Were they keeping a Journal? What is the explanation for the start of books?

[Splintercell100]

I always wondered how the start of all the books fit in with the normal story. The repetitive nature always bugged me and felt forced. Although, I will admit that when I was younger, I liked the sense of realism at first but then it got boring. So were the Animorphs keeping a journal or was it something the Ellimist did? Or is there never really an explanation because if you look at #54, there is no way Rachel would have time to write anything down as seeing as she died. (I think at best it might be a memory capture-like thing that the Ellimist stored but obviously there is no proof.)

On a side note, do you honestly think there will ever be a continuation of the Animorph's series? Like Book #55 or has the time totally gone away? What about a movie?

[Chad32]

I think the original idea is that they're writing diaries to make public about the invasion. Since they use present tense, it's not telling people what's already happened, like writing a book after the war is over.

[Aldrea Hammee]

I think this is another example of KA just changing her mind as the series went on. At first perhaps she wanted things to be like a journal of sorts, keeping track of the underground resistance or whatever. (Although, that raises another problem. If these kids were smart enough to know they couldn't trust anyone "I can't tell you my last name, etc." why would they keep a journal that could easily be discovered? Especially Jake!) After the first couple books I think it was just a good pov for her to use. Keeps the reader in the action, and it would also be kind of weird to switch to a different pov say, three books in.

I highly doubt KA intended the characters to be writing in a journal throughout the series. As somebody above me posted, Rachel would've had no time to write a journal entry in #54, and some books, for example MM #4, take place in alternate realities or have characters getting their memories altered, so they wouldn't be able to write about their experiences.

[11:11]

I can't remember what book it was, but it was a Jake book really late in the series and he was all "in the secret accounts that we've kept" or something along those lines. So the idea of them keeping journals or whatever wasn't completely forgotten. I dunno though.

[A ghost you know]

I blame the Ellimist. Yeah, I hate it when everything is explained by "the Ellimist did it", but there's no better explanation here.

#1: Two of the Animorphs (Jake and Rachel) have siblings that could stumble across the diaries and wreck everything. Tom is a Controller, so that would make his discovery a million times worse. There's no way the Anis would be taking that kind of risk.
#2: There is no way on this green Earth that Marco, highly-paranoid Marco, would be writing this stuff down unless Visser 3 was holding a Dracon to his head. Even then I doubt it.
#3: As others have said, the Animorphs had their memories wiped after various missions, and they hardly had time to write this stuff during those missions.
#4: Rachel died, yet her writing continued while she talked with the Ellimist. That means either Rachel (and the rest of the Animorphs) were writing the books or the Ellimist was, and Rachel wasn't in any position to be writing. Even if she had been, it would have been the last thing on her mind.
#5: We know the Ellimist wrote at least one of the books (the Ellimist Chronicles); why couldn't he have written all of them?

The only flaw here is in #4. Rachel's writing continued until she died, not a moment longer. The Ellimist should have been able to keep going after her death, while Rachel obvious couldn't have.
I think there's is a decent explanation, though. As we discovered in #7, the Ellimist doesn't know everything. Perhaps he could only access the Animorphs' thoughts and memories once they had been created? Since Rachel died mid-thought, he would be unable to finish the sentence for her.

[anijen21]

the diary-log thing is a cool gimmick, but it does start to fall apart if you examine it too closely. Not only can Rachel, Tobias, and Jake (?) not update their diaries up to the moment that they die, but seriously guys? All the sound effects? Really? And how did the good Rachel/bad Rachel thing work?

[roguebluejay]

So, basically we have just shown that AppleGrant is the Ellimist.

[MoppingBear]

maybe its all of their hirac dialests

[CounterInstinct]

I think it's just as if the animorphs and ax were retelling their stories. It was just an effective way of storytelling and we're all thinking too much. Remember, the concept of Animorphs according to KA was for kids to get inside the minds of children.

First person.

[LisaCharly]

I find Grapplegate's first-person narratives way stronger than their third-person narratives. Anis and EW are much more solid and emotionally-packed than Gone or Remnants.

[Alex Oiknine]

Maybe memoir is a better term.

And naturally the Ellimist lets them finish writing up their memoir after they die, like in Rachel's case. Sometime in the next fifty or sixty years we'll get these HUGE books full of the memoirs of all the Animorphs from Rachel's death point onward.

[Tim Bruening]

How did Tobias write anything?  (How would he hold a pen in his talons?).

[Redtailednothlit]

^exactly the question I was about to ask. How would Tobias write anything pre-13? And why would he, post-23, knowing Visser Three was suspicious of him?

We know that Ax keeps an Earth diary though. I would have liked to have read more of that!

[Tim Bruening]

^exactly the question I was about to ask. How would Tobias write anything pre-13? And why would he, post-23, knowing Visser Three was suspicious of him?

We know that Ax keeps an Earth diary though. I would have liked to have read more of that!

Tobias only wrote ONE book pre-13 (book 3, The Encounter).  It could be that Applegate postponed the next Tobias book because she realized that he was having trouble writing in his bird form!

Might the books be tyhe result of the type of device Elfangor was using to record his story just before he died (The Andalite Chronicles)?

[Redtailednothlit]

^exactly the question I was about to ask. How would Tobias write anything pre-13? And why would he, post-23, knowing Visser Three was suspicious of him?

We know that Ax keeps an Earth diary though. I would have liked to have read more of that!

Tobias only wrote ONE book pre-13 (book 3, The Encounter).  It could be that Applegate postponed the next Tobias book because she realized that he was having trouble writing in his bird form!

Might the books be tyhe result of the type of device Elfangor was using to record his story just before he died (The Andalite Chronicles)?

To be fair, he also contributed to MM1, which took place before #13. Plus, assuming they write as they go along, Tobias would have written most of #13 as a hawk as he didn't acquire his human self until near the end of the book.

In all honesty though, I've always wondered (in-universe) what the purpose of the whole "we can't tell you our names" etc spiel is. I mean, they give away other information about themselves freely. Assuming names have been changed, how many high-ranking yeerks had to go away for 4 days for a funeral? How many teenagers live at a wildlife rehabilitation clinic AND have a mum who works at the local wildlife Park? How many beautiful, gymnastic best friends does the daughter of the school principal have?  And the only son of Visser One's host, well...

Obviously I understand that as an author, KA used the "can't tell you who we are" thing as a device to create the atmosphere of tension, of suspicion, of not knowing who can be trusted and who can't. But in-universe? It doesn't make sense.