Sunday, December 15, 2013

Happy Holidays from the Friends of Freddy!


     I've always enjoyed Freddy's entry into the Christmas genre, More To And Again or Freddy Goes to the North Pole. It features, as do so many other Christmas books, a threat to that pillar of the Yuletide season, Santa Claus. In a clever twist, however, the threat is not hostile-the whalers see themselves as helping Santa modernize (a comment on the development of world economies over the century before North Pole's publication?). These whalers, lead by the steely Mr. Hooker, are perhaps the most relatable villians ever to stare down Freddy and his friends. Indeed, the confrontation between the two groups is, unusually, initiated by the Bean bunch. These whalers play games with the animals, eat ice cream jovially, and throw snowballs-a far cry from the murderous Herb Garble and the vindictive Simon.
     North Pole also marks the end of the first great era of Freddy's adventures, that time when Brooks' overall view of the books was of a group of animals thrust into unusual places. I think Brooks realized that, as good as these first two entries in the series are, the series couldn't continue under this model, and, sure enough, the next Freddy book, Freddy The Detective, was based on the animals themselves providing the incongruities with ordinary barnyard life. Happily, there was enough character development in Florida and North Pole to allow for this shift to proceed, for the most part, painlessly. It's pretty clear that the series was not meant to focus on Freddy originally, as he (admittedly debatably) dowsn't serve as the central character for a novel again until number 8, Ignormus. 
     In conclusion, we at the Friends of Freddy would like to wish all of you Happy Holidays! Enjoy (or despise) the Christmas music swirling out from every radio station while you can.


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