Rowan of Rin
Encyclopedia
The Rowan of Rin series is a series of five children's fantasy
novels by Australia
n author Emily Rodda
. The series follow the adventures of a shy village boy, Rowan. The books have each been shortlisted for the Children's Book Council of Australia's Book of the Year and the original Rowan of Rin won that title.
The village of Rin was founded 300 years before Rowan of Rin begins, when the Zebak brought the Rin-folk as slaves from their land, to fight against the resilient coalition formed by the Maris-folk and the Travellers. The Keeper of the Crystal of Maris convinced the Rin warrior-slaves to turn against their Zebak masters; the Zebak were ultimately defeated, and the Rin-folk travelled west to find a place to establish a home. In Rowan and the Zebak, it is revealed that the original town of Rin was located inside the walls of the Zebak city, and that the stronger Rin slaves were taken by the Zebak, trained, and forced to fight during the invasion. In Rowan and the Zebak, Rowan aids the last remaining slaves of the first Rin, Norris and Shaaran, flee their Zebak oppressors and arrive safely in the new Rin with a "working girl" grach names Unos.
Rowan is a weak and timid boy, with a strong heart and mind but a frail, sickly body and a love for the gentle Bukshah. He is an oddity in Rin, the people of which value physical strength, chest hair and courage, and is looked down upon by all those that feel ashamed that he does not live up to his late father's reputation. He is designated the role of the Keeper of the Bukshah, a domesticated form of cattle. In Rowan of Rin, he proves himself to be the greatest hero of all the villagers; when his six brave, strong companions fall to the hazards of the forbidden Mountain, Rowan perseveres, faces the great Dragon, and escapes. In doing so, he saves the town by relieving the Dragon of its crippling wound; the Dragon then resumes melting the ice around its cave, causing the stream to flow down to the village.
In Rowan and the Travellers, he again proves his worth when the village falls to the silent, deadly power of the Mountain berries, a new fruit brought down from the Mountain by one of Rowan's original companions, Allun the baker.The berries are in fact the infantile forms of a vicious, carnivorous tree that grows beneath it; in their arrogance, the villagers weed out the natural slip-daisies to make room for the Mountain berries. The Mountain berry juice lulls them into a deep sleep, all except for Rowan, who - due to his hayfever - drinks a potion made of slip-daisy roots. Rowan's sickness, previously causing others to pity and dislike him, led to his being able to destroy the Mountain berries and prevent Rin from suffering the same fate as the Valley of Gold, a beautiful settlement overrun by the Mountain-berries and destroyed by their adult forms.
In Rowan and the Keeper of the Crystal, he and his mother travel to Maris, where the great Crystal has dimmed and a new Keeper must be Chosen. Rowan's mother, Jiller, has inherited the role of Chooser from her ancestor, Leith, who came to Maris as a Zebak slave. Rowan and Jiller become acquainted with a Maris man called Perlain. Jiller is poisoned, however, and Rowan must Choose from three candidates instead; he delays, however, applying his wits and the candidates' abilities to finding a cure for the poison and saving Jiller. After the other candidates have left, it is revealed that Rowan's choice, Doss, is a Zebak spy. After briefly bonding with the crystal himself, however, Rowan realises that the power of the crystal is stronger than any other allegiance, and gives it to the Maris man. Doss becomes the new Keeper and repels the oncoming Zebak invasion.
In Rowan and the Zebak, Rowan's sister Annad is kidnapped by a Zebak flying creature called a grach. Rowan, accompanied by Allun the baker, Perlain of Pandellis, the Traveller Zeel and the spirit of the Wise Woman Sheba, ventures across the sea to the land of the Zebak. In the Zebak city, Rowan frees his sister and discovers the last descendants of the original Rin-folk, Norris and Shaaran. Their grandfather, Thiery, sacrifices himself to allow them to escape, back to the new Rin. The Zebak pursue them with a fleet of grach, but the invaders are repelled by the Dragon of the Mountain, whose dominion they had encroached upon. Rowan narrowly saves the townspeople from being incinerated by the Dragon's fire, proving his wits more valuable than the stubborn strength of the village leader, Lann.
In Rowan of the Bukshah, the village is plagued by a particularly long, harsh winter. The villagers, led by Sheba, flee to the coast, leaving behind Lann, Bronden, Norris, Shaaran, and Rowan, who insists on remaining to care for the restless bukshah. One night, ice creepers - enormous, snake-like monsters that radiate coldness - come down from the Mountain, feasting on Neel the potter, who had been hiding in the bukshah shed. Rowan, Norris, Shaaran, and Zeel follow the bukshah up the Mountain, to where the ice creepers have their nest, and aid the bukshah in breaking seals on the ice creepers' caverns, causing the heat from the Mountain to destroy most of them and end the Cold Time.
