Tiger
The Five Ancestors series, Book 1
Jeff Stone
Random House
Fiction, MG Action/Fantasy
Themes: Bonded Companions, Cross-Genre, Diversity, Felines
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Description
In 17th-century China, five young students at the hidden Cangzhen Temple have exceeded all expectations and mastered the sacred arts of kung fu,
inspired by the animals for which they were named. Though all orphans, they were raised as brothers, and think of each other so... or they used to.
Once there were seven, but, after a mission for the new Emperor, one died and another, blaming their Grandmaster and the temple, left. Now, the sixth
brother, Ying the eagle, has returned... with imperial troops at his side and vengeance on his mind, determined that the monks destroyed his life and
his birthright. With Cangzhen torn down and their master gone, the remaining five brothers - Fu the tiger, Malao the monkey, Seh the snake, Hok the
crane, and Long the dragon - find themselves scattered and unhomed, charged with uncovering the secrets of their hidden pasts and appeasing Ying's
terrible rage before all of China suffers.
Fu, twelve-year-old master of tiger kung fu, couldn't believe their Grandmaster wanted the five boys to hide like cowards when enemies came to
Cangzhen's gates. After all, he is a warrior, and ought not a warrior defend his own brothers and home? Now, he refuses to let the old monk's death,
and the deaths of so many others, be in vain: he is determined to recover the sacred scrolls Ying stole before burning the temple, and repay the blood
spilled on that ground. But for all his training, Fu is still a boy, alone for the first time in his life and untried in the ways of the real world.
It will take more than his tiger-like rage to fulfill his late master's final commands, and unlock the riddles of the past that might save the
future.
Review
I paid fifty cents for this book at an outdoor sale, and I'll say that I got my money's worth out of it. Character consistency and depth, as well as
plot integrity and interest, take a back seat to kung fu action and lessons learned via Life's two-by-four applied forcefully to Fu's thick skull. It
takes a certain stretching of one's suspension of disbelief to assume that any boy not past puberty has truly mastered something as physically and mentally
demanding as martial arts. When the dialog tends toward modern slang and butt jokes, and when Fu almost never displays the sort of focus and self-discipline
such a mastery surely entails, that stretch feels more like a break. At one point, when he is (for once) acting like a true master of martial arts, Fu
teaches a young boy the basics of a special kung fu kick which, he claims, takes at least ten years to master when focused on alone... which he, barely
fifteen, has of course mastered, in addition to numerous other difficult moves which, one can only assume, take at least as long to study, plus learning at
least one second language (Cantonese, in addition to the local Mandarin) and other lessons we readers can only guess at. Just when did he find the ten years
it took to master this particular kick, when he was also studying everything else about tiger kung fu... especially when the kick comes from horse kung fu,
which (I would guess) must require at least as much time and discipline to master as his own style? Did he start training as a zygote, or did the monks at
Cangzhen learn how to distort time to pack in all the lessons? If Fu weren't such an impatient, impulsive character 90% of the time, perhaps I would've been
less incredulous, but evidently Fu only learns the value of patience during his adventures in this book. Some authors, I'm sure, could find a way to keep me
from questioning such a fundamental aspect of their stories, but Stone isn't one of them. Then there are more subtle issues, such as how the dreaded Ying the
Eagle, who thinks he is truly heir to dragon kung fu and has gone so far as to tattoo his face with scales and split his tongue in draconian fashion, can
speak without lisping. It also starts getting a bit old, how many other theoretically incidental characters one meets who also happen to have animal names...
all of whom show a certain talent for martial arts, and undoubtedly will feature in future books. But, then, I'm not a huge fan of kung fu in movies or
fiction, and I need more than detailed descriptions of physics-defying "secret" martial arts maneuvers to keep me entertained. The target audience, preteen
boys who love kung fu movies but share Fu's lack of long-term focus (or at least his lack of life experience to realize the difference between thinking you're
a master and actually being one), will probably devour this book and its sequels eagerly.
And, no, while there is no magic in this book (yet), for some reason - with the "blood bonds" to ancestral animals and the improbable kung fu moves and such -
it read like Asian fantasy, so that's how I'm categorizing it. If nothing else, claiming Fu is a master of anything but selfish stupidity qualifies this book
as Fantasy of the highest order.