The Ribbajack: and Other Haunting Tales by Brian Jacques

The Ribbajack: and Other Haunting Tales Reviews

• 
  Mary Ellen

  Another great collection of scary short stories! Scary, yet fun, and the good guys triumph over bullies and the bad. Loved it.
• 
  CB

  Chris Bancells
  
  Jacques, B. (2004). The ribbajack & other curious yarns. New York: Puffin Books.
  
  Short Story
  
  Print
  
  Selection tools consulted: School Library Journal, WorldCat,
  
  
  Review:
  
  Best known for his Redwall series, Brian Jacques turns his prolific pen to a darker set of stories in this volume. Six stories wander over the course of a couple centuries, and what appears to be much of the Irish countryside. "The Ribbajack", clearly the best of the bunch, takes place at a British boarding school in 1937. The malevolent Archibald Smifft discovers how to produce a terrible monster spawned by his own imagination. When he sets the creature "born out of human spite" (p.18) on a perceived enemy, the consequences are dire. In "A Smile and a Wave" the contemporary teen Maggie is forced to enter her empty school to retrieve a forgotten coat. In doing so, she encounters a piece of Britain’s haunted past. This story is notable for Jacques' ability to wonderfully describe the foreboding brought on by an unnaturally empty hall. "The All Ireland Champion Versus the Nye Add" is an Irish fairy story in the most traditional sense. An average man, who has a bit of local notoriety, runs afoul of a mythical creature and does not come out better for it. In this case, great fisherman Roddy Mooney tries to hook the "Nye Add" and gets his line tangled in more ways than one. "The Mystery of Huma D'Este" follows a similar pattern, although there is a much greater sense of justice in the Greek-inspired fate of school bully Jason Hunter. "Miggy Mags and the Malabar Sailor" has nothing of the supernatural about it, but instead relates a Dickensian-style tale in which a young girl gets her heart's desire after escaping an overbearing grown-up. Finally, "Rosie's Pet" is a short, oddly sweet story of young love with a lupine twist. It's sure to give Twilight fans a smile. All in all, Jacques' collection isn't scary so much as it is entertaining and, well, curious. It makes for a good, if not totally absorbing, read, especially by the light of a dim lamp. Recommended.
  
• 
  Erica

  Book Talk: This collection of short stories may be by the author of Redwall, but if you're looking for cuddly animals you're looking in the wrong place. These stories mostly revolve around school-aged human youth and the creatures that do appear in the stories are anything but cuddly. If you want to find out what a Ribbajack is and what it can do, then pick up this book. I'd wait until day light to read it, though.
  
  Rocks my Socks: These stories are wonderfully atmospheric and perfectly capture the horror that literature has taught me to associate with English boarding schools and the countryside of Great Britain and Ireland in general. Thank goodness I was raised in America! On a more serious note, these stories have a dahl-esque sense of dark justice that I simply adore. The sense of justice, albeit dark, means that there are also some nice little morals in the stories. Also like Dahl, the stories are definitely dark, but they're actually not terribly violent. The violent bits that do exist are mostly left up to the imagination rather than described in detail, which I prefer.
  
  Rocks in my Socks: As much as I enjoyed the atmosphere of these stories the pacing was a bit slow at times. I started reading this book in the spring and only finished it in November. The stories were good and I enjoyed them when I eventually sat down to read one, but I never felt particularly compelled to keep on reading.
  
  Every Book its Reader: I'd recommend this to fans of suspense/horror or anyone with a taste for dark literature. The gender of the main characters switches depending on the story so I think it would be great for both boys and girls. As I said it's not graphically violent, but it is rather dark. I'd suggest it for 7th and up.
  
  Read more of my reviews at
  http://auldschoollibrarian.blogspot.com
• 
  Andye.Reads

  I haven't read a Jacques book since I finished the Redwall series. And, when you read a bunch of different stuff for over a year, you kinda start to forget certain things about certain authors that you really love. And that's kinda what happened to me; I had forgotten just how great of an author he was. Of course, I knew that Redwall was one of my favorite series and that Jacques is a great writer. But every author has a different style. From Tolkien to Rowling to Meyer, every single author has a different style. Some are more modern, some more golden oldie. Some prefer first-person views, some third-person. There are even some second-person books around. But I have to say that Brian Jacques's style of writing is possibly my favorite of any author. The way he words things is so...clever. He often uses words such as "jolly-good" and "bravo" in ways that I've never read before. And I absolutely love it. Jacques thinks of things to put in his writing that I have rarely, if ever, read. And The Ribbajack is one of the many examples of this.
  
