Continuing this childhood favourite series of mine is just bringing me so much joy.

Beautiful . . .

It feels as though books 1-6 were a prequel series, and this is the main event. It's an interesting approach, as now we know the history of the owls at the great tree, and the war that was just fought before Coryn arrived, but the drawback is that I've spent 6 books growing attached to Soren, only to be told he's not the protagonist anymore.

I wouldn't mind continuing to follow Coryn's perspective from here on out, but I'd prefer to be wrong in my assumption that that's where this is heading.

The outcast picks up directly after the prior book, which was excellent. Unfortunately this one slowly loses its pace and ends up with a rushed, anticlimactic ending that abandons much of the plot it had promised. While not terrible, it certainly was a missed opportunity.

This series is the most 12-year-old thing I have ever seen, by which I mean there are so many things that appeal to 12-year-olds, and that was BEFORE they added the wolves

Not quite as brutal as the previous volume, but still startlingly violent, this volume of the "Ga'Hoole" novel builds on the foundation established in the first 7 books. Lasky does not pull punches in depicting animal predation and conflict, and one does wonder how it all makes it past the censors! Lasky's recovering from whatever authorial funk she was in when she wrote the previous volume; this entry's prose feels less clumsy and the characterization more even. What is more, she appears to have fully committed to this being a fantasy series! In the preceding six volumes there were elements of fantasy, most notably the "scrooms" (owl ghosts) and the visions which various characters had, but everything else could be written off as potentially natural phenomena which were simply seen as fantastic to the animals. I feel this commitment has actually improved the series and the setting, as it makes the whole less frustrating. Good stuff!

It's the eight book of the Owls and they keep on hooting as the series progresses along with some good moments and others that are not so interesting.
After reading eight books in a fairly narrow space of time I'm going to take a break from this on for a while before returning later for the second half of the series.
It's a fair series, but nothing that I'm desperate to read in a hurry.

The Outcast by Kathryn Lasky. Is a book about Nyroc leaving the pure ones and trying to find a new life. I loved this along with every other one in the series. This seems like its a adult leaving his parents to start his own life. I would recommend this to someone who likes owls or birds.

The Outcast is the continuation of Nyroc's change-of-heart story. He's betrayed his mother and the Pure Ones and reinvented himself as Coryn. But he's also come to realize that there's no place for him in the owl kingdom, so he sets out for the volcano wasteland called the Beyond the Beyond. I will admit that every time "Beyond the Beyond" was mentioned, I would think of the Mysterious Beyond from Land Before Time and the "Beyond the Mysterious Beyond" song from the seventh movie. (Enjoy. Or, for diehard fans of the first movie, mourn.)

Anyway, the story leaves the owl world for the first time, bringing us in contact with our first creatures who escape blatant discrimination: the wolves. The wolves for some reason have Scottish-style clans and one of them is led by a Caligula who maims his children. (Did you think "acceptable racism", child enslavement, and cannibalism were inappropriate in a RL 4 book? Try some violent domestic abuse on for size!)

(With the wolves of the Beyond, of course, comes the spin-off series. But more on that in an upcoming review, I think.)

Unfortunately, this story also marks the major plot shift of the series. Suddenly the Guardians of Ga'Hoole take a back seat to the Ember of Hoole, and a whole new mythology shows up. Speaking from the perspective of someone halfway through To Be a King looking back on The Outcast, this shouldn't have been part of the Ga'Hoole series. Or, more accurately, The Hatchling should have started a second Ga'Hoole series instead of tacking onto the original six books. Because in all honesty, the series is fundamentally changed by The Hatchling and The Outcast. The protagonist changes from Soren to Coryn. The genre changes from adventure to fantasy. Things that were perfectly non-magical and explained mundanely in the first six books are suddenly magical and fantastic in the later books. Focus shifts from dealing with the Pure Ones to reliving myths (myths that are invented in these books rather than explained prior and feel "fake" as a result).

So what should have happened? Well, the first six books should have been the Guardians of Ga'Hoole series. Then The Hatchling and The Outcast should have been the Ember of Hoole series or maybe the Coryn of the Eclipse series, or whatever better title the publishers could have come up with. The First Collier, The Coming of Hoole, and To Be a King should have been the Legends of Ga'Hoole series (which I have heard it called by fans). As I haven't read the last four books, I can't give my opinion of how they should have rolled out, but, IMO, it shouldn't have been with all these fundamentally different stories mashed under one heading. I mean, really. If you're going to have a mid-series three-book flashback trilogy, you're writing a universe, not a series.

Next, it's on to the mid-series three-book flashback trilogy. Brace yourselves, mythology Retcons are coming.

داستان خوبه ها ولی یه سری نکات ریز نفرت انگیزی داره که نمیتونمشون.

The Outcast is the eighth book in the searies by Kathryn Lasky and continuse strate from where the last book left off.Nyroc after being costantly harast by his fathers skroom and a vision in the fire nyroc leves behind everything he once knew. His mother, the Pure ones and even his own name. And leves on a journy do discover his destony in a place where volcanose tern the sky black. Beyond the Beyond. I liked the fact that it continuse on Nyrocs story rather than on the band orthoe the story also focuses on Otulissa a bit Nyroc is still the main charactor of this story. Since the book is a bit short it seems a bit rushed in some places and some thing seem to be lef unexplaind.
My recommendation is still the same that you should only read this book if you enjoud the rest and espesaly if you like Nyroc as a character.

I really enjoyed this one, in particular the part the wolves play in the story. Kept me very engaged and wanting to know what treasures lay on the next page.