In each of the novels, Rodda reveals a little more about the history of Rin and its people. By the end of the series, the whole truth is learned:
Long before the time of men, the bukshah travelled up the Mountain every winter to feast on a grey fungus produced by the ice creepers. The bukshah were sustained for the winter, and the heat from the river of molten gold at Mountain Heart radiated into the ice creepers' cavern, maintaining a balance that controlled the population of the ice creepers and subdued the elemental rage in Mountain Heart. The valley behind the Mountain was eventually settled, and named the Valley of Gold. The people of this Valley learned the secrets of Mountain Heart, and deliberately prevented the bukshah from travelling up there; the fungus, uneaten, caused the river to flow with greater pressure, giving the people of the Valley more gold and riches. However, this also made the ice creepers more populous, causing the first Cold Time. The people eventually alllowed the Bukshah to climb the mountain again, and the balance was restored - but they never told their Traveller friends the Mountain's secret. Many years later, the people of the Valley of Gold discovered the mountain berries, but that winter, before the berries completed their life-cycle, the Zebak took a foothold in Maris and messengers were sent to the Valley asking for reinforcements. The people of the Valley left for the coast, but the keeper of the bukshah remained with the keeper of the silks, and soon one warrior returned - the people of the Valley had been captured by the Zebak before they'd even reached the coast. When the Bukshah left the Valley for Mountain Heart, the three companions followed them, hiding in the cave after the beasts had left. As the snow receded, the Mountain berries in the Valley spread, and overnight the abandoned Valley was overrun by the devil trees, transformed into the abhorred Pit of Unrin. The Mountain wall, undermined by the roots of the trees, collapsed, and Mountain Heart was blocked, sealing the companions inside. The people of the Valley of Gold,enslaved by the Zebak, founded the first village of Rin behind the walls of the Zebak city. Above their abandoned home, the companions lay dying and the Bukshah were kept from Mountain Heart, leaving the creepers to breed and multiply.
Hundreds of years later, the Zebak took the strongest of the Rin slaves as warriors to fight against the Travellers and the Maris-folk. The cunning works of the Keeper of the Crystal of Maris led to the Rin slaves turning against their Zebak masters, defeating the invaders. The Rin people then headed west and settled at the foot of the Mountain. Minds wiped by the Zebak, they remained unaware that half of their kinsmen were still enslaved across the sea, keeping their sad history recorded on silk paintings, as the people of the Valley of Gold had done also.
300 years later, the Zebak devise a plan to invade Rin via the air, using flying creatures called grach, then taking the Travellers and Maris-folk by surprise through a land attack. Rowan of Rin travels to the Zebak city to find his sister, and returns with Norris and Shaaran as well, the last two survivors of the original Rin slaves. Shaaran brings the silks with her to the new Rin, causing the leader of the Travellers, Ogden, to suspect that the people of Rin and the people of the Valley of Gold are one and the same.
A second Cold Time begins; the collapse of the western face of the Mountain prevented the bukshah from accessing the Mountain heart, allowing the ice creepers to spread their deadly winter across the Rin valley. The villagers flee, but Rowan - with Norris, Shaaran, and Zeel - follows the bukshah up the Mountain, clearing the remnants of the rockslide and allowing the bukshah to feast on the grey fungus and destroy the encroaching ice creepers. There Rowan finds the remains of the Valley of Gold's keeper of the bukshah, and also their silks. He sees that history narrowly avoided repeating itself, and that Rin almost suffered the same fate as the Valley. With the silks intact, their people's full and vivid history can be told.
The 7 hearts:
- Rowan of the Bukshah
- Marlie
- Strong Jonn
- Allun
- Val
- Ellis
- Bronden
Other characters:
- Jiller (Rowan's mother)
- Annad (Rowan's sister)
Fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
novels by Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n author Emily Rodda
Jennifer Rowe
Jennifer June Rowe is an Australian author. Her crime fiction for adults is published under her own name, while her children's fiction is published under the pseudonyms Emily Rodda and Mary-Anne Dickinson...
. The series follow the adventures of a shy village boy, Rowan. The books have each been shortlisted for the Children's Book Council of Australia's Book of the Year and the original Rowan of Rin won that title.
