Monday, February 07, 2011

Brian Jacques, R. I. P.

BBC News - Redwall author Brian Jacques dies aged 71: "A former merchant sailor whose children's books sold millions worldwide has died aged 71.

Brian Jacques' Redwall series of books were translated into 29 languages and sold 20m globally.

He first wrote the series, set in an abbey populated by animals, for children at the Royal Wavertree School for the Blind in Liverpool.

The Liverpool-born writer's weekly show, Jakestown, ran on BBC Radio Merseyside for more than 20 years.

He died after a heart attack at the weekend and leaves a wife and two grown up sons."

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

I liked all of the series I read, which is the first dozen or so, and am sorry he is gone. A great storyteller.

Todd Mason said...

A not-bad, but not quite representative, animated series of REDWALL was done as well.

Lexie Bellafonte said...

When I was in Year 7/8 the Redwall world seemed so magical. I devoured almost all the books, wrote book reports about them. I would read them under the table in class. He'll be sorely missed.

Anonymous said...

My son read every single book in the Redwall series when he was younger and he turned me on to them as well. Mr. Jacques books were something we enjoyed and bonded over. My condolences to his family and friends.

Anonymous said...

Oh I'm so sad! My oldest son Joey (now 12) received the first 2 Redwall books 3 years ago as a birthday gift. My sister gave them to him saying the key to having a strong reader was to find something they would LOVE to read. Redwall did the trick for both he and his younger brother (they devoured all the books in the series and have impatiently waited for another one to be released).

BTW, Joey was the TOP reader as he left grade school...blew away the record. When asked repeatedly how I had gotten my kids to be such avid readers, I passed on my sister's advice, AND I recommended The Redwall series. Especially for boys...what's not to LOVE!!

Thank you Brian Jacques, for offering wonderful stories to capture imaginations! RIP

Deb said...

I'm sorry to hear about this. When I was working in a junior high school library, Jacques's books were extremely popular (we had an entire shelf of them), especially with boys.

Karin said...

My son read them all more than once. We listened to a tape in on a long drive one time. Brian Jacques read, and did all the different voices wonderfully well. He was also at once time an actor.