Animorphs | ryuuzaki's Blog

The other day, I found my collection of Animorphs books.

The the thing that defined me as a person during my teenage years was my love of the Animorphs.  The problem with being an excellent reader is that you really loose your childhood.  By the time I was ten, I was already reading books that were far too difficult for the average person of my age.  Though this is admirable, those books really weren't aimed at me.  I loved Sherlock Holmes and James Bond books dearly, but they're books about adults, and not really relevant to the aspirations of a tweenager.

The Animorphs series by K.A.Applegate was my guilty pleasure.  My mother despaired of me, as the books were far too simplistic for someone of my reading skill and I could easily finish reading one in a few hours (£5 wasted in her eyes, when the same amount could be spent on a book that would last me weeks).  But I loved them.

I started the series when I found the third book at a school bookfaire.  I think I was attracted to it by its cover - brilliant violet with a picture of a boy gradually transforming into a hawk.  I was hooked from the moment I read it.  These were children whom (I imagined) were my age and yet the whole fate of the planet was resting on their shoulders.  Although they were young and ordinary, they were given the power to turn into any animal that they could touch in order to do this.  I wrote so much Animorphs fanfiction when I was a kid - inserting myself into their universe.  I still maintain that these books were the thing that encouraged me to write.

I regret that I do not have the whole series.  I think I've counted volumes 1-43 in my collection, as well as Megamorphs 1-3, The Hork-Bajir Chronicles, The Andalite Chronicles and Alternamorphs #1.  I don't know why I stopped buying them - whether they stopped publishing them in the UK or whether my mother finally put her foot down.  I intend to keep them until they disintegrate though.  I'm hoping to find the missing volumes too.  It looks like I still need volumes 44-54, Visser, The Ellimist Chronicles, Megamorphs #4 and Alternamorphs #2.  I hope that eBay can help me gain a complete collection.