Premise
The Rowan stories take place in a fictional world, one that - by Rodda's own description and illustration - is small and its possibilities limited, a deliberate move to make the setting easier to interpret for younger readers. The stories always begin in the small village of Rin, isolated and buried in a lush valley a fair distance inland, at the foot of the forbidden Mountain. West of the Mountain is an unnavigable wasteland, and east of Rin lies a river that runs into the sea. On the coast is the larger, more populous city of Maris, home to the fish-like Maris people, and it is stated in Rowan and the Zebak that Maris is the only point on the coast where ships can land safely, as north and south of Maris the coast is lined by hazardous rocks and steep cliffs. Across the sea, to the east, lies the land of the Zebak; the Zebak territory is a desert, its city encased in steel walls and protected from land threats by the desolate, hazard-ridden Wastelands. On the western continent, a group of people known as the Travellers move in a nomadic fashion between Maris and Rin, trading and entertaining as they go.The village of Rin was founded 300 years before Rowan of Rin begins, when the Zebak brought the Rin-folk as slaves from their land, to fight against the resilient coalition formed by the Maris-folk and the Travellers. The Keeper of the Crystal of Maris convinced the Rin warrior-slaves to turn against their Zebak masters; the Zebak were ultimately defeated, and the Rin-folk travelled west to find a place to establish a home. In Rowan and the Zebak, it is revealed that the original town of Rin was located inside the walls of the Zebak city, and that the stronger Rin slaves were taken by the Zebak, trained, and forced to fight during the invasion. In Rowan and the Zebak, Rowan aids the last remaining slaves of the first Rin, Norris and Shaaran, flee their Zebak oppressors and arrive safely in the new Rin with a "working girl" grach names Unos.
Rowan is a weak and timid boy, with a strong heart and mind but a frail, sickly body and a love for the gentle Bukshah. He is an oddity in Rin, the people of which value physical strength, chest hair and courage, and is looked down upon by all those that feel ashamed that he does not live up to his late father's reputation. He is designated the role of the Keeper of the Bukshah, a domesticated form of cattle. In Rowan of Rin, he proves himself to be the greatest hero of all the villagers; when his six brave, strong companions fall to the hazards of the forbidden Mountain, Rowan perseveres, faces the great Dragon, and escapes. In doing so, he saves the town by relieving the Dragon of its crippling wound; the Dragon then resumes melting the ice around its cave, causing the stream to flow down to the village.
In Rowan and the Travellers, he again proves his worth when the village falls to the silent, deadly power of the Mountain berries, a new fruit brought down from the Mountain by one of Rowan's original companions, Allun the baker.The berries are in fact the infantile forms of a vicious, carnivorous tree that grows beneath it; in their arrogance, the villagers weed out the natural slip-daisies to make room for the Mountain berries. The Mountain berry juice lulls them into a deep sleep, all except for Rowan, who - due to his hayfever - drinks a potion made of slip-daisy roots. Rowan's sickness, previously causing others to pity and dislike him, led to his being able to destroy the Mountain berries and prevent Rin from suffering the same fate as the Valley of Gold, a beautiful settlement overrun by the Mountain-berries and destroyed by their adult forms.
In Rowan and the Keeper of the Crystal, he and his mother travel to Maris, where the great Crystal has dimmed and a new Keeper must be Chosen. Rowan's mother, Jiller, has inherited the role of Chooser from her ancestor, Leith, who came to Maris as a Zebak slave. Rowan and Jiller become acquainted with a Maris man called Perlain. Jiller is poisoned, however, and Rowan must Choose from three candidates instead; he delays, however, applying his wits and the candidates' abilities to finding a cure for the poison and saving Jiller. After the other candidates have left, it is revealed that Rowan's choice, Doss, is a Zebak spy. After briefly bonding with the crystal himself, however, Rowan realises that the power of the crystal is stronger than any other allegiance, and gives it to the Maris man. Doss becomes the new Keeper and repels the oncoming Zebak invasion.
In Rowan and the Zebak, Rowan's sister Annad is kidnapped by a Zebak flying creature called a grach. Rowan, accompanied by Allun the baker, Perlain of Pandellis, the Traveller Zeel and the spirit of the Wise Woman Sheba, ventures across the sea to the land of the Zebak. In the Zebak city, Rowan frees his sister and discovers the last descendants of the original Rin-folk, Norris and Shaaran. Their grandfather, Thiery, sacrifices himself to allow them to escape, back to the new Rin. The Zebak pursue them with a fleet of grach, but the invaders are repelled by the Dragon of the Mountain, whose dominion they had encroached upon. Rowan narrowly saves the townspeople from being incinerated by the Dragon's fire, proving his wits more valuable than the stubborn strength of the village leader, Lann.
