WARRIORS

This second entry in a cat adventure series has solid plotting and enhanced complexity but is marred by the same preciousness of its predecessor. Six cats are far from home, on a quest for information that may save their forest from destructive Twolegs (humans). Though the cats come from different Clans, they’ve bonded on the trip, so when they meet an unknown cat Tribe and new dangers, they work together. The strange Tribe has had a vision in which one of the Clan cats is their savior; does this give him a moral obligation to fulfill their prophecy? Meanwhile, back at home, cats desperately watch their forest bulldozed and their prey disappear. Hunter’s writing is mundane, the cats’ names blend (Leafpaw, Squirrelpaw, Brambleclaw), and the replacement of the verb “said” with “meowed” and “mewed” is repeatedly cloying. However, a small plot twist is refreshing and suspense builds steadily towards the final installment, the plot of which is nicely unpredictable. (name chart, maps) (Fantasy. 8-11)