The Visitor (Mini-Review)

The Visitor by Chris Grine is an adaptation of the second Animorphs book by K.A.Applegate. The Animorphs continue to fight against the Yeerks while knowing hardly anything about the invading aliens. Their idea to learn more is to observe Chapman to see if he can give them any more leads. But to do that Rachel must face the true horror of what the Yeerks are doing.

I tend to have Mini-Reviews be spoiler free. But as this is an adaptation, I am not going to hold onto that rule like usual. So if you don't want spoilers for the graphic novel adaptation or the original book, I suggest you read those first before continuing.

In the original book there is a scene that perfectly showcases a weakness of Rachel's as well as a real life fear that many women have without making you think any less of the character. It is actually a scene that is only truly terrifying once you're older and can really think about what actually almost happened. The scene is more artfully crafted than most would think. In the scene Rachel has failed to connect with Melissa so the Animorphs can start infiltrating the Chapman household. As the stresses of realizing she should have stayed close to Melissa before the war and being a child soldier get to her, she decides she wants to fight an enemy that is beatable. So instead of calling her mom, she decides to go down an alley and finds a pedophile. After a quick half-morph she scares the monster away.

How does Chris Grine handle the scene? Without the internal monologue, we only find out Rachel was supposed to call her mom after the scene ends. So understanding how the scene reveals Rachel's character is much more subtext than in the original book. One change I loved was that the two people shooting at the Animorphs at the beginning of the book, reappear as the rapists. It's a nice bit of continuity that wasn't there before.

There are a few Animorphs Easter egg for die hard fans. I know, I know, this is an Animorphs book so of course there will be references. But two ones only those really into the series with get at first glance. One is when the two rapists are chasing Rachel, they go by Applegrant Bookstore. Katherine Applegate and Micheal Grant worked on the Animorphs series. So some fans have combined their names to form Applegrant. The other comes at the end of the book where the letter to Melissa is shown. The symbol on the bottom is that of the Animorphs tv show. I think I had a necklace of the symbol back in the day. This shows that Chris Grine is writing for the fans which is a great relief.

One nitpick is that "It was a dark and stormy night" was originally part of Rachel's narration. So it would've been nice to see it translated into dialogue and attributed to her. But the line was given to Marco. I get that he's the comedian of the group, but still...

I would suggest The Visitor by Chris Grine to those who love science fiction. I would also suggest The Visitor by Chris Grine to fans of the original Animorphs books.