In Rowan of the Bukshah, the village is plagued by a particularly long, harsh winter. The villagers, led by Sheba, flee to the coast, leaving behind Lann, Bronden, Norris, Shaaran, and Rowan, who insists on remaining to care for the restless bukshah. One night, ice creepers - enormous, snake-like monsters that radiate coldness - come down from the Mountain, feasting on Neel the potter, who had been hiding in the bukshah shed. Rowan, Norris, Shaaran, and Zeel follow the bukshah up the Mountain, to where the ice creepers have their nest, and aid the bukshah in breaking seals on the ice creepers' caverns, causing the heat from the Mountain to destroy most of them and end the Cold Time.
In each of the novels, Rodda reveals a little more about the history of Rin and its people. By the end of the series, the whole truth is learned:
Long before the time of men, the bukshah travelled up the Mountain every winter to feast on a grey fungus produced by the ice creepers. The bukshah were sustained for the winter, and the heat from the river of molten gold at Mountain Heart radiated into the ice creepers' cavern, maintaining a balance that controlled the population of the ice creepers and subdued the elemental rage in Mountain Heart. The valley behind the Mountain was eventually settled, and named the Valley of Gold. The people of this Valley learned the secrets of Mountain Heart, and deliberately prevented the bukshah from travelling up there; the fungus, uneaten, caused the river to flow with greater pressure, giving the people of the Valley more gold and riches. However, this also made the ice creepers more populous, causing the first Cold Time. The people eventually alllowed the Bukshah to climb the mountain again, and the balance was restored - but they never told their Traveller friends the Mountain's secret. Many years later, the people of the Valley of Gold discovered the mountain berries, but that winter, before the berries completed their life-cycle, the Zebak took a foothold in Maris and messengers were sent to the Valley asking for reinforcements. The people of the Valley left for the coast, but the keeper of the bukshah remained with the keeper of the silks, and soon one warrior returned - the people of the Valley had been captured by the Zebak before they'd even reached the coast. When the Bukshah left the Valley for Mountain Heart, the three companions followed them, hiding in the cave after the beasts had left. As the snow receded, the Mountain berries in the Valley spread, and overnight the abandoned Valley was overrun by the devil trees, transformed into the abhorred Pit of Unrin. The Mountain wall, undermined by the roots of the trees, collapsed, and Mountain Heart was blocked, sealing the companions inside. The people of the Valley of Gold,enslaved by the Zebak, founded the first village of Rin behind the walls of the Zebak city. Above their abandoned home, the companions lay dying and the Bukshah were kept from Mountain Heart, leaving the creepers to breed and multiply.
Hundreds of years later, the Zebak took the strongest of the Rin slaves as warriors to fight against the Travellers and the Maris-folk. The cunning works of the Keeper of the Crystal of Maris led to the Rin slaves turning against their Zebak masters, defeating the invaders. The Rin people then headed west and settled at the foot of the Mountain. Minds wiped by the Zebak, they remained unaware that half of their kinsmen were still enslaved across the sea, keeping their sad history recorded on silk paintings, as the people of the Valley of Gold had done also.
300 years later, the Zebak devise a plan to invade Rin via the air, using flying creatures called grach, then taking the Travellers and Maris-folk by surprise through a land attack. Rowan of Rin travels to the Zebak city to find his sister, and returns with Norris and Shaaran as well, the last two survivors of the original Rin slaves. Shaaran brings the silks with her to the new Rin, causing the leader of the Travellers, Ogden, to suspect that the people of Rin and the people of the Valley of Gold are one and the same.
A second Cold Time begins; the collapse of the western face of the Mountain prevented the bukshah from accessing the Mountain heart, allowing the ice creepers to spread their deadly winter across the Rin valley. The villagers flee, but Rowan - with Norris, Shaaran, and Zeel - follows the bukshah up the Mountain, clearing the remnants of the rockslide and allowing the bukshah to feast on the grey fungus and destroy the encroaching ice creepers. There Rowan finds the remains of the Valley of Gold's keeper of the bukshah, and also their silks. He sees that history narrowly avoided repeating itself, and that Rin almost suffered the same fate as the Valley. With the silks intact, their people's full and vivid history can be told.
