Book #76 of 2022: The Test by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs #43) This Animorphs novel is a direct sequel to ghostwriter Ellen Geroux’s earlier story #33 The Illusion, in which Tobias gets tortured by the unhinged sub-visser “Taylor.” The same antagonist is back for this tale, quickly recapturing the hawk boy after he makes the …
Tag Archives: reread
Book Review: The Journey by K. A. Applegate
Book #70 of 2022: The Journey by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs #42) In another riff on a classic sci-fi premise, this Animorphs novel by ghostwriter Emily Costello — fresh off her dubious success with Alternamorphs #2 — finds the team shrinking down to microscopic size, in order to chase a squad of Helmacrons who have …
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Book Review: The Familiar by K. A. Applegate
Book #64 of 2022: The Familiar by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs #41) Following another particularly gruesome battle in which the Animorphs barely escape with their lives, their leader Jake staggers home, too exhausted to comfort his traumatized girlfriend Cassie or take his usual precautions like changing clothes or checking himself for signs of blood. He’s …
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Book Review: The Next Passage by K. A. Applegate
Book #58 of 2022: The Next Passage by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs Alternamorphs #2) Here is the nicest thing I can say about this second Animorphs choose-your-own-adventure title: it is better than the first one. (It’s not a sequel, though: the “you” before was another kid who was wandering through the abandoned construction site of …
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Book Review: Back to Before by K. A. Applegate
Book #52 of 2022: Back to Before by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs Megamorphs #4) The fourth and final Megamorphs volume opens in media res, with the bloody aftermath of a recent Animorph skirmish against the Yeerks. By this point in the wider franchise, we don’t need any specifics about that particular mission; we can simply …
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Book Review: The Last Dark by Stephen R. Donaldson
Book #47 of 2022: The Last Dark by Stephen R. Donaldson (The Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant #4) The grand finale to the Thomas Covenant saga moves slower than one might predict, given the apocalyptic atmosphere and scant amount of time remaining for the Land. The sun and stars have all gone out, the Worm …
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Book Review: The Other by K. A. Applegate
Book #46 of 2022: The Other by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs #40) This is one of the more difficult Animorphs volumes to read, I think, because it shines an ugly light on a bigotry in Ax that I don’t believe we’ve seen before. It turns out that our noble alien visitor, along with most of …
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Book Review: The Hidden by K. A. Applegate
Book #40 of 2022: The Hidden by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs #39) I don’t always love the weirder Animorphs plots, but this one lands just right for me. In a sudden flare-up of simmering continuity, the Yeerks have repaired a piece of Helmacron technology from #24 The Suspicion, allowing them to track down incidents of …
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Book Review: Against All Things Ending by Stephen R. Donaldson
Book #35 of 2022: Against All Things Ending by Stephen R. Donaldson (The Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant #3) This penultimate volume has perhaps the slowest start of any Thomas Covenant story, with literally the first five chapters — one hundred full pages, almost a fifth of the whole text — spent on an extended …
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Book Review: The Arrival by K. A. Applegate
Book #34 of 2022: The Arrival by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs #38) The Andalites are here! Well, sort of. It’s not the reinforcement fleet that the Animorphs have been expecting while waging their desperate resistance war against the Yeerk occupiers. Instead, Ax’s people have sent a vanguard of just four warriors, with a stated objective …
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