Sunday, February 22, 2009

The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan


We're you ever fascinated by the different myths about the Greek and Roman gods? I know I always was as a kid. I could never keep everyone straight (just the major players) but I loved the stories! I still do. I could psychoanalyze for you why I find them so fascinating, but that's a long story for another post some day.

"The Lightning Thief" by Rick Riordan is a book written for middle schoolers - but don't stop reading this review! It's more than worth the read as an adult! Why? Well, remember those Greek and Roman gods I was mentioning? Imagine that they were real, and that they never actually died out just because the Greeks and the Romans we're no longer around to tell stories about them. No, they changed with the times and followed the center of civilaztions power as it moved from one place to the other, until they finally came to America.

That's right, Zeus, Athen, Poseidon, they all play their part in the real world, and they even have kids! You remember, the gods were always a sucker for a cute mortal. The children born to these mortal parents are demi-gods, heroes. They are also in constant danger. Monsters (which of course are real as well) can smell the god-blood in these demi-god children and they like to hunt them down. Many of these children are doomed to live a very short life, but there is hope for their survival.

Hope comes in the form of Camp Half-Blood, a training camp for the demi-gods, and the children just have to get there! Some find their way on their own, some of them are lucky enough to have their god-parent inform their mortal parent about the camp, and the others are found by scouts. At Camp Half-Blood they learn to fight as well as learning more about their heritage.

"The Lightning Thief" is book one in the series "Percy Jackson and the Olympians." Percy thinks he's a normal boy, although he'd be the first to admit he gets in trouble on a regular basis. He soon finds out that his life is a lot more complicated than he thought, his best friend is actually a satyr, and it's going to be up to him to save the world!

It's an easy read, but it's a lot of fun! Go out and get it :)

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