It has been a while since I've done any fantasy, so I picked up Rick Riordan's The Lightning Thief. When I met the publisher's rep back in February, she was all excited about the sequel to this one coming out (The Sea of Monsters), but I shrugged it off. I shouldn't have. I really enjoyed it.

Percy (short for Perseus) Jackson is on his sixth school in six years. He has all sorts of learning disabilities, including ADHD and dyslexia. When he's attacked by his math teacher and disintegrates her with a pen/sword, he realizes that in fact, he is a half-blood. His father is a god, and his mother a mortal. Because it turns out that the ancient Greek gods weren't myths. They really do exist, and their home, Mount Olympus, has followed the seat of Western Civilization for centuries. It's currently hanging out on top of the Empire State building in New York City.

Anyways, with the help of a satyr named Grover, Percy makes his way to Camp Half-Blood, a safe place for the children of gods to hang out and train. There Percy is assigned a quest of monumental importance. Hades has convinced Zeus that Poseidon stole his thunderbolt, and World War Three is about to break out. Poseidon claims innocence of any wrong doing and assigns Percy the job of going down to Hades to get the thunderbolt back. Along to help him are Annabeth (daughter of Athena) and Grover the satyr.

Beyond being a really fun adventure story, the book is funny. For instance, once the kids reach Hades, they are directed into three lines, "two marked ATTENDANT ON DUTY, and one marked EZ DEATH. The EZ DEATH line was moving right along. The other two were crawling." It’s full of lines like that.

Though Riordan does a great job with describing each god and mythical animal he brings in, I still think it'd be handy to have something like this on hand. Just in case.

The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan
ISBN 0786838655
400 pages