Animorphs || My Favorite Book Series #2

fanfictioner (50)in #review • 7 years ago

Hello, Steemit friends!

For some reason, many readers don't know K.A. Applegate's 'Animorphs' series, but over the years, it has developed something of a cult following, resulting in many reprints and a TV series aired on Nickelodeon. The entire book series consists of 64 books, 54 in the main series, 4 alien chronicles, 4 in the megamorphs series, and 2 as 'Alternamorphs gamebooks' which are not based on the main continuity of the series. The books are well known for their opening phrase: 'My name is...' and of their depiction as real events happening in secret under the reader's very noses. Each book's events is narrated by a different member of the animorphs (except for a very few which combine narrations), all of which are merely kids.

Animorphs is a coming of age story, and this shows in the progression in the tone of the series. At the beginning, the animorphs are innocent and naive, and full of ideals about good and bad. Along the way, however, each character is forced to change under the pressure of the war they fight. The series starts like a typical children's book, full of wonder at intersteller life and the awesome new technology that grants them their ability. But it doesn't take long before the horrors of war catch up to them.

Although a science fiction series, Animorphs is full of themetic references to the reality of life and war.

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Animorphs, like any good story, is also known for it's strong characterisation. The animorphs are all different, and the war affects each of them differently. Their relationships change --some suffer, some are strengthened. And like all war veterans, none of them really come out the same. The actual age of the animorphs are at first hidden from the reader, as well as their town and last names, in a bid to 'protect their identities'. At the end though, Jake, the leader of the group, tells everything and we realise that they started fighting when they were just 13, and continued till they were 16. In this way, the series concludes as not a kids story, but an adult's tale. The experiences of the kids are sharply brought into contact with the usual opinions of non-veterans when their parents are forced into the war. Their growth is clear when Jake, only 16, proposes to Cassie, and when she in return, showing the wisdom which is part of their character, turns him down, because she knows they are no longer the same persons they were at the beginning --the kids who fell in love.

Animorphs introduces a universe of awesomely varying species and environments.

This is what fans of animorphs love the most. K.A. Applegate describes a great, interconnected universe, and numerous fully imagined species. Her descriptions of Andalites, Hork Bajir, Arn and Yeerk, the villains of the story are so complete that one can believe they actually do exist. And the awesome characterisation is not limited to humans alone, but to these other species. By the end of the series, the yeerk, once viewed with absolute hatred and fear by the members of the animorphs, are understood in such ways that they become relatable, even pitiable on many levels. This is certainly the case for Taxxons, the everlastingly hungry, cannibalistic species, who live in a state of perpetual fear and would 'eat themselves if they could'.

What do you think of Animorphs? What did you love the most? Let's know in the comments!

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