Anyways, might I request a Faolan (Wolves of the Beyond) moodboard? I would desire it to be based around spirals, stars (more specifically, Ursa Major), water, bones, and wolves of course :) I would a appreciate a blue coloration, but I lack good words to descibe it, so perhaps try to base the color palette off the images? I can try to expand if need be but I want a general night time vibe.

I hope dis isnt too much, especially since first coming back ^_^”

here you go, I hope you enjoy! oooh yay, this is a cool first request!

then i had a child took his while like northern summer and he knows it all like he's been here before

*cues the tv show intro case scene music*

There was a moment, when me and my friend have read the books of Kathryn Lasky. He has read Ga'Hoole series, I have read Wolves of the Beyond series and Bears of Ice series, so later we told to each other the plot, it was interesting game and discussion with funny commentaries. Maybe I'll add something later in this post.

So, what I liked about these books — animals are sentient and have own myths, beliefs, laws, traditions and own language, and the book easily informs you, what word what means and stuff. Landscapes and some nature events are beautiful. Since animals are sentient, no wonder their society doesn't match all traits their IRL counterparts had.

In Wolves of the Beyond I liked Faolan, the main character, he was pretty smart and talented, but thanks he wasn't a Mary Sue, the books gave explanation and the context to his certain abilities and knowledges, how his adoptive bear-mom taught him to various tricks, which later helped him to survive, and how he helps and changes the world and others around him. The first three books were the best, they had detective and survival elements, they had creepy moments (rabid wolf, which hypnotizes through name, for example)

and some sort of stakes, because wolves wouldn't win battle against bear armies, which won't listen and care only about their young prince,

as well as wolf society are incredibly fanatical, hypocritical and ignorant (worse version of penguins from Happy Feet), they hate Faolan for his free, rebellious, brave and strong spirit, for challenging them and their idiotic rules, so they literally viewed Faolan as a demon or a witch literally (just like Sark, because she lived alone in swamps and was in friends with owls and could create cool things), as well his jealous and sadistic rival Heep committed murder for sentencing Faolan to death, but thanks Sark and Faolan's owl friend saved his life and revealed the true murderer aka Heep.

Yet I hated that Faolan didn't kill him but just allowed to run away to the land of cannibalistic barbarian wolves (same for McHits in 3rd book). I mean, I always hate such stuff with "We kill all army or servants, which mostly were forced to do order, but keep the main villain alive, because we have moral highground" crap.

Plus, I had issues with some fight scenes. If I made adaptation, I'd make adaptations and fight scenes closer to Felidae 1994 and Watership Down 1978. The 4th book had good and intriguing moments, yet I coudn't understand, how the she-wolf Sark (the best and most based girl and my favourite character in Wovles of the Beyond books) with her great nose didn't smell the scent of the thief since the beginning (when they found his secret place), and how this wolf thief was able to wear a helmet of a barn owl — either the owl was really big or the wolf was so small or he damaged the helmet.

But overall I liked this detective part, the despair from severe cold and hunger, how the son of a died leader masked himself like some sort of messiah and "helped" them to die in exhausing dance of hunger. The 5th book was mostly one long and boring prologue to the final book, yet the line with total mass death, and how our survivors go to new unknown and dangerous lands, struggling the nature forces, is interesting.

The element with how Faolan and other young wolves get cured from some congenital deformities is a little bit rushed, they should struggle and learn to live with healed bodies quite longer (claims like "The writer shouldn't add this magical healing, because disabled kids will be sad and cry! It's disrespectufl to disabled children! Booo!" are stupid for many reasons — first of all, not all characters were healed, Edme still stayed one-eyed, and the books heavily implied that exactly now, i.e. during destruction of volcanos or decision of owl king to keep the jewel in his own, born and living malkads are healed, i.e. pups which will be born much later still can be malkads, second, in the lore it was some sort of pact regarding exactly cubs with specifically inborn deformities, not acquired injuries, yet we'll discuss it a bit later, third, surprise, but through time and progress some deformities, diseases or injuries, which were forever in the past, now can be cured, fourth, Faolan and others struggled a bit after this, but due to certain events they should adapt as fast as possible, and IRL people after getting cure or prosthetics have hard time of long adaptation and rehabilitation, and fifth, normal people are happy, when someone gets a chance of getting cured, only idiots think like "I am forever with this injury, so everyone has to stay the same, or else it hurts my feelings!" — seriously, then let's forbid to write fantasy about resurrection, because "it will hurt feelings of those, whose family members or pets or friends died, and IRL they can't bring back to life someone with magic". Do you get it now?! Do you finally understand, how stupid this is?!).

