#02 The Visitor

Narrator: Rachel
Cover tagline: No one knows who they are.
Interior tagline: Nine lives are better than one….
“My Name Is...”: My name is Rachel.
Page count: 175
Publication date: June 1996 (first edition), May 2011 (re-release)

Publisher’s description:
If someone told you Earth was under a silent attack, there’s a good chance you’d think they were pretty strange. If that same person said Earth’s only means of defense depends on the actions and powers of five kids, you’d probably start to look for a quick exit. Guess what? It’s all true.

Rachel and her friends knew they were in for some pretty strange stuff from the very beginning. How often do you run into a dying alien who gives you the power to morph into any animal you touch? But that was before they knew what they would be up against. Now they know. And they know what they have to do. Before it’s too late . . .

* Okay so that summary gives absolutely no information about the plot of this book. Already I am intrigued.

* This time we open up with “My name is Rachel.” Like Jake, she won’t tell us her last name, or the name of her town, school, or state. In fact, whenever she does use a last name, she assures us that it’s a fake. Except I think she forgot to run a find and replace command before going to print because Chapman’s name is still Chapman when he appears in books not narrated by the Animorphs. Whoops.

* I said last time that Rachel was the least developed character. Since this entire book is from her point of view, we should hopefully learn a little more about her, like when Tobias challenges her to a flying race and she tells us that she usually doesn’t turn down a challenge. Unless the challenge is not leaving Jake to be killed by monsters in a construction site, right, Rachel?

* REVERSE FORESHADOWING (POSTSHADOWING?) ALERT: “Tobias was the smoothest flyer. That was partly because red-tailed hawks are natural acrobats. Partly it was because Tobias had much more practice flying than the rest of us./

“Too much practice.”

* Um why is this written like it’s a secret setting up for some reveal? We already know he’s a bird. That happened in the last book. Focus, K.A.!

* Anyway the kids are all testing out their new bird morphs that they got from Cassie’s barn. Rachel is a bald eagle, Jake is a peregrine falcon, and Marco and Cassie both morphed the same osprey. Um, why? Couldn’t one of them have been a little more original?

* They come across some teenagers drinking beer in a pickup truck who start shooting at them, as teenagers are wont to do. Rachel tells us that Tobias “has special reasons for disliking anyone who would shoot at a bird.” Can we put this dog to bed yet? SPOILER ALERT he’s a bird.

* The Animorphs decide to take revenge on these teenage creeps by circling around behind them in the forest and divebombing them out of the trees. If Rachel hits one of the trees at that speed, “[she] was Spam.” I don’t even know what kind of reference to count that as.

* They steal the teenagers’ gun and beer and Tobias almost scalps one of the kids with his talons, because if there’s anything the Animorphs hate more than alien invasions, it’s underage drinking. Chester, who you know is a creep because he has a ponytail, says, “That ain’t right. It ain’t right that no bird should take my rifle like that.” Which is possibly the greatest line in any work of young adult fiction. Despite clearly climaxing here, however, the book goes on for another 164 pages for some reason.

* Rachel dumps the rifle “about a mile out in the ocean.” Fortunately for Rachel’s attempts to disguise her location, every state in America is bordered by an ocean.

* The Animorphs return to the bell tower of an abandoned church, where they left all their clothes and shoes. “Ay, nyew donk luk so good yourself, Rachel,” Marco says, his mouth distorted by growing out of a beak. Clearly he said, “Hey, you don’t look so good yourself, Rachel,” but because we are all idiots, Rachel has to clarify this for us immediately afterward.

* Every book in the series begins with a multi-page summary of the Yeerk invasion and the Animorphs meeting Elfangor and getting the morphing power, because you never know, maybe some poor kid will want to start reading with book #54. But when Rachel gets to the part where Visser Three eats Elfangor alive, she says, “You know what? I really don’t want to talk about that. . . . You’ll have to ask Jake.” Damn you for promoting the other books in your own series, K.A. Applegate!

Star Trek references: “The steel door opened. It slid into the wall like the doors on Star Trek.”

Lord of the Rings references: “She looks like one of those solemn elves in a Tolkien book.”

’90s references: Itchy and Scratchy

Animatopoeia:
Zzzziiinnnngggg!
Zziiiinnnnngggg!
Zoom. ZOOM!
Zoom!
SAWWWAPP!
Crash!
C-R-R-R-U-N-C-H!
B-O-O-O-O-M!
Slam!