The Mark of Athena, by Rick Riordan

The Mark of Athena, by Rick Riordan

Genre: Middle School fantasy / adventure

Reason for Reading: This is the third book in a series that I’ve already started.

Synopsis: In this third book of the Heroes of Olympus series, 7 heroes – Percy, Hazel, Frank, Jason, Piper, Leo, and Annabeth – set out on a dangerous quest to Rome. The Romans and the Greeks must cooperate if they are to quell the rise of Gaia, but war is brewing between the two camps. Our heroes must try to postpone war while saving Rome from apocalypse-hungry giants and following the Mark of Athena – an ancient clue that only Annabeth can decipher.

My Thoughts: I’m not a huge fan of Riordan’s writing, though I think this series is a heck of a lot better than the Percy Jackson series. While reading this book, I finally figured out what it is about Riordan’s writing that bothers me – the audience is too childish. All the adults in these books talk as if they were kids. That grates on me. I guess I prefer kids books where adults sound like adults – even if they sound like silly or disinterested adults (which is often the case in middle school books). Despite my dislike of the style, though, I found this book well-researched and interesting. The plot isn’t very complex, but there’s a lot of action and some good humor. I’m not rushing to Barnes and Noble to buy a copy of the next book, but I’m planning on reading it “some day.” (Which probably means I’ll wait until the NEXT book comes out and reminds me that I still haven’t read House of Hades…which is what happened with Mark of Athena.) One thoughtful question about this book – and maybe this will be answered in House of Hades – is why did Riordan only write first person narrative from the Greek heroes’ points of view? Is he hiding something about the Romans?

Hero’s Lot, by Patrick W. Carr

The Hero’s Lot, by Patrick W. Carr

Genre: Young Reader Christian Fantasy

Reason for Reading: This is the second book in a series I began last year. The first was quite interesting – reviewed here – and I’m eager for the third to come out later this year.

Synopsis: In this second book of The Staff and the Sword series, Errol is compelled by powerful members of the conclave to go to a dangerous land and kill the traitor Sarin Valon. With a mixture of stubbornness and bravery, the princess follows Errol on his dangerous journey.

My thoughts: This book didn’t have quite the flare of the first in the series, but it was nevertheless quite enjoyable. The adventure was much more clearly laid out in this book, which made it less mysterious than the first, but the plot was thicker as a result. The story emphasizes the importance of forgiveness, and raises interesting questions about whether Church authority is “good” just because it follows conservative values that have worked for centuries. I tend to believe that Carr’s church is symbolic for the Catholic Church, and the hints of church-shattering philosophical changes that will come in the next book symbolize the conversion to Protestantism or perhaps simply the disgust many people have these days about the sex scandals in the Catholic Church. However, that’s a message intended for adults, I suspect, and the target audience – ages 12-15 will probably mostly miss it. The dangerous foreign land that Errol traveled to clearly symbolized Egypt / Muslims – Carr included some rather direct hints to that effect. I felt a little sad that the people of that land were generalized as evil, except for those that had been converted by God’s Christian word. Those few characters who weren’t pure evil seemed rather weak and a little selfish. Messages like this always make me sad – especially in children’s books – but I understand that it’s difficult to write an epic fantasy without having a hint of xenophobia. Someone has to be “evil” right? I’m not sure how this problem can be gracefully avoided. At the very least, there were “bad” people and “good” people on both sides of the border, which is as much as I can rightfully wish for, I suppose. 🙂

January Update

Well, it’s a new year! Last year was a difficult one for me – I moved back “home” to Minnesota, and was immediately distracted by family issues. Illnesses and other stresses abounded in my family this year. But I’m thankful that I was living in Minnesota at this time because I was able to be there for my family. Unfortunately, my family problems took away from my available internet time, so I got behind on writing my own blog as well as reading everyone else’s.

