LOL I HAVE ACTUALLY REREAD THIS ONE SORT OF RECENTLY!
my thoughts:
1) Why do you think that Cassie does not contract the Yamphut?
Plot-induced immunity tbh. Actually, I think Yamphut is kind of stupid. It doesn't make any sense that an alien disease is virulent to humans. There are very few diseases on Earth that can be contracted inter-specially, unless you've got AIDS or something and can die from feline pneumonia. Bacteria and viruses evolve to attack very specific biologies, so an Andalite-evolved disease would probably have no effect on human biology. NOT TO MENTION that if morphing can heal tissue damage from injuries, why can't it heal tissue damage from disease? Maybe ten years worth of fanon is working against me here, but I always assumed that the morphing technology purged any foreign organic growth, excluding whatever the morpher intended, eg clothes and Yeerks.
2) What do you think about Cassie performing brain surgery? Is it at all realistic? Additionally, do you think the Chee could have/should have been more help?
I actually really liked the level of detail that they used describing the actual brain surgery. I liked that she used the saw that cut the holes in birdhouses, I liked the description of her disinfecting the wound and cutting him open, idk. I did not like the "it will heal on its own" though because that was unnecessary considering he CAN MORPH which I think was dropped very often in ghost-written books for some reason. Anyway, it was very well-paced, tense, and believable. Besides, it's not like she was actually digging around in gray matter, she was just doing an appendectomy in Ax's head and those are supposed to be pretty easy surgeries. idk. I bought it.
3) How does Cassie do on a mission alone?
I usually hate Cassie, but once again, I liked this. I liked the sense of hopelessness that started to creep in as the Animorphs dropped out one by one, leaving her alone, because tbh she was always kind of the weakest link as far as confidence and courage. So she really stepped up to the plate in this case, and that was nice to see.
4) Cassie saves Aftran, and is faced with her dying of Kandrona starvation. Instead of letting her suffer, they allow her to use the Escafil Device to morph whale permanently. This ends up being the same motive that moves Cassie to steal the cube later on. My question is: How did Cassie not see the answer to the Yeerk problem then and there? Why did it take another 15 books or more?
Simple answer: Because she is a moralistic moron. Sorry, I really don't like her character, and I HATE HATE HATE how she was left off the hook for her actions so much. Ugh. I can never verbalize why I feel this way, but idk...all of her actions were guided by her conscience alone, and never the pragmatic sort of rationality that Marco or Jake employed. And that pragmatism was villified in the end while Cassie's intentions were validated...ugh THE ROAD TO HELL IS PAVED WITH GOOD INTENTIONS, and I think letting her off so easy on so many of these counts revealed a kind of favoritism and immaturity. I'm still pissed at her about leaving David in rat morph, and that was a mess Rachel ended up cleaning up for her.
7) How do you feel about the character of Tidwell/Illim?
I really liked him. I really liked his limited character development: I don't know why, but the detail of him flicking soap bubbles at his wife really stuck with me. I like when hosts are given believable, sympathetic motivations for becoming hosts or joining the Sharing or w/e. The Yeerks exploiting those levels of human vulnerability are what make them such evil, awesome villains.
6) Anything else? Funny moments? Sad moments? Intense moments?
I am dee-dee-dee-lirious!
And when Ax and Erek were playing that game and Ax is like "I now owe Erek one million dollars" lol idk it was really funny in a sick, scary way. Very effective. This is one of, if not my very favorite ghost-written book. Thirty-three probably comes in at a close second, but that one was a little bit too twisted and unlikely to work as well as this one.