  This book is, I guess you could say, a book of short stories. The Ribbajack and other Curious Yarns is a book of six short stories in which Jacques shows his writing skills on a different level then in his other books. Some of the stories are creepy, some humorous, some both. And, it was awesome. In starting this book, I had pretty high hopes, seeing as how high my expectations were. Jacques most certainly did not disappoint. I held on to every word, reading awesomely. Yeah, I'm so cool that the manner I read in is awesome. You read right.
  
  So, in conclusion, I leave you with this: Brian Jacques is a great author. If he wrote it, it will probably be good. The Ribbajack is great. Awesomely great. So, read it. Or I will consume your spirit.
  
  Austin
  
  http://ReadingTeen.net/
  
  
  
• 
  Iain

  The late Brian Jacques, Liverpool author of the "Redwall" series (begun in 1986, and ending with the posthumous release of "The Rogue Crew" in March pf 2011), should have received the world-wide acclaim that J.K. Rowling justly received for the "Harry Potter" novels two decades later. Jacques' powerful sense of narrative, his richly-developed characters, and his unerring ability to judge where to draw the line between keeping a children's story childlike, yet intelligent enough both to educate the child for adulthood, and to keep that child entertained, were a quality too rarely found in children's writers.
  
  Occasionally, though, Jacques turned his attention to other written works. In this collection of children's short-stories, Jacques exercised his inner-Stephen King, but in the form of a good campfire ghost-story. (He was still writing for kids here.) With the crisp, uncluttered style that was his trademark, Jacques tells six tales that will be likely to keep your children sleeping with the light on for at least a few nights. And wasn't that part of the fun of growing up for most of us?
• 
  Roy Hudson

  I may be jumping the gun on this one, as I have one last short story to read, but based on the first five stories alone, I can say that I enjoy the late Mr. Jacques's YA horror stories. As popular as his Redwall books are, I'm a bit ashamed to admit that this is the first of his books I've picked up, and that the only reason I bought it is that our library was selling it for $0.50 the day I went to hear Rick Yancey speak about his then-upcoming Monstrumologist sequel a couple Octobers ago. I decided to finish it this month because I have about 30 kids'/YA titles to read before this year's All Hallow's Read, including some classics I unfortunately missed out on as a kid. I only hope I enjoy the others as much as this I have this one!
  UPDATE: I just finished the last story, and I stand by my 4-star review. I really enjoyed the last story, as I did all of them!
• 
  Erika Powers

  Boring AF. Made it to page 15. YA but more like children's book. Too easy and very boring. Thats the scary part. How boring it is. Its so boring i don't even care what the hell a ribbajack is.
  
  Disappointed. Again.
  
  PS I write reviews for myself. I think theyre marked private, but if youre reading this, i messed up. Anyway, 15 pages IS enough of a chance to know its not gonna get better.
  
• 
  Jodi

  This is a good compilation of short stories and really spooky. Each story keeps you wondering what will happen next!
• 
  Brittany

  I love the Redwall series, unfortunately I did not love these short stories. They were 'okay' for the most part, though some had some questionable aspects(like a girl saying her mother was stupid, and a character with severely broken English who is described as simply 'Siamese'). But, mostly the Ribbajack was long and kinda boring, and the others barely held my attention any better. To sum up, I am glad to have this off my TBR, and I plan to unhaul.
• 
  Nathan

  Attempt at horror stories. I liked 'Miggy Mags and the Malabar Sailor'.
• 
  Grace Raven

  quick read. it was alright. expected a lot more. but ok.
• 
  Bharat Krishnan

  what garbage. language was hard to follow, and the characters weren't fleshed out at all. perhaps this is meant for toddlers?
• 
  Ruth

  I never thought I’d give this low of a rating to a book by Brian Jacques, but these stories were bland, boring, and not at all scary.
• 
  Isabella

  ive reread this about 4 times. I got this book in elementary school...i took it from the free book bin at the library
• 
  Laura Williams

  Short spooky stories. I don't like horror as a genre. These stories are very clever and not scary, just spooky ☺ Very amusing. Highly recommend.
• 
  Matschmomma

  These were all very clever. Enjoyable.
• 
  Louel

  There comes a time in a person's life when you realize that maybe an author you enjoyed as a kid wasn't particularly good at writing some genres. The stories here are very flat. The second story is literally 'Girl goes to grab her jacket from school, sees a ghost, and runs away.' That's it. Brian Jacques has the tendency a lot of writers have of making the 'bad' characters physically ugly, so you know how evil they are, which I find tiring. I'm so disappointed, because I remember looking everywhere for this book as a kid. I guess it was for the best I didn't find it back then.
• 
  Josiah

  "Fate is fickle, and the company of unwilling friends short lived."
  