Resolution 1: Blog about it! One of my New Year resolutions is to get back to writing blog posts and checking everyone’s blogs again. So hopefully I’ll see you around soon! I’m also going to make a better effort to write editorial pieces for my blog since it tapered off to ONLY book reviews lately. I’m not going to stop with the book reviews, of course, but I’d like to include some other thoughts as well.

I’d been studying the “Question of Evil” for a while, but my studies tapered off when I became too involved in internet-based reading challenges and with my family. This year, I resolve that I will not commit myself to so many challenges and group reads – I will focus on my own interests. Those are: social justice, the “question of evil,” and, my new interest, the “Question of Jesus.”

Even when I was a child, I asked myself who Jesus was and why people prayed to Jesus instead of directly to God. As the good little Catholic girl that I was, I decided that this was a very sticky question and decided to shunt it off to some corner of my brain and stop worrying about it. Because of this shunt, I have very little relationship with Jesus at all, and even feel a little uncomfortable when other people talk about their bond with Jesus. I just simply don’t know who Jesus is, I suppose. I’m a rather liberal Christian who believes that all religions are “right,” and so I’ve ignored my lack-of-bond with Jesus for quite a long time. However, I have recently decided to read a little about Jesus and find out what He means to me.

Dedicated to this cause, I went to Barnes and Noble, and browsed the Christian Life and Christianity sections. I resolved that I would buy a “spiritual” book rather than an academic one – because I think the root of my problem is that I have always viewed the question from an academic standpoint. Of course, I failed miserably at my resolution, and bought four academic books. 🙂 Oh well. There’s always next time! Or maybe since I think academically, perhaps I’ll find the answer in academic books? We’ll see. Hopefully I’ll do a better job at keeping my “blog about it!” resolution. Christian friends be warned – my thoughts on the subject of Jesus will most likely stick to academic ponderings.

Resolution 2: Just do it already! I make exercise goals for myself every year, and sometimes I complete them and sometimes I don’t. I DID end up doing a couple of sprint triathlons a couple years ago, and I had been thinking of doing one last year. But I realized that I simply don’t like swimming. It’s so wet and chlorinated! I’ve always wanted to do the Tough Mudder, but that’s one of those mud races where you need a team. And I couldn’t find a team.

But this year, I have a coworker whose friends do the Tough Mudder every year. Now I have a team! 🙂 So I’m going to train for the 2014 Tough Mudder (Minnesota). I’m a little skeptical that I can make the July 2014 race because right now I would consider myself a “mudderling” in the Tough Mudder Boot Camp. At the very least, I’ll be fit enough for the 2014 Warrior Dash (Minnesota), right? Sadly, I hear the Run for Your Lives races have now been canceled or I’d certainly to THAT again this year. 😦

Resolution 3: Move forward! I resolve to move my career forward.

Resolution 4: Keep up! I resolve to do a better job of keeping up on my reading of the news / current events magazines. My problem is I really want to know what’s going on in the world, but I’d much rather sit down and read a nice relaxing novel. I need to keep my reading more balanced with heavier stuff that I want to read but am always too tired to get around to. I’m also a pretty slow reader, so my book clubs take up a bit more of my reading availability than I’d like. I wish I had more free time!

Resolution 5: Please, just stop! I resolve to make fewer resolutions. I always make so many of them, and then I get burnt out and don’t complete any of them. I need to focus on those resolutions mentioned above. So no reading challenges! I’ll read whatever I want whenever I want, and not commit myself to group reads and challenges (unless I’m really eager to participate). I set a personal challenge this year to finish up as many already-started series and off-the-shelf (currently owned) books as possible.

Good luck to all of you and your New Years resolutions!

