Something new! (If you not on a reread :))
Rather than the shared points of view of The Andalite's Gift, we now have the first [[Animorphs Chronicles|chronicle]] book: a book written from a completely alien (heh) point of view to fill in some other part of the universe.
In this case Elfangor-Sirinial-Shamtul. The one who in a lot of ways started this whole mess. And after reading this book–apparently in more ways than we could believe.
On the plus side, we get a lot of fascinating world building. Learning more about Andelite culture directly, as opposed to via our normal human filters. Learning about Yeerks. Visser Three (before he was Three!). And Taxxons. And Skrit Na.
The Skrit Na ship was round, with tapered sides. It looked like a fat disc. You could hardly even see where the engines were, and the Skrit Na had blinking colored lights all around it. I guess they find that attractive or something.
(it’s a typical saucer shaped UFO)
On the other hand (minor spoilers, but it becomes obvious fairly early), time travel.
We’ve done that already–and not that long ago (The Forgotten). And… while it’s got some interesting points here, it makes things a bit too messy and convenient, at least in my opinion.
Especially when the two humans Elfangor meets (somewhat larger spoilers, although not for particular for this story) end up being Chapman (who is a *complete* oppurtunistic asshole... and Lauren--who is apparently Tobias' mother (bigger spoiler): I'll let you guess who his father is...
Yeah. Not my favorite.
But if you ignore the messier bits of time travel and tying everything together, it’s a solid book and an interesting point of view!
Onward nad back to the main story line.
Random thoughts (potential spoilers):
Of course, at that point all I heard was gibberish sounds. The translator chip, which all members of the Andalite military have implanted in their heads, requires a few minutes to begin to understand new languages. Some languages it never does get right. Fortunately, almost all species can understand our thought-speak since it works at a level beyond mere words.
Was wondering if they would touch on that ever. Or just ignore it.
It was perfectly spherical. A simple white sphere.
It looked harmless, even dull. And yet it was the most dangerous, deadly weapon any race had ever created.
Because of what it was, it could not be physically destroyed. But it had been hidden. As we watched, dumbfounded and afraid, the computer replayed the Skrit Na computer log.
It had been hidden on the planet called Earth. It had been buried deep in the ground in a desolate-looking area of blowing sand. And a huge stone pyramid had been raised over it.
Hidden for fifty thousand years.
Heh. Magical artifact under the pyramids.
But why?
The Time Matrix.
I found I had stopped breathing. I could barely imagine the power I was staring at. To move a ship into Zero-space took more power than a medium-sized star. To move anything through time took ten times that power. The power of ten suns. All somehow contained in that off-white sphere.
That seems off scale. If it only takes ten times the power of going to Zero-space (which we see even small ships doing) to travel in time… why don’t they do it more? I expect it’s also technically difficult?
I met a lot of humans who were working in the computer field. My human friend Bill used to come over to my room and we would exchange ideas. It was hard for me to simplify my knowledge enough for him to follow. Everything had to be explained in simple human terms, using words like “window” to explain a childishly simple concept.
And my human friend Steve thought it was a huge breakthrough to use symbolic icons and a simple pointer rather than a lot of complex language.
So… Elfagor pushed humans into computer technology (Bill Gates of Microsoft and Steve Wozniak of Apple). Convenient.
Yay ‘subtle’ references I suppose.
I don’t like it. 😄