The Lightning Thief is the awesome first book of the Percy Jackson and The Olympians series.
There are four books so far and a fifth coming in May.
The Lightning Thief is the story of Percy Jackson, a twelve-year-old kid from New York city, and his discovery that his father is Poseidon, the greek god of the sea. He goes to a camp for half-bloods, half god half humans, and is given a quest to retrieve Zeus' master bolt. On his journey he makes new friends, but many new enemies like Ares, the god of war. He gets the bolt and discovers Kronos, king of the titans and father of the gods, is behind the theft. This begins the war building through the following books.
I loved this book and all the other books in it's series. It is a great molding of modern and mythology. It is the perfect answer to "What would it be like if the world was run by giant immortal gods?" It has all the Greek monsters and gods from the mythology you know and a lot more that you don't.
The mythology is changed slightly to make it more modern. Like Medusa being a garden statue vendor on the highway, Ceberus being a rottweiler, or Ares being a biker who carries around a shotgun. Percy and his friends visit the Lotus Hotel and Casino in Vegas like Odysseus and the Lotus eaters. They even have to escape Crusty the water bed salesman like Theseus from Procrustes. These changes shift the stories to fit the times and make The Lightning Thief an even more enjoyable read.
The story is also funny and easy to relate to. Obviously not the demigod part, but it is focused on teens. Percy isn't one yet in this book but his friends are and he is in all the other books.
He also is dyslexic and ADHD, so he doesn't really fit the "hero" role to well which makes the book funnier, along with his friend Grover the clumsy and short saytr who is the comic relief of the story. Without humor a book just isn't as good.
The whole book isn't just stupid monsters and jokes it also has a lot of interesting mythological stories and creatures you probably never heard of before like Charon, the skeletal spirit guider of the Underworld or Furies, Hades' torturers. The blend of all these elements seem to balance the book and make it enjoyable for more than just teenagers. My mom even reads these books!
Rick Riordan is a great author whose books are enjoyed by many people. Check out The Lightning Thief, I'm sure you'll enjoy it. If you like mythology and you like exciting books, this is the book for you. The Lightning Thief is all that cool mythology without all the boring writing style. Great mythology made better,The Lightning Thief can't be missed.
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I also have read this series of books by Rick Riordan. I would go as far to say that these books should be required reading for English One. While I was studying mythology in English One I began reading this series of books to help enhance my understanding of the reading material required by my teacher. This series of books takes ancient Greek mythology and puts a modern spin on it while still keeping it relatively accurate. Rick Riordan does a great job putting mythology into a modern, easy to read and interesting text. I also highly recommend these books.
ReplyDeleteI’ve read most of Rick Riordan’s series, and enjoyed most of it. The books are harder to appreciate when I am older because the language is more focused on younger readers, yet the books are still great. The Lightning Thief was an excellent book, to me, because of the way mythology is incorporated into the present day world. Riordan also includes many humorous situations in his novels which make reading his books all the more fun. This book also helped out during English 1 when we studied the topic of mythology. This series, and especially this book, I would recommend to anyone.
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