I have scripted it but I will be doing exactly one take and I won't be editing very much,

first because I don't have a lot of time and second because I don't think this is a book

deserving of much time.

However, I do want to get my thoughts out about it because this book is the latest in

a long line in a chain of bad books and bad choices and I would like to talk about that

in a longer format than short note posts.

So…Onestar's Confession Time.

This was a controversial book before it was even released,

but save for the excerpt released on the website last month and the one leaked passage that

a lot of people saw, I have avoided looking into or judging the book as a whole, until

now.

Spoilers are ahead.

All right, for anyone who might not have read the book or gone away despite my warnings,

I'll give a very quick summary.

Long story short, after Onestar and Darktail's deaths, Onestar is asked to think back on

his life while Tallstar and some other Starclan cats decide whether or not he belongs in Starclan.

And…he does that.

What we get is supposedly a full summation of Onestar's life, from his apprenticeship

under Deadfoot where he ventures into the Twolegplace alongside the kittypet apprentices

Windclan tried out, to the clans leaving the lake and him leaving Smoke and Darkkit, to

his clashes with Mudclaw and then Firestar, and finally to his downfall when Darktail

arrived.

The format is no different from a regular book, but this time it's apparently Onestar

thinking about his life, and when that's done, he concludes he's not all bad, Tallstar agrees,

and he goes to Starclan.

The end.

I'll start off with this.

Onestar's Confession is a completely useless book.

The main points of this story were told in Starlight in April of 2006, about 16 years

ago, Shattered Sky in April of 2017, about 5 years ago, and Winds of Change in June of

2021, about one year ago.

We did not need to hear the New Prophecy and A Vision of Shadows stories *again* so soon

and with so little added, which is an unfortunate pattern in a fair chunk of the recent supplemental

material.

Meanwhile the pieces that actually would have been new, Brokenstar's exile of Windclan,

Onewhisker's relationship with Smoke, his relationship with Fireheart, how that relationship

changed with Firestar to the point of the Eclipse battle, his opinions on the Dark Forest

trainees and why he chose Harespring as a deputy, all of that is blatantly skipped over

or trimmed down to such a point that nothing is gained from it other than what we already

knew.

We learned about three new kittypets: Bailey and her kits Brushpaw and Tansypaw, or rather

Melody, who were all nice…slices of characters, and were fun for what they brought, but since

they all only had a few chapters to exist in, they didn't get to show off a ton of who

they were and were mainly there for the sake of one character's motivation.

And, of course they had to exist for a brief period, because they were retconned characters.

We knew they couldn't become full warriors as soon as they got their apprentice names

because they weren't shown in the allegiances for the first and second arcs.

But bad pacing and not giving time to relationships are issues that underline so many of the problems

in this book and that's something I'll continue to bring up as we go along.

I also can't continue without addressing the elephant in the room: the various elements

solidified for the family tree in this book, especially those to do with Onestar.

Some were done, sloppily, in the excerpt we got on the website, though mostly in the other

clans, Thunderclan unfortunately included.

Graystripe and Darkstripe are now officially brothers and both kits of Willowpelt guys!

No matter how little it makes sense.

Over in Windclan, Ashfoot and Morningflower are now Onestar's siblings (but they actually

made a mistake since the original author post about this made Ashfoot and Morningflower

older and this book made them littermates, which is not a meaningless choice as it makes

Fireheart and Onewhisker stupidly far apart in age when they were implied in the first

arc to both be new warriors on parallel paths).

However, even past the excerpt we had plenty more problems.

Whitetail was canonized as Onestar's second mate and Heathertail as his daughter.

This means that Onestar became mates with his former apprentice, a fact that the book

decides to explicitly point out in a very poorly worded passage, and Breezepelt and

Heathertail are officially both mates and cousins, something that the book never even

acknowledges, as is the case with many romantic relationships that were accidentally written

to be between family members in this series.

But as usual, none of this was necessary, and it absolutely could have been retconned

or ignored altogether since none of it was in the books before.

Whitetail was implied to have shared a nest with Onestar once, but this easily could have

been ignored, or her being Onestar's apprentice could have been ignored.

They could have easily left Onewhisker as an only child, explaining his name along with

stopping his daughter from marrying her cousin.

That said, it was also kind of inevitable that the team would decide to do this given

their past choices.

For a few years now, in just about all of their supplemental material, they have been

adding as many old author statements turned website family tree facts into the books as

possible, without giving any of them second thoughts or even looking back at the original

statements that the ideas distantly came from.

Whether it's a point of pride, covering their backs, carelessness, laziness, or trying to

maintain promises they made to make the website seem more official, this is the road they

have been taking and they don't seem to be turning back.

So from this point of the video onward, I will be doing my best to ignore the family

tree add-ins as much as possible.

The book has far more problems than just that, and they all warrant some amount of discussion.

Firstly, the prologue and epilogue, which I'm going to discuss together since they chronologically

happen right next to each other, immediately after Onestar and Darktail's deaths.

Both of them are put in a sort of field neutral zone where they are to be judged.

Darktail is immediately pulled away, to the Dark Forest by Ashfur we would assume, but

also possibly to the Dark Forest by Starclan who somehow have power over rogues now.

Onestar is then faced with Tallstar and asked to reflect on his life while Starclan discusses

what to do with him.

You might think this is a return of the trial system from Squirrelflight's Hope, but you

would be wrong.

Onestar doesn't present a case to anyone, and the remainder of the book telling his

life is not anything he says aloud or even anything that is analyzed by whatever unseen

panel may be judging him.

Onestar himself doesn't even get to see anyone besides Tallstar in this time, and all Tallstar

asks is that Onestar think a little.

When he comes back, after an unknowable period of time, he immediately agrees that Onestar

has "tried so hard to atone for [his] mistakes" and that has earned him his place in Starclan.

