The Departure

Wow! Iloved this Book! I think everyone was impressed because usually the Cassie books stink. This book is a turning point in the Animorph series. Cassie learns that she can't escape the war, but when she has to return, it will be even harder to fight . .

K.A. really tops herself with this book. I used to think of Yeerks as just evil slug with no feelings, no right to live. But after reading The Departure, I thought about what the Yeerks were really trying to do: survive. We do that when we eat animals and plants. If we said that the Yeerks were wrong for trying to survive, then we are wrong for eating plants and animals. Maybe there is a better way to survive then by taking over planets, like symbiosis, but the Yeerks don't know that, just like we don't think about substituting meat and plants with something else. Cassie understood that, and she accepted to be infested by Aftran to show her that maybe there was another way. Maybe what changed Aftran was the fact the Cassie didn't hate her, but pitied her. Maybe thats what we need to change Earth. Maybe thats why in book 52, Ax says that people like Cassie are more dangerous, because they pity the enemy.

A shame to leave this one out of your reading list! Cassie's usually the one to explore the moral dilemmas the Animorphs face, and The Departure is no exception. It's a different structure: the Jake chapters at the end, for example. However, I didn't think Applegate really succeeded in portraying the emotional devestation that would have been caused by Cassie's presumed loss late in the book - a minor detraction from a book that provides legitimate narrative furthering.

Cassie is tried of violence, tried of the Yeerks. She wants peace, but how can she get it? In this book Cassie leaves the Animorphs, for good. She quits. No more Animorphs for her. Then she finds someone who knows there secret. Will she go back to violence to solve this promlem and break her vow? Or will she stay w/ her morals and let this person(Or alien, I'm not telling!) live? To find out more about this book and see what happens, read it! It's really good!

This book is definatly going down as one of the best Animorph books along with 6 and 13. Who would ever think Cassie would ever go so far in her beliefs that "All Life is Sacred" I was shocked at what she did for Karen, Aftan and herself. It is a wonderful book.