Sheba's Prophecies About the Journey to the Mountain
- Seven hearts the journey make,
- Seven ways the hearts will break.
- Bravest heart will carry on,
- When sleep is death, and hope is gone.
- Look in the fiery jaws of fear
- And see the answer white and clear,
- Then throw away all thoughts of home
- For only then your quest is done.
- Let arms be still and voices low,
- A million eyes watch as you go.
- The silken door, your pathway ends;
- There fire and light will be your friends.
- Then see yourselves as others may,
- And catch noon's eye to clear your way
- Nothing here is as it seems,
- Dreams are truth and truth are dreams;
- Close your ears to loved ones cries,
- Die if you believe your eyes,
- Bound yourselves with rope and blood,
- And let your guide be made of wood.
- Look at the hand that points the way,
- And take the path where children play.
- Your ways are marked by lanes of light,
- That means escape from endless night.
Sheba's Prophecy About the Fate of Rin
- Beneath soft looks the evil burns;
- And slowly round, the old wheel turns.
- The same mistakes, the same old pride;
- The priceless armor cast aside;
- The secret enemy is here,
- It hides in darkness, fools beware;
- For day by day its power grows,
- And when at last its face it shows.
- Then past and present tales will meet,
- The evil circle is complete...
Orin's Ancient Antidote for Death Sleep
- To mix the brew that wakes Death Sleep,
- Fill one spread hand with silver deep.
- In hungry pool, moons raise their heads,
- Pluck one and add the tears it sheds.
- Stir slowly with new fighter's quill,
- Three times, no more and let it still;
- Add venom from your greatest fear,
- One drop and then the truth is clear.
Sheba's Six Prophecies for the Journey of the Zebak Land
- Five strange fingers form fate's hand:
- Each plays its part at fate's command.
- The fiery blaze, the answer keeps
- And till its time, each secret sleeps.
- When pain is truth and truth is pain,
- The painted shadows live again;
- Five leave but five do not return:
- Vain hope and pride in terror burn.
- The light that gleams at their backdoor,
- Will guide you from the lonely shore;
- But dangers seek you as you go,
- One from above; one from below
- One hides by night; one hides by day,
- And hard and stony is your way.
- At dawn the enemy attacks,
- As hunger howls, the mirror cracks.
- Then pressed against that shining wall,
- Like worms among the bones you'll crawl.
- It's useless now to fight or plead:
- Squirm softly, while the creatures feed.
- The one who first heard Zebak bells
- Must use the truth, the mirror tells.
- The hand must bleed to reach the end;
- One finger stands, the others bend.
- With chain and sorrow you must pay,
- For other hand, to guide your way.
- When evil strikes and fury wakes,
- Then love will face the choice it makes;
- Death will free the loyal friend,
- As it began, so will it end.
- Bound to the beast you play your part-
- The comfort of the aching heart.
- As fear approaches like the night,
- Flee from the field and hide from sight.
- The power stirs, the anger wakes,
- The rage upon the darkness breaks.
- A fearful lesson, learned full well,
- A tale that they alone can tale.
Books in the series
- Rowan of Rin (1993)
- Rowan and the TravellersRowan and the TravellersRowan and the Travelers is the sequel to Rowan of Rin, and the second book in the Rowan of Rin series written by Jennifer Rowe and published in 1994...
(1994) - Rowan and the Keeper of the CrystalRowan and the Keeper of the CrystalRowan and the Keeper of the Crystal is a children's fantasy novel by Australian author Emily Rodda. It is the third book in the Rowan of Rin series.-Plot summary:...
(1996) - Rowan and the ZebakRowan and the ZebakRowan and the Zebak is a 2002 children's fantasy novel by Australian author Emily Rodda. It is the fourth book in the Rowan of Rin series.- Plot summary :...
(1999) - Rowan of the Bukshah (titled Rowan and the Ice Creepers in some countries)
Rowan of Rin
The books are based on Rowan a timid young boy from Rin, Rowan's life changes when the stream that flows into the village ceases to flow. Without the precious water, the village of Rin is doomed. The six strongest villagers must brave the unknown terrors of the Mountain to discover the answer to the mystery and restore the water's flow. Rowan, the weak and unwanted member of group must go with them, and incredibly, it is his help that the villagers need above all.The 7 hearts:
- Rowan of the Bukshah
- Marlie
- Strong Jonn
- Allun
- Val
- Ellis
- Bronden
Other characters:
- Jiller (Rowan's mother)
- Annad (Rowan's sister)