Heh…heheh yeah right tell that to Juniperclaw.

The rules of what gets you into Starclan or the Dark Forest are so completely obfuscated

and contradictory at this point that I really couldn't tell you one way or the other if

Onestar deserves to be in Starclan or the Dark Forest.

Honestly this book's very inclusion of Onestar's judgment and reflections may only muddle the

point more.

But I can say that the life the rest of the book showed me did not convince me of his

just placement.

And that's really what it had to do, because this book isn't a case for cats in Starclan.

It's a case for the readers to say he deserves Starclan by the end of the book.

We open the first numbered chapter with a training scene between Onepaw and his mentor

Deadfoot, and the skill they choose to focus on is careful stalking and using the direction

of the wind to catch prey, with Deadfoot specifically pointing out how running after rabbits isn't

the only way to catch them.

Windclan is specifically supposed to be a clan where you are better off running after

prey and utilizing your speed in the open moors to outrun your opponent.

What Deadfoot is teaching is Thunderclan skills, or what has become the default for the Erins

to always go with when they need a training scene.

It's not a massive thing by any means but, as with many problems in this book, it's the

continuation of a long ongoing problem.

In this case, where even the hunting techniques, one of the only remaining differences that

supposedly exist between the clans, become uniform.

Now one thing that actually is new here is some new characters: a brave kittypet named

Bailey who wanted her kits to be strong and self-sufficient so they could defend themselves,

as she had against a badger.

In service of this, she brings her kits, Leo and Melody, to the clan and they are apprenticed

as Brushpaw and Tansypaw.

Brushpaw is more eager about being in the clan and becomes a good friend to Onepaw while

Tansypaw really doesn't like having to hunt or fight and wants to return to her twolegs,

but doesn't since her mother and brother don't want to leave.

As I said earlier, these guys are fun, but they are here for exactly two purposes.

First, they introduce Onepaw to the twolegplace and the…ahem, "pretty kittypet" Smoke and

regularly bring him back for the extent of their apprenticeships so Onepaw can get acquainted

with the kittypets there, which of course is shorthand for "he really only speaks repeatedly

to Smoke."

Their second purpose has to do with Windclan and Onewhisker's overall opinion of how kittypets

fit into clan life.

As one of the motivations for Onewhisker to leave Smoke and Darktail behind, the Erins

wanted him to believe without question that kittypets couldn't be warriors.

To do this, they had both Brushpaw and Tansypaw fail their assessments, mostly because they

spent too much time visiting the Twolegplace with Onepaw and not enough time training,

and subsequently had Tansypaw leave, Brushpaw die in a spat with Shadowclan, and Bailey

leave after that.

Now, call me crazy but maybe "no kittypets could ever be warriors" isn't the lesson you

should take from three talented cats leaving in different ways, but when have the clans

ever been rational about that sort of thing?

Partially as a result of this plotline, they also wanted (as they have often wanted in

the recent works) for Onepaw to face a lot of opposition in his clan to the ideals he

had as an apprentice, meaning that most of Windclan, especially Tallstar, were all very

impatient and arguably unfair towards the kittypet apprentices, and all were completely

unconvinced that a kittypet could ever have something valuable to offer as a warrior.

Given who Tallstar's best friend was as a young warrior, or how much he respected Firestar,

or in general how tolerant and patient he was, this is a particularly disappointing

casually of the recent mob mentality trend that has persisted even into the main series

where any cat who isn't a protagonist will go out of their way to hold onto illogical

opinions that often go against established characterizations solely for the sake of making

the protagonist face adversity among their clanmates or other clans.

That said, I'm at least glad that these kittypets each got some level of characterization and

decent, unique sendoffs for each of them.

Now, if you're looking ahead, or, you know, thinking at all, you may be wondering “Hey,

Sunnyfall?

How could Onewhisker ever come away with the idea that kittypets can't be warriors when

one of his best friends in the first arc, Fireheart, proved right in front of him that

a kittypet could become a fantastic warrior?”

Well I'm glad you asked, because the book promptly answers that by…skipping over the

entire period where any of that would be relevant.

Actually, here's a helpful list of some of the things the book completely timeskips

over: Brokenstar's takeover of Windclan territory, Windclan's time in exile, Windclan's

rescue and Onewhisker meeting Fireheart, Onewhisker being given and training Gorsepaw, Onewhisker

being Fireheart's friend and seeing the tom grow, Onewhisker losing Gorsepaw, Onewhisker

and Fireheart each crossing borders to help each other and their clans, Onewhisker developing

any relationship with or even concept of Smoke beyond several mentions that she's pretty,

Onewhisker beng given and mentoring Whitepaw or figuring out who his apprentice is at all,

Onewhisker having any further relationship with his sisters after that first chapter,

and the Bloodclan battle where Firestar saved his life.

Boy that sure seems like an awful lot of very relevant material that was skipped over completely.

A lot of it could have even been particularly pivotal to Onewhisker's opinion of kittypets,

or even more directly to his later relationships with Firestar, Smoke, Ashfoot, and Whitetail

and the choices he will make based on them.

Sure would have been nice to see any of it.

Well don't worry, there's a perfectly good and logical reason for skipping all of

this work and having some truly abysmal pacing in this book: If we saw any of Shadowclan's

takeover or Gorsepaw's mentorship, they couldn't avoid showing us a relationship

with Fireheart; if we saw a relationship between Onewhisker and Fireheart, he would unquestionably

have had a better opinion of kittypets and not realistically turn Smoke away for that

reason; if we saw any of his mentoring Whitepaw the reader would have that in their mind when

she became his mate later; and if they showed any more in-depth relationships or personalities

for Smoke or Ashfoot they would have to…do work and flesh out she-cats who clearly only