Customer Reviews

The Invasion (Animorphs Book 1)

5 star:		(163)
4 star:		(23)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I used to love this series when I was young. I'm now 21 and a few months ago I decided to reread them. I wasn't too sure how much I'd like them since they are "kids books," but boy, I was hooked. I read all 54, and the 10 or so extras in just a few months. These books are probably my favorite books of all time, and I've definately read my fair share of books from every age group and genre.

I still remember when I discovered this book four years ago. I was at the Scholastic Book Fair, looking for a book with excitement and adventure. My librarian recomended Animorphs, and I got everthing a person can possibly dream for. There is action and suspense. There are battles and fights. There is shock and emotion. There is the war between good and evil. Then, I was taken far into the air.... I was given the description of what it is like to be an animal. I felt the instinct, the emotion, the fear, the suspense. I was in a dream, a nightmare. The book was full of vivid descriptions, powerful emotions, and a thrill of adventure. It is everything you ever dreamed of. You'll love it!

Series have a bad reputation for being junky books with formula plots, but Animorphs is probably the best series for your child (both girls and boys) to be interested in. (Avoid Goosebumps like the plague!) Series are good for reluctant readers because there's always another book to read next, and kids want to keep reading. This series, about a group of kids who can "morph" into animals and use this power to save the world from a secret alien invasion, will hold kids' attention and it may be enough to get them excited about reading for life. It's certainly better than playing Nintendo all day! I am 14 and I haven't read an entire Animorph book, but I've read enough parts to tell what they're like. My brother (age 10) and his friends love the series. There is also information about animals--how a hawk flies, what a lizard's eyesight is like, what it feels like to be that particular animal. So your child is learning something as well, probably without knowing it! There is exciting action and adventures too, but it's not excessively violent. There's lots of humor in it too. So, if your child is a reluctant reader, try Animorphs. Or if your child is already interested in the series, you have nothing to worry about. Another good series is Redwall, by Brian Jacques, though it is more violent. They're also good for a wider age group--I read them too, and even some adults I know enjoy them. PS. Check secondhand bookstores and libraries, as buying all the Animorph books new may get expensive.

Jake, Rachel, Cassie, Tobias, and Marco were just average teenagers when they decided to take the shortcut home through the abandoned construction site. But in that construction site, they learned the secret from Elfangor, a dying Andalite. Things called Yeerks have the power to invade the bodies of anyone. The Yeerks plan to take over the world by doing this. And now, Elfangor has given the five kids the power to morph into any animal they want. Using this power, they can fight the Yeerks.

At first, the kids just want to believe that their experience was all a dream. But they realize that it's no dream when they try out their morphing powers. Things get even more scary when Jake discovers that his brother, Tom, has been invaded by a Yeerk. Now, it's up to them to destroy the Yeerks and save the world. They are the Animorphs.

THE INVASION is the first Animorphs book, and it is definitely an amazing way to start out the series. We learn about all the major characters and some of the species that most humans are unfamiliar with. And although this book appears to be for kids, it's pretty intense. I would recommend this book (and series) to anyone--especially people who love sci-fi.

This is a great book to start off this great series. The Invasion starts of the animorphs series and is one of the best. Jake, Rachel, Tobias, Cassie and Marco are normal kids heading for home. Then they decide to take a shortcut through the abandoned construction site. Suddenly, a space ship lands right in front of them. Out comes an injured andalite (which is an cross between a human, scorpion and a deer). He explains that the yeerks, a band of paristic aliens have come to Earth. They have turned some people into "controllers" by going inside their heads and enslaving them. The kids have to stop them. The andalite gives them the power to morph, which is the ability to turn into any animal they touch. Then a yeerk ship comes. Out pops Visser Three, the only yeerk able to control an andalite. He morphs into a horrible creature and EATS Elfangor (that's the andalite's name). The kids escape and think over these horrible events. Most of them are reluctant except for Tobias. But then they all fight together. It all ends in a fight on the yeerks' feeding ground. Find out what happens to Tobias who loses the battle in a way you can't imagine.

I'm back again, here to tell you about the first Animophs book. It's told by Jake, the leader of the Animorphs, and it tells how Jake and the others meet Elfongor, the andalite prince fatally injured in a battle between his species and the evil (mostly) parasitic yeerks, and get the morphing power. It is extreamly well-told, with good descriptions of the aleins and feelings and emotions explained well. Alot of the story takes place in the abandened construction site, whare the Animorphs first see the yeerks, including Visser Three who has an Andalite host body and watch as he brutally kills Elfongor. But they now have the morphing power, so the natural leader Jake, his feirce cousin Rachel, gentle Tobais, smart mouthed Marco and Animal lover Cassie start the battle to save the world, equiped with with the DNA of any mammal, bird, reptile or insect they touch. An exelent book to start off an exelent sereis.

