Anonymous asked: ok so..... i always ignored the animorphs books as a kid (i think i picked one up and it wasn't the first book and i was confused and annoyed and the covers were ???? tacky??) but you're making me want to get into them as a 21 year old.... i mean. i guess i'm asking: what should i expect. how much of a commitment am i getting myself into.

Right, so, the first thing you should know here is that I know plenty of people who started reading these books as adults and therefore: no judgement.  The covers, also, are terrible, so furthermore no judgement on that front.

THAT BEING SAID.

Animorphs is a best-beloved series and it’s not their fault they lost the cover art lottery, this was such a formative series in my life.  Like, Robin McKinley taught me what you could do with words and stories, but Animorphs taught me what you should do to characters.  RIP all my characters who are still paying for that particular lesson.

So, Animorphs is a middle grade series, yes, it can be cheesy and tropey and absurd (and DATED good lord the 90′s seem like a long time ago).  But also…like, it’s a 54 book series literally RIDDLED with grim moral quandries, grisly murder, gory battles, war crimes, and general trauma, so forgive them their occasional descent into middle grade nonsense.  If you’ve ever looked a kid’s series that you loved to bits and pieces and thought to yourself “Jesus, these kids should be an absolute train wreck, I can’t believe Harry Potter/Percy Jackson/whoever sleeps at all ever,” Animorphs is the answer to that thought.  The first named character–my beloved weird alien prince Elfangor, the Wise Mentor Character™–dies horribly forty pages into the first book, and it pretty much goes downhill from there.  I affectionately call the kids the PTSD Squad and lordy.  LORDY.  Are they fucking ever.  Ongoing Fandomn Discourse includes the eternal question of “What is the first onscreen instance of really serious PTSD” and I generally argue for the suicide attempt in Book 3, but I could also see my way to granting the nightmare in Book 2.  The people who think it takes until Book 5 are just wrong, I love you all, but no.

  • If you read these, I invite you to join @lathori in the experience of stopping every couple of chapters to say, in a horrified tone of voice, “Why did your parents let you read these when you were SEVEN”
  • Reasons, okay.  Also I was a really bullheaded kid.  And it wasn’t like they were going to give me nightmares.  They probably should have.  But they didn’t.  Because Reasons.
  • I digress.

But so, in terms of what you’re committing to…that.  That is what you’d be committing to.  In addition to the main series, there are 4 Megamorphs (of WILDLY variable quality, to be sure, and largely optional, but good brain candy most of the time) and 4 Chronicles.  The Chronicles are Andalite (PHENOMENAL BOOK, COULD BE READ INDEPENDENTLY, ABOUT MY GOOD WEIRD BOY ELFANGOR, DEF A FAVORITE), Hork-Bajir (really interesting characters, good concept, a little shaky on the dismount, so to speak), Visser (I don’t remember a ton of this one but GODDAMN I love Eva), and Ellimist (didn’t read this because honestly I didn’t care about the Ellimist that much as a kid except in terms of his ongoing torment of the Squad and I still don’t).

I feel it’s also my duty to warn you that events conspired against KA Applegate and much of the second half of the series is written by an assortment of ghostwriters, who are ALSO of wildly variable quality.  Example: Book 33, affectionately called The Torture Book by much of the fandom, could probably be used to raise me from the dead so that I could enjoy it one more time.  Books 37 or 39, on the other hand, which I pretend don’t exist, could be used to raise me from the dead so that I could bitch at length about how much I Fucking Hate Them.

  • What is that Rachel characterization, Book 37, what are you doing with your life.
  • Book 39.  What the tap-dancing fuck is the buffahuman.  Why.  Why do I have to live with that in my head.
  • Anyway.

To that end, I recommend letting yourself skim and/or skip books if you reach one you really can’t handle the writing in after, say, the early 30′s.

  • But don’t skip 37 or 39 because you have to Understand My Pain.

ANYWAY.

ANIMORPHS.

GREAT SERIES.

GET THEM ALL FOR FREE HERE.

KEEP ME POSTED IF YOU CHOOSE TO READ THEM.

Tags: animorphs book rec animorphs ebooks i'm reading them out loud to laurens because we're domestic like that which means she's you know RIGHT THERE to wonder out loud at opportune moments why i was allowed to read these i was a stubborn ass kid okay and also i converted my mom and she's not that much of a hypocrite anyway anon rest assured my mom started reading these at 37 so like you're in great company she's the bomb other people reading animorphs I HOPE i'd say don't feel pressured but FEEL PRESSURED ANON THEY'RE GREAT BOOKS i mean obligate trigger warning for...everything tbh no sexual violence but honestly that's about it everything from brainwashing to murder to body horror to gore BUT THEY'RE GREAT BOOKS I'D GIVE THEM TO ANY CHILD filed under: reasons the rest of the polytonic squad probably is worried about me with their kids whatever idgaf i'm great with children no that's a lie i'm afraid of anyone under the age of 12 especially toddlers they're so uncontrolled but so so breakable oh my gosh anonymous asked and answered idiot teenagers with a queue also! my queue tag is a bastardized animorph's quote