The Lightning Thief

Author: Rick Riordan

Genre: Fantasy

Series: Percy Jackson & The Olympians (book #1)

Summary

(Note: Since a good synopsis of this book already exists from the publisher at barnesandnoble.com, I copied the following section from that site. My own evaluation of the book starts with the section "Positive Elements.")

Twelve-year-old Percy Jackson is about to be kicked out of boarding school . . . again. No matter how hard he tries, he can't seem to stay out of trouble. But can he really be expected to stand by and watch while a bully picks on his scrawny best friend? Or not defend himself against his pre-algebra teacher when she turns into a monster and tries to kill him? Of course, no one believes Percy about the monster incident; he's not even sure he believes himself.

Until the Minotaur chases him to summer camp.

Suddenly, mythical creatures seem to be walking straight out of the pages of Percy's Greek mythology textbook and into his life. The gods of Mount Olympus, he's coming to realize, are very much alive in the twenty-first century. And worse, he's angered a few of them: Zeus's master lightning bolt has been stolen, and Percy is the prime suspect.

Now Percy has just ten days to find and return Zeus's stolen property, and bring peace to a warring Mount Olympus. On a daring road trip from their summer camp in New York to the gates of the Underworld in Los Angeles, Percy and his friends–one a satyr and the other the demigod daughter of Athena–will face a host of enemies determined to stop them. To succeed on his quest, Percy will have to do more than catch the true thief: he must come to terms with the father who abandoned him; solve the riddle of the Oracle, which warns him of failure and betrayal by a friend; and unravel a treachery more powerful than the gods themselves.

Positive Elements

The author does a good job developing Percy's character from a troubled kid to a budding hero. Percy is loyal to his friends, and displays much courage and wit when facing difficult situations. He deeply loves his mother and risks great danger to both protect and rescue her. One of his teachers, Mr. Brunner (who turns out to be a centaur and Camp Half-Blood instructor named Chiron), pushes Percy to do his best in spite of his ADHD and dyslexia. Ultimately, good triumphs over evil, although there is a set-up for the sequel at the end of the book.

Spiritual Content

Given that this is a book incorporating Greek mythology, I was interested to see that the author gave a nod to the one true God. Chiron tells Percy great powers are at work in his life and that gods are very much alive. Percy responds by saying, "Wait, you're telling me there's such a thing as God." Chiron answers, "Well, now, God - capital G, God. That's a different matter altogether. We shan't deal with the metaphysical." He goes on to say he was referring to "gods, plural, as in, great beings that control the forces of nature and human endeavors: the immortal gods of Olympus. That's a smaller matter."

That said, because worshiping the gods was a common practice in ancient Greece, there are still spiritual elements to the story. Percy learns that monsters (such as a Minotaur) can be killed, but do not die because they do not have souls. They can be dispelled for awhile, but they are primal forces and eventually re-form. The kids at Camp Half-Blood offer bits of their dinners as an aromatic burnt offering to the gods. Percy meets with the spirit of Delphi to learn the prophecy for a quest he has been challenged to accept. She speaks to him through a green mist that wraps around his brain so that he hears her voice in his head. Percy prays on two occasions: once, he says "Father, help me," to his father Poseidon, and another time he finds himself muttering a prayer, though he isn't sure to whom.

One's behavior in life determines which part of the Underworld one lives in after death. At either extreme, "good" people live in Elysium, a luxurious, gated community, and "bad" people live in the Fields of Punishment, where they are tortured for eternity. Percy's quest involves traveling with two friends to the Underworld to meet with Hades. Once there, he sees a televangelist in the entry line who had raised millions of dollars for orphanages, but then got caught spending it on luxury items for himself. He died in a police chase when his "Lamborghini for the Lord" went off a cliff. Percy asks why a preacher who believes in a different hell would be in the Underworld. His friend responds, "Who says he is seeing this place the way we're seeing it? Humans see what they want to see."

Sexual Content

A large part of the stories of the gods and goddesses involve their intimate relations with each other and with mortals. The affairs are not graphically explained in the book, but the reader knows that the relationships occurred, as well as the names of any children that resulted. The author writes that after WWII, the "Big Three" (Zeus, Poseidon and Hades) agreed that they would not father any more children because their children were too powerful and affecting the course of human events too much. However, Poseidon broke the agreement and had a secret relationship with a mortal who conceived and bore Percy. As a result, Percy is considered a demigod or half-blood.

The reluctant director of Camp Half-Blood, Dionysis, has the job partly as a punishment from his father Zeus for having relations with a wood nymph. Ares has a date with his girlfriend Aphrodite who is married to Hephaestus.