PS For those of you who can't work out the naration order of Animorphs, book numbers ending in 1 or 6 are Jake books, 2 and 7 are Rachel books, 3 are Tobais books, 4 and 9 are Cassie books, 5 and 0 are Marco books and 8 are Ax books, although this order changes at book 46.

Ten years ago while these books were being written, I was focusing on reading horror novels like Stephen King's Desperation. I saw a few Animorphs books lying around one day and thought to myself "Oh, how cute. Someone at our high school reads children's books." Then last Saturday I had some time to kill and was in the library. I saw the books again and said "Eh, why not." My first reaction was: whoa, this author really knows how to write. This book doesnt have any of the boring scenes that too many adventure story authors don't know how to get rid of.

I realized I needed to go somewhere private to allow the visual imagery of the books to really come at me full-force. So I took out four books, went home, and read them in one sitting. I'm amazed. I've never experienced "can't put it down" before. I've been going back every day I have free time to read more of the books. And even when I'm out doing other things I keep replaying the scenes in my head. I wish I'd picked up these books ten years ago.

Animorphs #1 the Invasion is a really, really great book. Now i'm reading all of the other books in the series. I'm on the third book,"The Encounter". Or at least I think that is what it is called. I even watch the show. I read this book about a year or two ago. Anyway, if you don't own this book, buy it and read it. If you do have this book and you haven't read it yet, then what are you waiting for? Start reading it right now. This is in my top 5 favorite books.

Note: This review pertains to the entire Animorphs series, rather than this specific book.

When I read most of the Animorph books several years ago, I thought it was very suspenseful and entertaining.

Now, as I look back, it seems that these books, although targeted at 4th-6th graders, have suprising depth, with often tenebrous themes concerning free will, sentimentalism, and morality.

This series, now 15 years old (spanning 1996-2001 with the finale being book #54), has held up pretty well over time. There's a feel of both freshness and nostalgia with these books, which has been and continues to be well represented in the cover art. Each title has the characters "morphing" into their animal avatars, and for the 2011-12 re-release, the hand drawn progressive stages of morphing is replaced by 3-D lenticular art, which certainly makes me smile. It's cool, it's cheesy, it's high-tech-y but not really...and nostalgic, all at the same time. Would that the publisher had also kept the "flipbook" effect with small progressively morphing figures on the corner of each page in the book!

My kids are hooked enough on the stories that I can't pass a bookstore or library without a foray to look for another title in the series. And it's a pretty good hook, to give young readers a sense of what it would be like to be a scruffy dog, with heightened smell and hearing, a bird of prey floating on high wind currents, even a lizard swallowing down a struggling spider whole and alive! (That "Ewwww!" is inevitably followed by, "Then what?")

The plot has been criticized as a ripoff of Heinlein, but I'm pretty sure Robert Heinlein didn't invent the whole "bodysnatchers" motif. In fact, the depiction of the books' baddies (Yeerks) as parasitic slimy slug critters in their natural state, immediately called to mind (for me) TV's "Stargate" Series, developed at about the same times as this book was published. There are certain mythical archetypes that repeat in human storytelling - what matters is how well the tale is told.

And Applegate tells it pretty well in Book One, establishing a world where humans are infiltrated by parasitic, conquering aliens with a relative economy of words, keeping young readers hooked on the action of the stories. I liked and largely "believed" her young teen characters, while noticing that the author's ear for dialogue is only middling, a fault found in many excellent writers of kids' books. It's very, very tough to write naturalistic children's dialog. Moreover, the better choice may be to NOT have young characters speak too faithfully in the slang and dialect of their particular time, for fear of "dating" the book in re-release. I'll cut the author a bit of slack, here.

I'm a bit troubled about where I know this series is going, having "spoiled" myself for the end of the series, down the line. These kids are keeping terrible secrets from friends and grownups, any of whom may be secret captive "hosts" to the evil Yeerks. They're going to fight a terrible war and suffer the loss of both innocence and many who are nearest and dearest to them. Some will grow up to be reasonably happy, emotional survivors of all that - some, not so much. Pretty heavy reading to be putting into a 9 or 10 year old's hands, even knowing it will be awhile getting there.

But of course, readers grow up, too. My eldest grew up on Harry Potter, and like Rowling, Applegate chose very deliberately to have her characters age, and have their adventures progress from scary to scarier, introducing increasingly mature themes, within an overall series arc of pretty epic scale.

But then all the great stories hurt the heart in the end. My kids love Animorphs like they love Doctor Who and Harry Potter and all tales where the reader (or viewer) is a tagging alongside well-loved old friends for a (literally) awe-inspiring, suspenseful adventure. I have to trust that they'll be ready, when it's time to be a little heartbroken.

Re-release of this series with the new covers is scheduled to continue through 2012. I may just have to replace a few dog-eared copies in our home collection.