Not his best work but still a fun read. The ending felt rushed when it could really have been a third of the book.

1. Mhm. You know, I've badly wanted to read Triss for years. Now that I've finally done it I'm wondering why I was so keen on picking up this one book in particular. I think I blame it on Triss being marketed (is that the right word?) as Redwall's first female Warrior, and I read the rest of these books during a period of my life where first female anything was something to be gleefully glomped on.

2. For those not in the know, Redwall is a series about cutesy animals with swords and slings fighting off less cutesy animals with rapiers and heavy accents. There are some species of animal who are always good, some other species who are always bad (I may need to re-read Outcast of Redwall to see the one maybe-exception) and the good guys are brave and the bad guys are cowardly and mustache-twirlingly evil. Redwall doesn't shy away from death- important characters die in every book, but it's not big on nuanced portrayals of morality.

3. There's also a lot of worldbuilding that's accrued over the books- different species have their own organizations, cultures and (sigh) dialects. Possibly too many dialects, but I recognize this is a book meant for children and that the funny accents may appeal to them. I certainly was a fan of molespeech when I first read one of those books and I bleeping wonder why.

4. But all of these things are series-specific, not book-specific. Triss is a decent book on its own (Redwall books are generally really entertaining- reading one for the first time isn't an experience to be missed), but it pales in comparison to my nostalgia tinged view of some of the others. Where are the Badger-led armies? Where are the heroes hopelessly outnumbered by the ravenous hordes of vermin? Where is the seige warfare? (no the paltry assault by the pirates does not count when I say seige warfare I mean "like in Mossflower") When I approach a Redwall book I approach it muttering "please let there be seige warfare please" and this book did NOT hear my pleas.

5. The Redwall books usually have multiple sets of PoVs and that's fine. But I think this book had problems emotionally connecting the reader to any of the characters. I'm usually at least a little invested? Not so much this time- events flowed thick and fast and everyone good guy was a clone of another good guy and every bad guy was a variation of another bad guy. I don't think the multiple PoVs was the heart of the problem, but I'd say the Redwall chapters were pretty extraneous. Even if they did feature both my favourite villain (the adders) and my favourite characters (those two dumb birds) in this book.

6. Triss becomes the Warrior at nearly the 80% mark, which is terrible payoff for all the foreshadowing. I'm also not convinced by the immediate "of course you're someone I can trust" camraderie thing. Redwall has never been nuanced about some species being good and some being bad, but there's usually at least non-zero interaction or an immediate crisis smoothing things along? Idek. It may just be nostalgia glasses again.

7. Aaaand yeah. About that. As a young 'un the easily drawn racial discrimination parallels flew right over my head. I am more aware of them now, and while I certainly do not accuse Brian Jacques of racism, the potential implications make me a bit queasy.

8. Most of these compliants could be put down to taste, but I also think this book is less well thought out than the other Redwall books? How precisely did a bunch of raiders who got surprised by snakes have the time, energy or inclination (after all, it's been made very clear that these are dirty, uneducated, dumb as rocks vermin) to write down actual riddles? I mean if it was just the guy who ran away I could see him making a quest for his kids because he's an asshole. But the stuff that was found at Brockhall? Makes no sense. Also, the villains (with the exception of the adders and that one tracker) were so incredibly ineffective. This whole book was the mossflower citizens cackling as they ran rings around them.

9. Things I want to whine about, subjective edition: what even was that thing with the hedgehog paradise and the sudden and unrelenting lurrrve at first sight? Why do we see so much of the dibbun shenanigans and an actual feast in the middle of a battle- I'm all for black comedy but this was basically two separate books? Why does every single person who is not a mouse or an otter or Triss have an accent or a verbal tic? Why did we not see the battle between the snake and the dumb birbs? If the adders aren't doing mind control (which is pretty normal for Redwall books but apparently not in this one) why did those two Redwallers at the beginning of the book lie?

