The Invasion (Animorphs #1)

The animorphs series was a big part of when I was growing up, what stands out to me the most about these books is that by following it's characters across multiple smaller stories, young readers will be able to engage in a form of secondary storytelling, piecing together the disparate pieces of everyone's story arcs and personalities, watching them grow in a realistic fashion. Further the story takes it's young audience very seriously and maintains an engaging sci-fi horror aesthetic the whole way through- the story covers the kids moving simply from the only aware victims, to a resistance movement, onward to their own counter offensive, it deals with a variety of interesting problems the kids have to work through socially, emotionally, show more and so forth. Unlike many novels in it's genre, the series goes well beyond a simple save the world power fantasy, and is capable of engendering empathy.

Also wonderful for animal lovers, and it bridges several different youth interests. show less

It’s the 1990s and normal teens Jake, Cassie, Rachel, Tobias, and Marco are doing normal 90s teen things like playing arcade games at the mall and cutting through abandoned construction sites when they see an actual space ship and meet an actual alien. With its dying breaths the alien tells them the truth - Earth is already being taken over by Yeerks, parasitic slugs that enter people’s ears and take over their brains. Anyone could already be infected. To help the teens fight the invasion, the alien gives them the power to change into any animal they touch. Luckily Cassie’s parents are veterinarians (and also the local zoo seems to have zero security whatsoever, not even, uh, locks). Their first step in the resistance they are now show more waging, alone, as children, is to find out what people they thought they could trust are already infected - a teacher? A parent? A police officer?

With the obvious caveat that it’s a 30-year-old middle-grade book, this still hits so hard. Those poor kids are all alone trying to fight a fascist takeover! The animal anatomy & facts are pretty good, zoo procedures aside, and I loved the graphic descriptions of human bodies changing into animal ones. The descriptions of the different kinds of aliens are great, too, if you don’t question how a 12-foot-long giant centipede got to the middle of town undetected.

I kind of want to reread more of them, especially since I didn’t read them in order as a kid, but the middle-grade writing is very grating. It’s so passive and full of filler words. Maybe audiobooks? show less

Five teenagers walking home from the mall see an alien spaceship. Yet instead of a message of universal peace or at least the promise of first contact, the dying alien only has one message: The Yeerks are here. What are the Yeerks? They are alien brain-controlling slugs, they are invaders, and they are winning. Now our only hope is five teenagers with the power to turn into animals.
I read this for pure nostalgia. When I was in grade school “Animorphs” was my favorite set of books. Decades later “Animorphs” is undergoing a bit of a renaissance, with graphic novels and maybe a movie coming out soon. I thought I’d jump on the nostalgia train and re-read the series.
The ebook I read is apparently an updated version that was show more released several years ago. This version corrects a few mistakes in the original text, patches up some continuity issues, and takes out some of the ’90s references. While part of me wanted to be a purist, I have to admit I appreciated the fixes. Even as a child, I was annoyed by the mistake that goes against how it works later in the series.
Honestly, I was surprised how well it holds up. It’s a quick read, I finished in less than an hour, so it feels almost like an episode of a show. The characters are fun and actually have some depth. Even from the very beginning of the series, there is a sense of seriousness about it. The stakes are high, and these kids are unprepared. They’re not going to magically solve everything, but instead are going to have to fight a guerilla war.
I totally suggest any '90s kid give it a look. I am definitely going to do a series re-read. It’s a fun quick read, but there is substance to it. I’m looking forward to the rest of this series. show less

I was a little too old for these when they first came out, so although they drew my eye because of the animal element, I never got around to them. Finally, a few decades later, I decided to give them a try...and I'm so glad I did. More than standing up to time, this first book in the series is a fun, action-packed, animal-centric adventure that I thoroughly enjoyed. I'm sure I would have loved these as an elementary-schooler, but as an adult who's picky about children's reads, I'm still diving in and loving them. When my nieces get old enough, I can't wait to gift these reads to them, but meanwhile, I'm going to keep going with the series and enjoy every moment.

