The Lost Hero is the first book in Rick Riordan's second series about the adventures of the modern-day children of the Greek gods.
However, Percy Jackson fans, be forewarned: Percy doesn't appear in this book—in fact, he's missing! Oh no!
This new series—or, at least, this first book in the new series—focuses on three new campers:
Jason, who doesn't remember anything further back than waking up on a school bus full of delinquents. When he arrives at Camp Half-Blood, nothing feels quite right. He feels almost like he's on enemy territory. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that he speaks Latin fluently (instead of Greek), is drawn to wearing purple instead of orange, and has a tattoo of an eagle and the letters SPQR on his forearm?
The beautiful but down-to-earth Piper, who can talk almost anyone into doing almost anything. Unfortunately for our plucky band of heroes, she has a dark secret: her father has been kidnapped by the Big Bad, and if she doesn't sabotage the quest, he will be killed.
Leo, who has a nervous habit of building mechanical gadgets. He's warmly welcomed into the apparently-cursed Hephaestus cabin upon his arrival at Camp Half-Blood, but he's keeping a secret, too: he has a dangerous talent rare to the children of Hephaestus—a talent that brought about his mother's death.
If you're already a Rick Riordan fan, you've probably already read The Lost Hero. (I have no idea how I got so behind.) Riordan is one of my "Oh, just one more chapter" authors, in that I always mean to get around to doing other things, but I never manage to stop reading. I suspect that that's because he has a great knack for first sentence hook:
Even before he got electrocuted, Jason was having a rotten day.
Leo's tour was going great until he learned about the dragon.
The Lost Hero has the same formula as the early Percy Jackson books: Two boys and a girl on a quest that takes them all over North America; all three of them are fated to be gamechangers, but not necessarily in a good way; the hero—son of one of the Big Three—and the girl have romantic tension while the second boy is the comic relief. Lots of adventure, action, and humor, but the highlights for me, as always, are Riordan's re-imaginings of the Greek (and now, Roman) gods, heroes, monsters and villains. (Although I did feel bad for poor old Medea, who's cast as a villain. I mean, I understand why, but I still always feel bad for her.)
This one doesn't work particularly well as a stand-alone—unlike The Lightning Thief, which was a read that, at the end, had me hoping for a sequel, this one felt throughout like The First in a Larger Series. Not that I think that will even remotely be an issue for fans!
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Book source: ILLed through my library.
Don't worry. Percy's not gone for long. You should read The Son of Neptune right away...
Posted by: Nate Austin | 10 January 2012 at 12:56 PM
I assumed as much, given the title of Book Two! Looking forward to it.
Posted by: Leila | 10 January 2012 at 01:37 PM