Violent Content

There is plenty of sword-fighting (Percy carries a pen that, when uncapped, becomes a sword). When a monster is slain, it explodes into a yellow powder and vaporizes on the spot. Percy kills a minotaur by first removing, and then driving, his own horn into his side. A battle with the Furies involves whips, Percy's sword, and Annabeth's knife. Percy uses his sword to kill Medusa, and then he severs her head and ships it in a box to Mt. Olympus. Percy battles a fire-breathing Chimera. Percy slashes Procrustes with his sword in an effort to save his endangered friends. In a battle with Ares, Percy stabs his sword into Ares' foot, causing ichor (the golden blood of the gods) to flow from the wound. Percy contemplates kicking his cruel stepfather in the groin.

Drug/Alcohol Content

Gabe (Percy's stepfather) is a poker-playing, beer-drinking, and cigar-smoking man. We are told he spends a lot of money on beer. Dionysis is the god of wine and at one point he conjures up a glass. He looks to Zeus and apologizes before changing it to a can of Diet Coke. Some people waiting to enter the Underworld smoke cigarettes. A surfer "screamed something about bad mushrooms" when he sees Percy and his friends surface unexpectedly in the ocean.

Crude Language

In frustration, Percy calls his English teacher an "old sot." Percy nicknamed his stepfather "smelly Gabe." There are several occurrences of curse phrases in ancient Greek.

Other Negative Elements

Gabe asks Percy to provide his gambling funds and to keep it secret from his mom. He is selfish and demanding of Percy's mom. At the end of the story, Percy gives his mom the box containing Medusa's head (it was returned to him by his father). He encourages her to use it on Gabe (anyone who looks at the head turns into a statue). She says she could never do that, but later Percy receives word that Gabe went missing and, "on an unrelated note," Percy's mom sold her first life-size statue of a poker player to an art collector in New York.

Percy, Grover and Annabeth steal clothes from a closed-down water park.

Percy's friend Annabeth (another demigod) explains that he has dyslexia because he is hard-wired for ancient Greek, and in fact, reading it does come easier for him. His difficulty sitting still is because of battlefield reflexes which, in a real fight, will keep him alive. His attention problems are because he sees too much - he has better senses than regular mortals. Annabeth then tells him, "Of course the teachers want you medicated. Most of them are monsters. They don't want you seeing them for what they are."

Discussion

These Literature Circle questions were present in the copy I read, and I thought some might find them helpful when discussing the book:

1. Describe what kind of student Percy Jackson is. What troubles does he have in school?

2. What is Percy's relationship with his mother? Why does he think she has bad luck?

3. What does Percy discover about the Greek gods at Camp Half-Blood? What do they have to do with the camp?

4. Why is Percy more excited than scared about his upcoming quest to the Underworld? What other feelings does he have about his assignment?

5. What clues do Percy and his friends have that all is not right with "Auntie Em"? Why do you think they overlook the clues?

6. What does Percy's fight with Echidna reveal about his character? What new things does he discover about himself?

7. The god Ares says he loves America. He calls it "the best place since Sparta." What does he mean? Do you agree with his assessment of America? Why? Why not?

8. At the Lotus Casino, Percy realizes that unless he gets out quickly, he will "...stay here, happy forever, playing games forever, and soon I'd forget my mom, and my quest, and maybe my own name. I'd be playing Virtual Rifleman with groovy Disco Darrin forever." What critique is the author offering of modern life? Do you agree with it?

9. When describing the effects of Mist, Chiron says, "Remarkable, really, the lengths humans will go to fit things into their version of reality." How is this true in the novel? In Greek mythology?

10. When Percy finally meets his father, Poseidon seems distant and hard to read. Percy says that he is actually glad about this. "If he'd tried to apologize, or told me he loved me, or even smiled - that would have felt fake. Like a human dad, making some lame excuse for not being around." Do you agree with Percy?

11. How does the last line of the prophecy - you shall fail to save what matters most in the end - come true? What do you think of this ending? Did Percy make the right choice?

12. Throughout the story, Percy is troubled by frightening dreams. In what ways do those dreams increase the tension in the story? Is their menace completely resolved by the end of the story?

13. After her return from the quest, Annabeth resolves to try again to live with her father and her stepfamily. Do you think they will all get along better now? Why? Why not? What do you predict will happen?

14. In the end of the book, do you sympathize at all with Luke's feelings of betrayal? Is there anything you can relate to about his point of view?

15. Percy's learning difficulties become strengths in a different context. What seem to be attention problems enable him to be aware of all sides of attack during a battle. While he struggles to read English, he masters ancient Greek almost effortlessly. What skills are valued most in today's society? How might students who struggle today have been successful in a different moment in history?

Conclusion

I thought this book was a fast-paced, creative, humorous and well-written introduction to the characters and stories of Greek mythology, a subject most children will study at some point in their academic career. As with most books, there is room for discussion and analysis with your reader afterward, focusing especially on separating mythological beliefs from Biblical beliefs. Also, for children who live with ADHD and/or dyslexia, I am not sure how the author's use of these conditions will be received. I did not like the idea that teachers want these kids medicated because most of them are monsters and don't want the kids discovering their true identity.