The 6th book had own great moments like the ancient ice bridge to new northern lands (now inviting and warm with food), powerful deadly winds, travelling on water animals, the line with how Faolan and his beloved Edme return memories about their past lifes from ancient times, yet I'd want something more mind-blowing with Faolan's true nature rather than just some wind spirit with many lifes and rebirths, and what plays big role actually, not just mirrors some ancient event and cycle.

But the sixth book had many flaws, which quite ruined for me the experience — unneeded new characters (the wolf mother and her pup she unwillingly had with the antagonist from 2nd book), because their abilities could be given to the characters from previous books,

the survived antagonist Heep from 2nd book and his anticlimatic, lame and unsatisfying death (yes, exactly the crap "Some new character from nowhere kills the villain instead of main characters") — seriously, Heep should die from fangs of those he caused so much pain in the past (Faolan, Edme, Whistler) or Heep should be killed by young Rags, the orphaned wolf from clan of abandoned barbarian wolves, so he would prove to Faolan and friends that barbarian wolves can change and be noble and stuff.

So, after this I don't understand, why the writer returned Heep in the first place instead of killing him in the finale of 2nd book, so he'd be eaten by cannibalistic barbarian wolves, while in 6th book she could return survived wolves from McHit clan from 3rd book, since they were banished to the lands of barbarian wolves, but 5th and 6th books don't mention them, what implies they were either eaten by cannibals or died in cold and hunger in 4th book or died in cataclysm in 5th book, i.e. the writer could make certain barbarian wolves this threat and antagonists in 6th book, and nothing would change at all. Now about certain moments that bothered me a bit: For the context. Malkads aka pups with some congenital deformities, i.e. even if they are born slightly deformed (different eye colors, for example) or because they were born too early or too late than they should generally, their parents are shamed and separated and banished from pack, their normal pups go into adopted families, the deformed pups get thrown away to their death, but if they survive, they should return into their pack, so they are in lowest caste in a pack, so their life is a literal hell with hunger and constant bullying, both physical (hits, bites) and mental, they can't even hunt, they eat remains and scraps and they always should thank their tormentors for humilation and various "poses of obedience with bowing, groveling and fawning" they always should make near wolves of higher rank, and they believe they torture and bully malkads for some greater good according to their beliefs they kinda clean themselves from curse and shame through torturing malkad FACEPALM).

You can't imagine, how I sweared during reading this in 2nd book, I wanted to shoot all these arrogant aristocrats in wolf skin. Among all packs only McNamara pack is normal. And the funniest thing — regular wolves are jealous toward survived malkads, because such malkads have a chance to become a volcano guardians of the jewel of current owl king. 1. How malkads survive in the first place? Like, Faolan was lucky to be rescued and adopted by a female bear, so she becomes the mom for him until her death. But what's about Sark, Whistler, Heep? Who raised them? Other animals? Then why they have no knowledge in surviving and various tricks? Like, they are literally newborn pups, when a pack abandons them to die in cold, water, claws of owls or other predators etc. They are blind and can drink only milk, they are weak and can't normally move.

HOW?!

