Very, very good

loved this whole series....only a few more to go....

It was really good and adventurous!!! I can't belive Lutta died!!!! :(

The best part of this book was Lutta but she died with no resolution to the subplot? Kinda stupid tbh

Loved it as I do all the books in this series and the Wolves of the Beyond!

A compelling end to the old chronicles that gets you excited for the next books.

See the first book in the series for a full review.

I AM OBSESSED WITH THIS SERIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Final book of the three book prequel that covers the life and growth of Hoole as he becomes king. Any great book in the guardian journey. We are listening to the audiobook version and enjoying it immensely in this format.

Book 11 and the final book of the Legends Triology, To Be A King was likable not excellent for besides a few errors, the author didn't tie up all of the loose ends as effectively as in her previous books.


The things I liked about this book in particular were the creative new characters, a new romance, and Hoole's transition from being a chick to an adult, from being a follower to a leader. Part of the book centers on the forces of evil (Pleek, Ygryk, Kreeth, and Lutta, Pleek and Ygryk's "daughter"), while the other part centers on the newly formed Guardians of Ga'Hoole.

This book basically lays the foundation for the Guardians of Ga'Hoole, the sea of Hoolmere and the Island of Hoole. The final battle for the N'rythghar is waged. While King Hoole reigns over the S'rthgahr, chaos runs rampant in the N'rythghar. Lord Arrin is ammassing an army for a final invasion, while kraals, Ullryck's hagsfiend troops, and a mad upstart owl's forces fight for the spoils. King Hoole must also form an army before Short Light, or lose all hope of ever reclaiming his father's throne. Hoole gains new allies: Strix Strumajen the Spotted Owl, Sir Bors the Barn Owl, Sir Tobyfor the Northern Hawk Owl, Lord Rathnik the Snowy Owl, and many others.

New, dark forces also lurk, preparing to strike and steal the Ember of Hoole: the archfiend Kreeth, and the changeling bird Lutta. Lutta transforms into Emerilla, Strix Strumajen's lost daughter, in order to gain Hoole's trust and steal the Ember. But Lutta finds something much more than just the Ember...

There are also deaths in To Be A King, but nothing too disappointing. Basically, the entire book explains how the Guardians of Ga'Hoole came to be.

But there were some problems in the book. Some parts were poorly edited, and had many errors. At the end, it was unclear whether or how Lord Arrin, Ullryck, and Shadyk were defeated and/or killed. Sure, Hoole and the Guardians triumphed, but the whole battle was mostly vague.
Other than that, To Be A King is a great ending for the Legends trilogy and provides some insight on Book 12, The Golden Tree.

Really thankful this section of the series is over. It was interesting a all to know the history, but all of the un-needed villains and characters with weird names, "magic," and whatever really made these last 3 a drag. On to the final 4.

Published by Scholastic, "To Be a King" is a compelling adventure story told from multiple POV's. Authored by Kathryn Lasky, "To Be a King" is recommended for every fantasy reader out there. What makes this book so enjoyable is the amazingly twisted plot and the absolutely entertaining characters.

One of the first things that caught my eye was the plot development. During the entire story, new discoveries are made as Hoole becomes determined to become the king his people need. A scene that interested me was the gathering of the parliament. In a hollow near the roots of the tree, Hoole rallies his closest advisers with a plan for a new future. At first, the parliament is puzzled at the absence of the great ember from the Beyond, a land of volcanoes. The ember was said to possess powerful magic that was prophesized to be retrieved by a great owl. Hoole had been the one to retrieve the ember, and thus took his birthright title to king, but in doing so, he was then considered a mage by other owls. Disliking this mindset, Hoole begins to explain how not all of his power lied in the ember. As he explains, Hoole gradually convinces the parliament of how he is “… an owl first, a king second, but never a mage.” (Lasky 18) This event then signaled the beginning of a new era, where all magic, or magen, are nonexistent and thus affected the plot. Filled with new meaning, the new Guardians of Ga’Hoole then committed themselves not to magic but the ideals of “goodness, equality, and nobility.” This is only one of the many twist and turns in the plot of “To Be a King,” but its characters are just as interesting.

Just as the plot develops, so does Its characters. Of course, for a narrative to be interesting, the characters have to be as fluid as the plot. One of my favorite characters is Theo, a Great Horned Owl who is the first blacksmith and the one who created the first battle claws. Unfortunately, before he met Grank, Hoole’s godfather and mentor to Theo, he was a humble, scholarly pacifist, and yet his legacy would be known as the one who created one of the most dangerous weapons in the owl world. He even comments on this later in the book while talking to an imprisoned owl, “It is, my dear… a sad thing to have as a legacy the creation of a new and deadly weapon.” This is very moving because an owl who used to absolutely abhor violence is the first to create a new weapon, and the first to draw blood with them. It seems both ironic and depressing, because as he grows older, Theo loses most of his resistance to bloodshed and inadvertently becomes a warrior, despite his original desire to join the Glauxian Brothers, a group of priestly owls. Another character that matures over the plot of the story is Lutta, one of the antagonists turned protagonist. She was an experimental hagsfiend created by another hagsfiend, given the abilities to transform into any species of owl, Lutta impersonates Emerilla, a soldier who went MIA (Missing In Action). On a mission to steal the Ember of Hoole, she unexpectedly becomes infatuated with Hoole, and eventually falls in love with him. Before, she was considered a freak, an abomination, but after spending time at the Great Ga’Hoole tree, she begins to what seems like a gizzard, the organ only owls possess and where their strongest emotions are felt. Earning the trust of Hoole, she unintentionally begins to develop feelings for him, and in the final battle, she finds that she is unable to kill him and steal the ember. To make her situation worse, she is then killed by another owl on the accusation of spying for the enemy. Despite that, Lutta had made a complete U-turn on her opinion of owls and their gizzards, and creates one herself. To sum it up, almost all of the main cast of the book were transformed in one way or another, and that made Kathryn Lasky’s tale of nobility and owls all the more appealing.

To wrap up “To Be a King,” the pure essence of its characters and plot have this book listed as a favorite among many other readers.

If you liked this review, I would highly recommend that you read the series, because even though I've explained the main plot, this is nothing compared to the magnificence which is the "Guardians of Ga'hoole."