William Horwood

A sequel to The Wind In The Willows would clearly be a most welcome thing.

This isn't it. It falls badly flat.

It has none of the subtlety, the beauty or the humour of the original. The characters are the originals, with a couple of new ones. Who appear, then are discarded. Mole's Nephew hardly speaks. Portly, a minor player who returns, can barely do so for being so cold. Even Badger has been reduced to black and white without any colour, even grey. Why is there no glorious Pickwickian chapter of Badger's promised High Tea? The only character given any space at all is Toad, who is just the same old caricature. That's not enough to be a sequel to a book of Willows' stature. Even the metaphysics is sadly lacking; we revisit the Piper at the Gates of Dawn's island and Mole waxes philosophical, but there's just nothing to it. Everything here is as thin and washed-out as a Winter afternoon. It was very difficult to even finish this.… (more)

I had very fond memories of loving this book (this series!) when I was probably a young teenager. I thought Milly would like it so we decided to read it together. It is fair to say I did not enjoy it as much this time around! Its really over-long, the religious allegory is pretty heavy handed, and why are the mole mating scenes so sensual and detailed??
Now, it is also a wide ranging animal saga with lots going on, and its still a pretty good adventure and Milly immediately wanted to move onto reading book 2. I just don't think I'm the target audience any more.… (more)