Book(s) Ranger's Apprentice by John Flanagan

 So this has been optioned (for at least a second time actually - Book 6 or 7 has an author's note at the end that the series was optioned...and that book came out in about 2008) to be adapted into a movie, and I remember reading them in high school in about 2010. 

But rereading them, I realized I don't remember any of it. Honestly, not a whit. It's not even "oh I remember bits and pieces", I think the one thing I remembered is that, well, there was a ranger and he had an apprentice. 

I wonder how many of these I ended up reading eventually. Maybe up to Battle for Skandia? Well, now I read the first 10 (because there's both a sister series AND a sequel series AND mini stories and the continuity is a bit of a mess).

 

I appreciate, with such deep characters with strong characterization, how Flangan switches up the group dynamics. Sometimes you'll have ornery Halt with straightforward Horace, or deft and adept Alyss, and often times in different countries that are clear analogues to real world locals, of which the only two I can directly remember are Skandia being Scandinavia and Nihon-Ja being Japan.

I do think some of the characterization can veer a little into stereotypes, with a handful of mentions of characters darkening their faces to fit into a landscape (and yet are still called out with 'yeah we know you're not one of us' lmao). 'The Emperor of Nihon-Ja' also does a bit of a....thing with how the names are pronounced of the English-Analogue main characters that rubs me the wrong way. 

I probably would have said "The consonants will sound different here," say "they said [name] but it sounded more like [how they say it]." once, instead of constantly spelling out the accent.

There's also a few recurring jokes about minor female character's appearance, things like "it's been quite a few years since she was fair", lazy jokes about weight, things like that. It lessens in later books, so it's still jarring to come across one. 

There is a lot of good detail and research put into the fighting, stealth, bow work, and ships. That is extremely admirable. There are also characters put into real danger, to the point where even though you know there are more books, you can't help but be concerned and wonder if they'll make it out.

Sometimes pieces of descriptions get dragged out a little, maybe once or twice a book. 

One very good thing is how a storyline will often last for 2 books. Will and Evanlyn get captured in book 2, they're not freed and returned to their homeland until book 4, and it's said to last almost a year. The Macindaw arc is also 2 books. You'll see stories build off of each other, but not so much them be loosely connected in the same world. The only other time I've seen something like this in a middle grade series is The Mistmantle Chronicles. 

 There are two, arguably three, prominent female characters - Why are they all various shades of blonde? Is it a nitpick? Well, why is it? It's almost like some male actor dating identical women except they get younger. They're smart and enterprising, although it sucks that the big mention of tension between the two young women is basically tangled in a lopsided love triangle of "I think this thing but turns out no it's not."

The sequel series (starting with book 12) just makes it worse; Evanlyn, after events transpire, if you read the book you know, is now another frazzled and harried mom to a teenager who has forgotten, well, everything about the world and is a carbon copy of her now invalid father,although she still keeps a microcosm of her wit and - and I hate this word - sass.

It's even worse for Alyss. If nothing else, these books have shown just how far we have come as a society when it's about writing female characters.

I have less problem that they're not all fighters, not for any sake of 'historical accuracy', bc historically, you're not crossing a minor ocean to get to Japan if you come from Analogue England or Analogue Spain. I just don't feel that strongly about it.

Overall I truly enjoy the hell out of the books despite my criticisms. The characters will face down situations and instances that force them to challenge and change, and as they grow, it does kind of lessen.