The Ruins of Gorlan is the first book in the Ranger’s Apprentice series by John Flanagan. It’s a young adult fantasy novel. You can read it online and for free until Febuary 15.

Plot:
Will is one of five orphans growing up under the Baron’s care. He dreams of becoming a knight, but unfortunately is too small to do the task. Instead, on the day the apprentices get chosen into their future professions, the mysterious Ranger Halt turns up and takes Will on.
After that it’s pretty much Will struggling with his fate while Evil Is Brewing.

It’s a sweet book, but nothing too original. I can see kids enjoying it, but as I could tell you what would happen about fifty pages before it actually did, I didn’t really get into it that much.
I don’t mean to say that this is a bad book, but it’s a clear case of me just not being the target audience.

[SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS]

The writing is fine. Nothing special, but nothing bad either.

The characters are a little stereotypical: the small boy, who doesn’t have much physical things going on, but has a good head; the big boy who is the opposite: not very bright, but physically very talented; the girl who is very motherly and always in a good mood [because that’s what mothers are]; etc. And let’s not forget Aragorn Halt, who doesn’t talk a lot about himself but is actually Very Important.

The main problem I had – except for the fact that I could have told you the plot of the whole thing after reading the first few pages – was that I didn’t care so much for Will. I found Horace, Will’s best friend and the big boy who gets to be a knight, and Horace’s story much more interesting. Unfortunately that was resolved pretty quickly and then he vanished until he was allowed to cheer for Will in the end.

The Kalkara [beasts that look like part bear, part ape and have an basilisk stare] were rather creepy and the description conjured up a very definite mental image.
But the ending was a little… well. If a flaming arrow kills them that easily, why has nobody ever done it before? Why didn’t anybody have that idea?

Anyway, these are all things a kid won’t care that much about, I think. So, I’d say it’s fine for kids to read, but I don’t think I’ll continue reading the series.

Btw, it’s probably gonna be made into a movie.