  —The Ribbajack and Other Curious Yarns, P. 97
  
  Brian Jacques has a nearly exquisite feel for the terrain of various Scottish dialectic tones, and it paints all of his novels with a unique brush. Mostly known for bringing this flair to the famed Redwall series, he has now taken his unique writing style to the telling of six scary stories for young readers (actually, this is his second such collection).
  I get the feeling that these tales would definitely be best suited for an inherently eerie atmosphere, such as around a campfire or alone in a dark house. There are some creative twists involved, which should effectively keep the reader guessing.
  I would give one and a half stars to this book.
• 
  Tim

  The Ribbajack is a short story that follows the swashbuckling theme that Brian Jacques uses in almost all his books. The story has the feel of a folk tale and teaches a moral at the end of the story. I have always been a fan of Brian Jacques stories and this one did not disappoint me. It was a little different in its character development due to the brief nature of the story.
  
  The tale is of a boy who is as bad as can be. The whole school is afraid of him and he dabbles in the dark arts. When someone finally stands up to him he decides to get his revenge. He is going to learn, however, that when you seek out revenge it is usually you that pays the price.
  
• 
  Piepie | The Napping Bibliophile

  By the author of the Redwall series, these were a lot of fun to read! Though I didn't think they were as good as the Redwall books, I did enjoy reading this collection of stories that were not about Jacques' signature animal characters. If you want something to read on a quiet evening, then this book of scary stories is for you! My favorite was the Medusa tale, but I think Jacques put just as much thought into these yarns as he did in his Redwall collection. Fans of his work will notice some similarity in people's dialects here as were voiced by the Redwall characters.
• 
  Nicole Lydia

  I am a life long, die hard Redwall fan, but this was pretty bad. If I find a book in the horror section, I better be sleeping with the lights on that night. This wasn't even creepy, let alone scary. Any one of the Redwall books is creepier than this book. The only mildly promising story was "The Ribbajack". Had that story been added to and turned into a 167 pages there might have been something. The only other story I didn't completely struggle through was "Rosie's Pet", and it was cute, not scary.
• 
  Stephanie

  The Ribbajack & other Haunting Yarns is a book of short stories. I gave it a three because some of the short stories, I felt were lacking. But The short stories; Ribbajack, Miggy Mags and the Malabar Sailor, and Rosie's Pet were all very good stories. This is a great book if you have extra time on your hands and need a funny or interesting "yarn" to tide you over.
• 
  Mandi

  When young Archibald Smifft takes up an obsession of witchcraft and his superiors try to reform him, his imagination creates a horrific monster to take revenge on his archenemy, the Reverend Miller, and disappear with all those who try to stop him, but his evil mind is foiled by his own monster. Comes with five other strange tales that will intrigue even the most exceedingly droll hearts!
  -Olivia
• 
  Jen

  What a delicious romp through the imagination! Jacques never disappoints in this collection of short stories. From the titular "The Ribbajack" to the charming "Miggy Mags and the Malabar Sailor", I was enchanted and delighted. While a few of the stories are creepy ("A Smile and a Wave" comes to mind), all are lovely reads to enjoy on a cold, winter's night and they all contain laugh-out-loud bits of humor.
• 
  Nick B

  This book is a bunch of short stories put together. I really enjoyed reading this book alot.the stories where stories of monsters and ghost and stuff to sort of shake you up alttle to leave you wondering. IF you like not knowing whats comming up in a storie and haveing that great suspense then read "The Ribbajack & other curious yarns" By, Brian Jacques.
• 
  Michael

  These stories were interesting... Just interesting. I don't know if I find them amusing or what, but... I know they were "interesting".
  The stories aren't really horrific or scary, not even frightening at the least.
  Overall, the book was fun while it lasted, not exactly worth the full price to me, but.