The Owly Trilogy: A Collection of Adventure Stories for Children
by Orla Kelly
The book has a lovely cover artwork of forest animals that are reminiscent of the Jungle Book animals.
The main character in the book is a wise young bird, Owly, a fairly wise owl, who likes to help other animals. He also believes in team work and roping in all the animals of the forest to help someone in need and teaches them to care for each other and protect each other - admirable qualities for young readers.
The animals live in a magical forest which has a very wise, kind and helpful Magic Tree and the Spirit of the Forest, who makes all things bright and beautiful. But the Spirt and the tree did not reveal themselves to the animals until the animals went in search for them.
Basically the plot of the trilogy, as summarised at the beginning of Book II, is that all the animals had lived in a dark forest for quite some time without anything bright or beautiful, so the Spirit of the Forest was absent from their lives. All the animals stayed in their specific groups without mixing or talking to other animals.
But one day when Lizzy lizard was in danger of being eaten by Victor Vulture, Owly managed to get all the animals together and asked for their help. This was the start of team work in the forest. It was a magical day when they all learned to make friends with each other and when they all started working together and went on amazing adventures, such as going to Victor Vulture's secret place with show more a beautiful cave and lake.
Then in order to attract the Spirit of the Forest into their lives they all went in search of bright things and made a huge collection of bright things, The Spirit of the forest then showed herself to the animals in colourful patterns, like rainbows, and helped them in their tasks. Her magnificent rainbows enabled the animals to slide down the rainbows as a short cut to where they wanted to go.
The reader does not really get to know any of the other animals though as Owly is the main character and the story is really all about him. There are some animals that show their characters, like Victor, who was fierce, vicious and nasty in the beginning, before he became a nicer bird when the animals were kind to him.
Then the badgers also showed the nails and teeth and aggressive nature, while Cloud, the butterfly, showed she was not satisfied with the way she was made and wanted to be rainbow coloured. Happily for her the Spirit of the forest granted her wish.
The book shows promise as a children's story but there is a lot of waffle such as the chapter on Owly's adventure with Cloud. There is too much unnecessary detail prevalent in several chapters and young children could get bored in places. The best chapter is the first - the magical day, which is most enjoyable.
- Review by Bev Mortimer show less
by Orla Kelly
The book has a lovely cover artwork of forest animals that are reminiscent of the Jungle Book animals.
The main character in the book is a wise young bird, Owly, a fairly wise owl, who likes to help other animals. He also believes in team work and roping in all the animals of the forest to help someone in need and teaches them to care for each other and protect each other - admirable qualities for young readers.
The animals live in a magical forest which has a very wise, kind and helpful Magic Tree and the Spirit of the Forest, who makes all things bright and beautiful. But the Spirt and the tree did not reveal themselves to the animals until the animals went in search for them.
Basically the plot of the trilogy, as summarised at the beginning of Book II, is that all the animals had lived in a dark forest for quite some time without anything bright or beautiful, so the Spirit of the Forest was absent from their lives. All the animals stayed in their specific groups without mixing or talking to other animals.
But one day when Lizzy lizard was in danger of being eaten by Victor Vulture, Owly managed to get all the animals together and asked for their help. This was the start of team work in the forest. It was a magical day when they all learned to make friends with each other and when they all started working together and went on amazing adventures, such as going to Victor Vulture's secret place with show more a beautiful cave and lake.
Then in order to attract the Spirit of the Forest into their lives they all went in search of bright things and made a huge collection of bright things, The Spirit of the forest then showed herself to the animals in colourful patterns, like rainbows, and helped them in their tasks. Her magnificent rainbows enabled the animals to slide down the rainbows as a short cut to where they wanted to go.
The reader does not really get to know any of the other animals though as Owly is the main character and the story is really all about him. There are some animals that show their characters, like Victor, who was fierce, vicious and nasty in the beginning, before he became a nicer bird when the animals were kind to him.
Then the badgers also showed the nails and teeth and aggressive nature, while Cloud, the butterfly, showed she was not satisfied with the way she was made and wanted to be rainbow coloured. Happily for her the Spirit of the forest granted her wish.
The book shows promise as a children's story but there is a lot of waffle such as the chapter on Owly's adventure with Cloud. There is too much unnecessary detail prevalent in several chapters and young children could get bored in places. The best chapter is the first - the magical day, which is most enjoyable.
- Review by Bev Mortimer show less
This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.