The Lightning Thief

I picked up this book because it was popping up on lists everywhere. The readers who I have come to be able to trust were ranting and raving about it and when I realized it had a Greek gods in with the story, it was just a draw that was too powerful to resist.*

This is the story of Percy Jackson, a troubled kid who has ADHD, dyslexia, a hot temper and the inability to stay in any school for more than a year. He fails every class, is currently at a boarding school, has a disgusting step-dad, a saint of a mother, no connection with his real father and he keeps encountering what he thought were ancient mythological creatures but they are in his life. Zeus thinks Percy stole his lightning bolt and even though he has no idea why such accusations could be thrown at him, he has to find the lightning bolt and get it to Mt Olympus in ten days or western civilization could be completely destroyed.

I LOVED this book. I loved it so much that I was willing to take a risk and read it out loud to all of my junior English classes. I am reading the whole book four more times, one chapter at a time. The writing is hilarious, the chapter headings make my day, the mythology is accurate. It is kindof like the movie National Treasure in that each validation of the gods influence on our society does have a decent enough premise that you could make a case for it. I laughed out loud several time the first time through, and still laugh, even my fifth time reading a section. It is an absolutely delightful book.

*(I have this thing with the Greek society - I LOVE it! The gods, the philosophers...it is always in my top five of other time periods I would visit if I ever found myself in a time machine)