10. Honestly, it felt a lot like Jacques was painting by numbers when he wrote this one. It's like he made a list of all of plot points that made Redwall compelling and tried to make a quilt based on that checklist, while ignoring softer requirements like structure, continuity, cast relevance and heart. Something of a dissapointment, all told. I feel like I need to go re-read Mossflower or Mattimeo or The Legend of Luke to see if my nostalgia glasses have fogged visibility down to zero.

11. PS: I was very stressed about the hedgehog paradise getting attacked for a while there and very relieved when it didn't happen. But after finishing the book I sortof feel like that should have been a thing. You know I'm disappointed when I go "I wish that thing I badly did not want to happen had happened at least I would have had feelings about it."

12. PPS: While I'm not usually a fan of Redwall-style epistolary entries, that last two chapters were probably the best part of the book. More stuff happened in them than in the rest of the book, and frankly this story should have started with Triss getting the sword and moved on from there.

While I enjoyed the seafaring bits of this book, I had a hard time reading about Scarum. He was annoying from the get-go and doesn't change a jot through the entire thing. But I can see how kids reading the series would enjoy his silly personality maybe. I also wasn't all that interested in Sagax but he was at least just a little bland rather than outright annoying. I think this book would have been more interesting, to me, if we spent more time learning about Triss, but by this point, Jacques very much has a style when writing Redwall so I knew not to expect it.

Over all, could have been better, but it was still an enjoyable read / listen.

3.5 - A comforting read :,) the characters are simple, the good guys are good the bad guys are bad etc. I haven't picked up a Redwall book since I was a kid and I love this world! The snakes were super cool. Also I know this book is called Triss but I feel like she was barely in it, the otters did most of the work.

Well, I give this book 3 stars, but I do so hesitantly. This book was a hard read for me and I had to borrow it 3 times to finish it. The reason is simple, Scarrum hare is just frustratingly obsessed with food to the point they are more a villain and a hamper on the community, more than a dibbun could ever be! Sadly I do not recommend this book over the other great Redwall books.

"If I could give this book zero stars, I would. It was by far the worst of any of the Redwall books. There was a character who was pretty darn close to being literally intolerable and it's a wonder I didn't give up on this book solely because of him. The titular character, Triss, had exactly zero personality. Every single other character in this book, of which there were far too many, had more backstory, motivation, and characterization than her. And to top it all off, if you ever have the misfortune to read this book and you're wondering how he's going to wrap everything up in the few pages you can tell are left, I am sorry in advance for the way he ends up doing it. Had I known the book was going to be this bad, I probably would have skipped it. But because I'm trying to read all of them with my fish friends, we of course read this one too. And while my fish friends always find something to enjoy about the stories, if I were to make my own recommendation about this book, it is that it should be skipped by anyone reading the Redwall series. I actually can't believe how bad it was."

Unfortunately on the weaker end of the Redwall series. The pacing was off, the villains weren't scary, the characters felt like bad Xeroxes of prior Redwall personalities and lacked their usual charm, and I think it was a huge narrative mistake to recount the final battle as a secondhand memoir from a completely unknown voice rather than as, well, an actual battle. But, y'know...it's still Redwall. <3

3.5

The villains' pseudo-Germanic accents were a bit much, but it does a better job of balancing three sets of characters (the runaways, the Redwall inhabitants, the Salamandastron warriors) than some of Jacques' later Redwall installments.

Once again a romp into the world and woods of
Redwall , as always his books are a quick read to give you that adventure fix we all crave at times but although the story was good I thought some of the characters were over written and the one minor character I wished each would have stayed longer but loss is also a theme in all of his books. Triss is a good story and you can never go wrong with his books usually but don’t start out with this one it will possibly put you off the Redwall series

never been this devastated by the death of a redwall villain....captain plugg firetail i will never forget u

At this point on in the series is where Brian Jacques works starts to fall off in quality IMO