Reading and Film Completed Last Month

My nephew and a friend of mine watched the first season in one weekend. My friend had just had surgery, so she had a lot of down time to just sit – and my nephew just kept wanting more and more. He also learned to use the rainbow loom while watching Doctor Who, and made me this awesome bracelet (pictured below). I’m glad that we agreed to watch this series through in order, it’s a lot of fun. So far, I’m impressed with the fact that British TV has so much racial diversity – American TV tends to have shows that are biased towards one particular race, but Doctor Who has a more believable race ratio in its casting. Also, I admit that the Dalek are the most awesome enemy EVER. Lethal trashcans with suction cups and lasers?! AWESOME! They make me so happy. 🙂

Awesome Bracelet made by my nephew with the Rainbow Loom

I managed to find the money to re-subscribe to The Economist, which is my favorite current events magazine for foreign news. My first copy was the December 14th – 20th edition.

It had an interesting article about the pros and cons of raising minimum wage in America – though the lean was slightly conservative (at worst, it won’t harm anything! It COULD help.) Personally, I don’t understand the deeper economic repercussions of raising minimum wage, but my gut feeling says that it would probably help people who are struggling at the current minimum wage, and I doubt it would cause a permanent dent in the unemployment rate.

I’m still not a great fan of Rick Riordan, but I’m going to bully through and finish this series. He did a much better job both in writing and in research for this series than he had for the original Percy Jackson series, but there are still some quirks about his writing style that grate on me. Check my upcoming review for more details.

I watched the first story arc of the 1963 Doctor Who Series – An Unearthly Child – with my good friend and her parents. We enjoyed this campy B&W show, though the Doctor certainly isn’t as charismatic as the more recent ones. And I had a really hard time believing that the 23-year-old Carol Ann Ford was a 15-year-old child. She DID slouch a lot to add verisimilitude.

In this show, we are introduced to the Doctor and his grand-daughter Susan. Susan’s teachers begin to wonder who Susan is, and why she lives in an old junk-yard. So they follow her in to the TARDIS and are accidentally swept away into the stone age.

I’m slowly puttering through these fairy tales. I end up reading one every couple of weeks. It’s great fun to read this mixture of familiar and unknown stories. Folklore is pretty fascinating, isn’t it?

The Story of Bensurdatu: Three princesses disappear and the King promises that anyone who should rescue his princesses will get to marry one of them. A couple of knights set out to rescue the princesses, but they fail miserably and become servants in an inn because they’re out of money. Then Bensurdatu sets out, rescues the two knights from servitude, and rescues the princesses by jumping into a magical river which the knights are too cowardly to enter. The knights betray Bensurdatu, though, and they leave him to die and take the three princesses home, claiming that they were the rescuers. They marry two of the princesses, but the youngest refuses to marry anyone but Bensurdatu. Luckily, the young man manages to rescue himself, and returns to the king as a hero. He marries the youngest princess, and the two nights are expelled from the kingdom. I feel sorry for the two older princesses, but I guess they should have been strong like the youngest one. 🙂

Newly Acquired

Advance Review Copy. Never read a book by Lisa Unger, but thought I’d grab it since it was free.

I got an autographed copy of this book for my mom for Christmas. Klassen is supposed to be a fantastic writer, and apparently does fantastic historical research for her novels. I’ll have to read it when mom’s done with it.

Nook Free Friday

Spirit Animals: Wild Born, by Brandon Mull

Spirit Animals: Wild Born, by Brandon Mull

Genre: Children’s Fantasy, appropriate age range 8-10.

Reason for Reading: Brandon Mull is one of my favorite authors, and so of course I had to read this book as soon as it came out.

Review

In children’s eleventh year, they undertake a ceremonial transformation into adults by calling their “spirit animals.” Most children fail to call any animal at all, but none in history have ever called one of the Great Beasts. So when four children call the spirits of the four Great Beasts who died years ago in a brutal war to save humanity, the kids are quickly swept up into an adult world of conspiracies and danger.

This is an adorable first book in a series. It is appropriate, both in maturity and reading level, for an 8-10 year old – and it would be equally enjoyable to boys and girls. The children’s adventures are exciting, but not violent or scary. Some interesting questions of ethics are brought up: for instance, should we support the people who have always been in power and who appear to fight for “good,” even when they haven’t ever helped us?