2. Why exactly females are blamed for absense of pups? Like, her mate can be infertile, not she. 3. Why to separate and banish either infertile couple or a couple, which birthed even only one malkad? It would fair and logical, if it was constant, when a couple is healthy and has no problems with hunger and thirst. 4. Why to kill malkads, which just have different eye color or absent tail or slightly turned out leg or simply were born too early or too late? They are sentient animals, so body language isn't that important thing in their world, there's tons of other ways of communication. One thing deformities, which literally mark such puppy as weak, sick and dead soon without any doubts, another thing such innocent elements. Heep is fully healthy, he just doesn't have a tail, later he himself (for getting rid of Faolan he saw as threat to his chance of becoming a volcano guardian and hence not experiencing bullying of pack members anymore) devoured another malkad, which just was born too early and had no deformities. If it's not a genocide, I don't know what it is. 5. Why to bully and to banish an infertile she-wolf, if she still can be a great hunter and warrior in a pack or a nanny and a teacher for puppies? And why to bully a pregnant she-wolf and mark her unborn yet puppies as malkads, if she just gives birth a bit later or earlier? 6. If malkads survived, why to forbid them to show their knowledge and abilities, which can be useful for a pack in hunt? Faolan literally was punished for hunt despite he already in young age was twice bigger than adult wolf and also Faolan was able alone to fight and kill a cougar and barbarian wolves and Faolan alone successfully hunts and kills a deer, so WTF?!

Such fighter and hunter would be the great gift for any pack! But no, he is not allowed to hunt and eat normal food, he is not allowed to howl, he is not allowed to defend himself verbally and physically, he is not allowed to have a name, he has to suffer from hunger, cold, rejection, bullying and abuse, he has to walk hunched over, with his tail tucked between his legs and with his belly crouched to the ground and his muzzle in the mud, and not dare to look at a high-ranking wolf, which harms him. 7. Why Faolan and other outcasts and malkads couldn't just create own pack (or join McNamara, which accept banished wolves)? Why couldn't he live alone like a bear (or like Sark) or with a potential mate (Edme)? Why to return to those disgusting scumbags, which abandoned him to die and now torment him? Why to tolerate their stupid rules?

I always hated this cliche, when a main character gets constantly bullied, abused and rejected by everyone literally for nothing, but for whatever reason he/she still has to save them and care about them, when some crap happens with them (Balto, Rudolph the reindeer etc). They don't deserve you, you owe nothing to them, you don't have to "prove and show your value", so let them die or struggle and suffer with their problems. Help only to those who respects, loves and values you like a living being, like a person. 8. What if Faolan refused to join the pack? Would they kill him for justified refuse to be a scapegoat without any rights? 9. What if a pup had no physical deformities, but tons of mental ones (psychopathy, sadism, deviations and disorders; males in McHeet clan can be partially the result of such inborn mental pathologies with upbridging), which became visible much later? Is this pup still a malkad or not? 10. What's about pups, teens or adult wolves, which lost their eye, paw, ear or tail or got some crazy wound, which left ugly scar with absent part of flesh and visible bone, during fight, for example? Will they become considered malkads or not? 11. Survived malkads gnaw and hence carve drawings, stories and events into bones of other killed animals. Why can't they be chroniclers and keepers of the chronicles and history of this family and pack? After all, this is an important role in the pack, they should be respected for this, not humiliated and offended. And they should be respected also for helping dead souls to ascend on stars into their version of heavens to other spirits and deities. These clans literally have singers, who sing legends and past old stories. 12. About any punishments and penalties for thwarted hunts. In a normal and adequate pack, instead of these moronic reprimands, humiliations and walking around with a painted bone, they would simply say, for example, you failed to catch a deer, so you have to feed the pack with food commensurate with this deer — that is, either catch the same one, or several smaller animals, more or less equal in weight to the lost prey, you will feed a pack, and then you can find food for yourself and eat. At the same time, the offender's abilities would be revealed, shall we say, suddenly the hunter is both a fighter and a good strategist, and even able not to lose concentration alone or in the case of a scattered pack. The laws in this pack need huge reformation. 13. Why McHeets had no malkads, so they literally mutilated own newborn pups (healthy pups, Edme was one of these mutilated ones) for marking them as fake "malkads" with chance of getting own power over volcano guards?

