Animorphs #1: The Invasion, K.A. Applegate

I love children's books. They move so quickly! In just the first few chapters, an alien crashes to earth and gives our protagonists the ability to morph into any animal they touch so they can fight the evil Yeerks (basically slug bodysnatchers, but not cool ones like Skip from Starstruck). Backstories get told to us directly, by the narrator. These kids are making plans and executing plans left and right, finding the Yeerk pool and confronting their leader, Visser Three, before the end of this book. Love that. Its fun when characters get things done. Its also fun when they turn into lizards and have to literally control their lizard brain impulses.

I think i probably missed these as a kid because by the time I was old enough to be ready for the violence and death in these books I was being encouraged by teachers to read more advanced work. K.A. Applegate's prose is very functional, without frills or subtlety, which took some getting used to since I read this right after The Vegetarian. But The Invasion was such a propulsive start, I look forward to reading Animorphs #2 next time I need something short and fast. My library has the entire series on Libby! I can get them whenever I want for free!