Absolutely recommended.

I read pretty much all of these, and while the quality of individual books varies, taken as a whole, this series is very, very good.

I think what I like most is its ability to avoid placing its alien races into categories, which is a trap a lot of science fiction (and a lot of fantasy, with its non-human races) seems to fall into. The complexities of cultures are all carefully explored in Animorphs, so not all Yeerks are bad, for example, and not all Andalites are good. They each have their own idiosyncrasies that are presented as distinctly nonhuman, but not necessarily associated with a good-evil axis. If you can get ahold of all the books these days, it's worth reading.

Going back to a series you loved as a kid is difficult. For one, nostalgia adds a sweet filter to our memories that may not truly be deserved. For another, our reading tastes change. And we get older – we expect different writing styles.

Returning to The Invasion, the very first Animorphs book, was a journey for me. These books influenced me so much when I was younger. I wanted to believe in these kids and their abilities so bad. As an adult, I was pretty sure these would be ridiculous and I would hate them and why was I so intent on ruining a good memory, exactly?

I am ridiculous.

Even though The Invasion is clearly written in the voice of a 14-year-old, this book is still wonderful. The concept of the series is strange and exciting and show more refreshingly unique as a whole. You’ve got shape shifters and you’ve got aliens. You have five very different kids as our protagonists. The Invasion starts the story with Jake, who ultimately becomes the leader of the crew… but Cassie, Rachel, Marco, Tobias? They’re all good. Rachel and Tobias were my favorites as kids, but as an adult, I think I can appreciate them all.

And let’s be real, here. This series is very much intended for middle grade readers – it does not have the same descriptions and flowery prose as most YA. It’s dialogue-heavy. It’s direct. There’s a lot of awkward conversations that feel a bit stilted but it all feels right in this context. The writing style and the voice work well for the series and for the intended audience. If this was a YA romance I’d probably drop some shade, but this is a MG urban sci-fi in first person. It works.

I know my blogging audience and I don’t think I’ll be able to convince many or any of you to run out and pick up The Invasion… but if you know any middle grade readers who are imaginative and love to read and love animals, this is a great book to pick up. And if you, like me, read these when you were younger and feel like a nostalgia read, I fully support that. It’s a quick book at under 200 pages and I enjoyed falling back into the world.

And you know what? I think I’m going to keep adding the rest of the series to my TBR. show less

I read... I think it was the first seven or eight Animorphs books, back when I was fifteen or so. As I was reading them mostly for the plot (which didn't show a lot of variety from one book to the next) and since each book cost a small fortune but could be finished in about two hours, I just wandered away from the series after a while. With used copies being available for a few cents nowadays, I decided to give the Animorphs another try, so here we go.

This book is so, so hard to rate for me. It mainly serves as an introduction and I can't even tell if the plot was rushed or paced just right. The main thing I took away from this reread is that if there's one thing you should read these books for, it's the characters. Sure, they aren't show more terribly deep (yet) but they're already showing their potential.

It took me half the book to once again settle into the kids' narrative voices (Jake in this book's case), which are very casual, as the book is presented as them talking to the reader directly (or at least directly addressing a potential reader in their world) in a very casual, teenage-y tone. It does fit the kids though, so I'm not really complaining. It's just something you'll have to get used to.

And then there are of course the "is this really a kids book?" moments. Our protagonists do an awful lot of crying-in-terror, and for good reasons too; many of the things they witness even in this first book are nightmarish. (I think the narrative voices help make things not as scary as they could be but between deadly alien monsters and humans enslaved in their own minds/bodies, there's plenty of horror of all kinds to be found.)

I'll definitely stick with the kids for at least a few more books.

(Favourite moments: Cassie's beautiful horse morph and the amazingly creepy scene with Jake and Marco playing a videogame with Tom.) show less