I ask this, because it gives weird implication that malkads in general exist because of this magical oath between the ancient revered first wolf leader-guardian Fengo and the ancient and first owl king Grank, i.e. all suffering of malkads is their fault and, ironically, the fault of Faolan's past incarnation-life aka Fengo. Especially with this detail that McHeets never had malkads, because they aren't noble in contrast to other clans... Yeah... actually the best clan is McNamara, whose creators are mostly she-wolves from McHeet clan, and this clan accepts banished wolves. Not to mention that other clans aren't noble exactly because of how they treat malkads, how hypocritical, fanatical, ignorant, stupid they are. Like, they have laws to not kill their worst ones (especially high-ranked), but are totally okay with killing cannibalistic barbarians wolves (because they don't know their stupid traditions and don't live through these stupid traditions), which are mostly just orphaned pups, abandoned and lonely, and which live in severe area, where almost no food, so they do what they do only out of survival, but at least these barbarians don't have these stupid traditions, rituals and bullying and humilation of malkads and low-rank wolves, so ironically in most aspects the barbarians are much better than all these "noble clans". And, yes, I'm on Sark's side, she was right — fuck all these monstrous rules, traditions and beliefs and castes. She was the best girl, she created dishes, paint, medicinal decoctions and infusions, various traps, cool. And I liked that with the destruction of Beyond Lands with all mass deaths of all these packs, all owl and eagle kingdoms, all these old traditions and beliefs died, so Faolan with Edme and friends (and several other survived owls, eagles and wolves) went to new lands, making the better world, where no malkad will suffer, where all his friends will live happily etc. So, what's about Bears of Ice series?

Overall I enjoyed the first two books, they were great and intriguing, with these dark themes of propaganda and fanaticism and had creepy moments (the floating and bleeding ghostly parts of the kidnapped and sacrificed bear cubs, mutilated in the ice tower clock), relatable characters (young polar bear siblings Stellan and Jutte, which try to rescue their mom and find their dad, who is the leader of rebellion against fanatics),

again cool areas and landscapes with dangers, where wild animals are friends or enemies. I liked that spiders and snow leopard were positive characters.

But the 3rd and apparently final book was a huge disappointment for me, it even pissed me off. Not only because it is basically a story without finale, where the entire battle with the Grand Patak (The Great Inqisitor aka the main antagonist, which is left without any backstory and normally explained motivation and goal except "I am true god, I'll destroy all who is against me and my word and will!") is off-screen, but because the way how the writer depicted wolves. And it seems Kathryn Lasky didn't write 4th book, because she realized she created large contradiction. And she literally devalued and erased the entire Wolves of The Beyond series and Faolan's and Edme's journey and arcs, their effort and path, but also created the plot holes. Before how I started to read 3rd book about Stellan and Jutte, I genuinely thought that their adventures happen between the owl saga (Ga'Hoole) and the wolf saga (Wolves of the Beyond), i.e. the ancient giant glacier, which destroyed their land and killed inhabitants of this land and forced Faolan and his friends to go to the new land (Distant Blue) in 5th book — it is what the Grand Patak did, i.e. he caused a flood and destruction by turning on the ice clock etc, that's why the coldest areas became warmer, while warm areas colder and stuff. It all made sense. But no, Bears of Ice series happen after the saga about Faolan, 10-20 years after Wolves of Beyond series. And 3rd book about Stellan and Jutte created tons of problems. The entire 3rd book gives impression that it is one big forced fanservice. I.e. instead of, for example, making plan and preparing for epic battle against The Grand Patak and his followers the protagonists simply travel in one area to another area and encounter familliar characters from previous series. And villains lack the threat and are just idiots in this book.

About the huge problems and contradictions. The 6th book about Faolan blatantly stated that nobody (except our main characters, their friends and also eagle couple) survived, they forever went away from their devastated, destroyed and dead motherland to the new area, and the ice bridge melted as well (the last part of the journey they travelled on narvals), hence no other wolves and other animals survived and no other potentially survived wolves could reach on their territory, this Blue Distant land. The books about Faolan and Edme were about changes and abandoning these cruel and barbarian traditions, they even themselves (and one of the pups) said that nobody will abuse and kill malkads anymore, no stupid and cruel traditions anymore, only new happy life with respect, support and equality in the new world, the blue land (or how it was named in eng version). The 6th book even mentioned that not only all wolf clans and packs died, but also Ambala (eagle kingdom) and Ga'Hool (owl kingdom) as well were destroyed and all inhabitants died.

AM SO SORRY ABOUT THE NO PICTURE PART DIDN'T REALISE I DISABLED THAT FEATURE

Anyways, here they are!

Thought that Faolan could have those arms, yknow, those stretchy arms (AM SORRY I DUNNO HOW TO EXPLAIN)

Hope you like them! Sorry if it took so long