Book Review: Animorphs #44, The Unexpected
Happy Friday Everyone,
We made it to the end of the week! Give yourself a big pat on the back and treat yourself to some serious R&R if you can. You deserve it!
I’ve been having a crazy busy week of reading, so I may take a day or so off to cool my jets.
But before I do that, I want to share my review of Animorphs #44, The Unexpected by KA Applegate.
Like the last ten or so books, I don’t believe I got this far in when I was a kid, so the story didn’t sound all that familiar. I will say that I was a little hesitant about this one because it sounds like the stakes aren’t very high, but like always I charged forward like the bullish Taurus I am. On to the review!
Blurb:
The Animorphs have been split up before. And they’ve had to fight battles without one another. But this time is very different. Not only is Cassie totally alone. She’s managed to find herself in Australia. In the rural Outback. The other Animorphs and Ax don’t even know she’s there.
Cassie doesn’t have any idea where she’s going, or if she can even survive the rugged terrain. But she does know she has to get to a town or village and contact her family and friends. Because she’s just realized that there’s someone else who is also new to the Outback.
GoodReads
The Review:
I gave this book three stars.
While technically this should be a 3.5, I had to bump it down for a number of reasons.
Alright, so this time around we’re in Cassie’s POV. On a mission to stop the Yeerks from recovering a chunk of one of their ships, Cassie finds herself separated from the others. Seeking safety, she hides in a cargo hold, waking up to the nightmare that she’s on a plane headed for God knows where. Can Cassie find a way out of this bind and make it home?
This book did have a lot of potential but I was a bit disappointed.
As usual, Cassie is, well, Cassie. Her character is portrayed very well throughout the book, and I felt that she had to make some tough decisions and didn’t torture herself quite as much as she usually does. That being said, the other Animorphs are something of an afterthought. They’re present at the beginning and end, but that’s about it and there’s nothing wrong with that. What I did feel was lacking was their teamwork effort. In the mission at the beginning Cassie is all on her own basically begging for her friends to answer her, and they only come in at the last minute to leave her stranded once again. It was really frustrating. Why didn’t they tell her about the plan? And even if there is danger around, how could they just leave her hanging like that? It didn’t make sense to me after all they’ve been through.
The plot was alright, but disjointed if you ask me. Nearly half of the book we spend getting Cassie to her destination, meaning we only get the last half to let the story fully develop. I would’ve preferred they cut down on the airport hijinks and spend more time on the main plot point.
Also, I feel that this book shouldn’t be occurring this late in the game. What I mean is, these one-character journeys of survival would be better placed at the beginning. I would’ve loved to see this one as #14 instead of the actual #14, which was quite disappointing. It’s just too late in the game for Cassie to go off on this relatively lower-stakes adventure. There are only ten books left. We need an amp up for the big finish, but we’re not really getting that with this story or the other recent ones, and that is dragging my score down.
Is this book well-written? Sure! Just don’t expect it to change the trajectory of this series by any means.
That’s a Wrap!
Thanks for stopping by, and happy reading!
Have you read this book before? What did you think? Do you have a book recommendation similar to this one? Feel free to share in the comments!
If you’d like to see other reviews of mine, feel free to check out the book review section of my blog or my GoodReads. You can also follow my GoodReads reviews here. There are some great binge-worthy books on there!
Have a great day!
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