably what I enjoyed best about this book is that it centers around these characters that we already know. It features Martin, Gonff the mousethief, and Dinny the mole going off on another quest together, which is very cute really. And there are other familiar faces present, like Columbine, Bella the badger, Abbess Germaine, and Ferdy and Coggs.

It also gives more history to the characters, like the fact that Luke the Warrior was born in St. Ninian’s (and there’s more to the story of St. Ninian’s as well haha) but then driven out by a wildcat (who is later defeated by Martin in “Mossflower” conveniently enough). And then Redwall Abbey is built and Gonff and Columbine settle down in St. Ninian’s.

Then towards the end it mentions the tapestry, and reveals that the figure of the warrior mouse is really Martin’s grandfather, also named Martin. I wonder if we ever learn about his adventures?

Another connection is through the otter family. It turns out that Skipper has two nephews with their own tribe, and Skipper’s brother is Mask, an otter who is featured in “Mossflower” as well. Not a major point, but still pretty cool.

While we’re on the subject of the otters, the arc for Folgrim was pretty nice. He’s an otter who went mad from fighting, but with the help of Martin and co, they manage to fix him up again. It’s another aspect of these stories that indicates how much better peace is than war.

So the story centering around Martin is good, but I didn’t love the character of Trimp. It seemed like she was just there to take care of a little squirrel baby that they found and didn’t really have anything to contribute to the rest of the adventure. I didn’t mind her though, just wondered from time to time why she was there.

Oh and this is one of the few quests where they explain how the adventurers get back to Redwall, which is often skipped in other books. I laughed a little when I realized that Jacques decided to put that in.

The story of Luke is also very good, it aligns with what we know about Martin’s past from “Martin the Warrior” and “Mossflower”. And it involves a ferocious female squirrel warrior, which is always great.

This is a great adventure tale that brings back familiar characters that we know and love. A wonderful read all around.