I look forward to the rest of the books in the series.

Thoughts
Although this book was in no way overtly religious, it definitely has the savior vs. super-powerful-creature-of-evil allegory which is common in epic fantasy. I doubt there is any explicit religious intent with this allegory, and I think it’s fascinating how this allegory slips into our literature so smoothly. It seems that our minds are programmed to search the world for saviors and for physical manifestations of evil. One could as easily interpret such naturally occurring patterns either as the cause or the effect of religious beliefs. I mean, it’s as easy to say that we search for a savior because in our hearts we know He is out there as it is to say that we believe in a Savior because that’s the mechanism our brains have developed to cope with life’s difficulties. But whichever way you believe (and most people have an opinion on the subject), it is undeniable that we crave such stories.

How to Train Your Dragon, Cressida Cowell

How to Train Your Dragon, by Cressida Cowell

Reason for Reading: Trying to keep up with my nephew’s reading. 🙂

Genre: Children’s Fantasy

Review

Hiccup Horrendous Haddock, the famous Dragon-whisperer of lore, had to learn about dragons somehow – and this book chronicles his growing pains. He and a team of similarly-aged kids must capture and train baby dragons in order to be accepted into their Viking clans as adults. They face expulsion if they fail! But Hiccup’s dragon simply isn’t cooperating. First of all, it’s tiny and toothless – which is humiliating for the dragon of the son of the Chief. Second, it has an attitude problem: it refuses to be trained. It looks like Hiccup might be expelled from his Viking clan! But then some sea-dragons emerge from the depths of the ocean – and only Hiccup (well, with help from his dragon and his friends) can save his people.

This was a hilarious book. My nephew, who isn’t a fan of reading, just gobbled this one up. He even sounds excited to read the next one. 🙂 There are funny pictures drawn throughout the story, and the narration itself is laugh-out-loud funny it a childish way. I really enjoyed this book.

I also loved the 2010 movie which was VERY loosely based on the book. The basic setting was the same – a Viking boy named Hiccup must save his clan from destruction at the teeth of hungry dragons – but that’s about all that’s the same. In the movie, dragons are creatures to be hunted. They aren’t kept as pets. Both the book and the movie are very cute and very funny. But in order to enjoy both, you need to be the type of person who is willing to accept that just because the plot is different, doesn’t mean the story is bad. (This is difficult for many people to admit!)

My new Teacher and Me!, by Al Yankovic

My New Teacher and Me!

Written by Al Yankovic, Illustrated by Wes Hargis

Reason for Reading: I met Weird Al Yankovic when he was at Barnes and Noble for the signing of his new book My New Teacher and Me! I was impressed at what a nice person he seemed to be – he smiled and laughed and joked for 4 hours straight as hundreds of people flocked up to him to get his signature, babies pulled his hair, teens pressed phones to his ear so he could talk to someone not present, and so on. I loved watching his facial expressions – his face is so animate! And, clearly, I had to get his signature on a few copies of his book – for the children of friends. 🙂

Genre: Children’s Picture Book

Review
Billy is excited to meet his new teacher Mr. Booth – but Mr. Booth isn’t too excited to meet Billy. Mr. Booth questions Billy about why the boy is covered in dirt, and Billy launches into an imaginative story about how he was digging in his backyard and found a dinosaur. When Mr. Booth expresses skepticism, Billy’s story gets wilder and wilder. Finally, Billy teaches Mr. Booth a lesson that the most inventive people in the world were also the most creative thinkers – they were people who didn’t yield to hard-set rules set by color-within-the-line leaders. This is a fun story, with great illustrations, and something to think about. Perfect for little kids. 🙂

