Skip to main content

Book #34 The Lightning Thief : Percy Jackson and the Olympians

Last week I read the book, The Lightning Thief, by Rick Riordan which is the first book in a series of books, about humans that are half-human and half-god, they are called half-bloods.

This book brings us back in the world of Greek mythology, and then brings that world into western civilization in the United States. I loved this book, not only for the great writing, action packed plot, and dynamic characters, but because it has a lot of history, facts, myths, and tales rolled up into a fiction novel. I love that as a teacher's viewpoint, students would read this, and then want to read some Greek mythology to better understand characters in the book, circumstances, and innuendos. This story follows a 6th grade boy, Percy Jackson, from a school where he is attacked to Olympus where he.... I'll leave that up to you to find out!

I do have some criticism, Percy Jackson in the book is supposed to go to the Underworld and get the lightning bolt back, and then return it to Zeus to avoid a war, this means he has to travel across the United States on his own, with Gods and Monsters following him, and he's only a 6th grader? I don't think that is a very good age for this character to be, and I'm not sure if the author thought it would be the best age to start, to continue with his next novels in the series, but it doesn't seem plausible to me really. I wish that Percy would have been in 8th or 9th grade, and then I could really see him doing some of the stuff that he does in the book. In the movie version, he does seem a lot older, they don't allude to his age, which makes me think they wanted Percy to be older as well.

The movie version of this was what got me wanting to read the first book. Now that I have read the book though, I think the book is much better. The movie itself seems rushed, more complicated than it needs to be, and not as good with the conflict in the story. They made changes in the plot, in order to better explain it to people who have not watched the movie, but I think that it just made it more confusing, and that they should have just kept it like the book.

All in all though, I really liked the book, and I think that many people would enjoy this series, especially young students in 6th, 7th, and 8th grade. Although, many adults would too!

Rating: (out of seven stars)

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

So Lost...

For so long I have been focused on getting a full time job, and now that I have that I am once again focusing on my future. Questions just keep plaguing me like: "What am I going to be doing in a year?" "Will I go to grad school?" "Will I get a teaching job?" "Will I stay at my current job?" "Will I get another job somewhere?" And now I just can't seem to get these questions out of my head. I feel so lost.  I don't know what to do, where to apply, how to find new opportunities. Ever since I was a little kid, I have been striving for something. Whether it's doing well in sports each season, or getting good grades at the end of the year, getting Top 10 of my class, and then graduating high school, then it was doing well in college, finding a good major, and then graduating. Now that I am done with all that, I am finding that it's hard for me not to feel a little lost, lonely, confused, and without purpose. Once I discove...
1 comment
Read more

Book # 38 Water for Elephants

Thanks to a co-worker who lent me the book, and friends and family that told me how amazing this book was, I finally read, Water for Elephants , by Sara Gruen. I have been hearing rave reviews from friends, family, coworkers, online sites, and other blogs about this book, and I have to say that I agree whole-heartedly. This is a wonderful book about love, life, the circus, and how connected people can become with each other and animals in such a short time. It's a stunning tale of the carnival and circus people of a time long ago, and how their lives revolved around the circus, the performers, the workmen, the animals, and the crowds. I loved all the characters in this book, and it was really interesting going from the past to the present with the main character. The love between Marlena and Jacob is so wonderful, and pure that it's a great part of this book. I also love how involved and invested Jacob becomes with the animals and some people in the circus. It's a tale of...
2 comments
Read more

Book # 19

Today I had a day off, so I spent my day cleaning my apartment, listening to christmas music, catching up on shows, and the best of all, reading. I started and finished the 18th book, Something Like Fate  by Susane Colasanti. Another wonderful book from the warehouse book sale. This is by far my favorite of the three Colasanti books that I own, and have read recently. This is a book that really shows the reality of high school: the pressures, the people, the attitudes, the cruelty, the mocking, the relationships, and the hardness. I remember high school and how easy it was for someone to ruin another person's reputation with a few words that might not even be true. That's what happens in this book, Lani and Erin are best friends and then Erin starts dating Jason. Although, Jason and Lani are pretty much soul mates for high school anyways. The chaos ensues from there, and we see how relationships are built, torn down, and how reputations are ruined. This book also adds in fa...
1 comment
Read more