My son is reading this book and it doesn't bother him that the ferret is the bad guy too much. It did bother me, and so I did not read it. To each his own I suppose. My other son is reading another redwall book, that has ferret/weasil/otter like creatures silhouetted on the back cover. I can't remember the name of this book, but he says that all those creatures are not depicted in bad ways in this one, just Veil pretty much. He is a little boy rememeber, so his comprehension might be off. But you might want to check out other books in the series such as this other one. Wolfy http://wolfysluv.jacksnet.com [Posted in FML issue 4448]