The Stonekeeper’s Curse, by Kazu Kibuishi

The Stonekeeper’s Curse, by Kazu Kibuishi

Reason for Reading: My nephew loved this series 🙂

Genre: Children’s Fantasy Graphic Novel

Review

In this second book of the widely popular children’s graphic novel series Amulet (see the review for the first book here), Emily and Navin’s mother is still in a poison-induced coma, and the kids must journey to a dangerous forest to find the cure. They are led by a fox-man Leon Redbeard, who says that it is his job to bring them safely to a lost city of guardians. They are chased by the Elf King’s son Trellis, whose loyalties are questionable. This was a cute second book in the series – though the plot is still very childish and light. The kids (especially boys!) love it. 🙂

Chasing the Prophecy, by Brandon Mull

Chasing the Prophecy, by Brandon Mull

Reason for Reading: I love Brandon Mull! 🙂

Genre: Young Adult Fantasy

Review

In the final book of the Beyonder’s trilogy, Rachel and Jason’s group must separate into two teams – each against “impossible” odds. Jason’s team goes in quest of a lost prophecy while Rachel’s lays siege upon Maldor’s fortress. All must learn to have faith in each other – a task which is much more difficult than it seems.

I loved the Beyonders series. I eagerly awaited the publication of this book, and read it the moment it was released. I wasn’t disappointed. Brandon Mull has a vivid imagination – he’s created a world that’s very different from the standard epic fantasy – most of his creatures are of his own design, and follow a very creative set of rules. This book is much like the classic epic fantasies like The Hobbit in that there’s a lot of traveling/walking, and most of the action takes place while on the move. Personally, I’ve always liked that format of fantasy – not sure why it appeals to me so much, but it does. 🙂

I can’t wait until Mull publishes another book! 🙂

See my review of the second book, Seeds of Rebellion.

Merlin’s Blade, by Robert Treskillard

Merlin’s Blade, by Robert Treskillard

Reason for Reading: A review copy was provided by the publisher in exchange for a fair and honest review.

Genre: Young Adult Christian Fantasy

Review
Merlin has been living peacefully as the blind son of a village blacksmith when druids invade the area with an evil stone that usurps the minds of the villagers and turns them against God. Merlin is the only villager who is unaffected by the stone’s powers. His problems become worse when the High King Uther and his infant son Arthur arrive in the village and are attacked by the druids. Merlin must save his village as well as the young prince. This was a fun retelling of the young Merlin’s back-story. It’s marketed as a Young Adult Christian Fiction, though I think it could be enjoyed by a wider audience. Merlin’s Blade isn’t “preachy,” which is a complaint of many Christian Fiction books, though it does (understandably) perceive the worship of a stone to be an “evil” act. The druids are portrayed as mostly bad (or at least mislead) people, but I appreciated that some of the druids were actually rather likable. I’m a fan of Christian fiction writers who are able to see the humans behind the non-Christian characters. So, if you’re a fan of retellings (especially YA retellings), I think this is a book you might enjoy. It took some interesting liberties with the story of Merlin and Arthur, but it was also rather fun to see how that sword got stuck in the stone to begin with. 🙂

I’ll be waiting for the next book in the series!

James and the Giant Peach, by Roald Dahl

James and the Giant Peach, by Roald Dahl

Reason for Reading: To keep up with my nephew’s book reports

Genre: Children’s Adventure / Fantasy

Review
After the tragic death of his parents, James has been living with his horrible neglectful, hateful aunts Sponge and Spiker. One day James is given a magical bag by a mysterious stranger – and in his excitement he trips on the root of a peach tree and dumps all the magic on the tree. Soon a peach larger than a house has grown out of the tree. James crawls into the peach and begins the adventure of a life-time.

This is another classic kids story that I read as a child and haven’t picked up since. I’m glad I had a reason to pick it up again, because it was really funny and silly and it had a lot of nostalgia for me. Dahl has just the right amount of humor and whimsy in his books. 🙂

After reading the book, my nephew and I watched the 1996 stop-action movie. It was a cute movie that followed the basic story-line well enough. But it was a bit too sentimental and it lacked the dark humor of Roald Dahl’s story. Cute for an hour’s entertainment, but nothing I’m going to watch again and again.