Sunday, July 4, 2010

Book #76: The Battle of the Labyrinth

The Battle of the Labyrinth (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Book 4)Title: The Battle of the Labyrinth
Author: Rick Riordan

Another year at camp, another quest for Percy Jackson. This time he and his friends descend into Daedalus's labyrinth in order to accomplish a few objectives: Grover must find Pan or lose his searcher's license, Percy wants to find Hades' son Nico di Angelo, and the whole team must find Ariadne's string in order to keep Luke from using it to navigate the maze and destroy Camp Half-Blood.

However, you might as well call The Battle of the Labyrinth "the book in which Percy gets horny." Just like J.K. Rowling, Riordan decided that when his protagonist hit the age of fifteen, he couldn't ignore his hormonal urges any more. Even though it's fairly obvious from Book 1 that Percy and Annabeth are destined for each other, there are a couple of girls in this book who give Athena's daughter a run for her money (and when Percy learns that Athena bears children from a communion of minds and not, ahem, in the normal way, that may put a damper on how he sees future procreation with her daughter). Anyway, Percy finds himself mediating between Annabeth and Rachel Elizabeth Dare, the mortal whose phone number Percy has blazed into his memory, and when he ends up recuperating on Calypso's island after falling from Mount Saint Helens, he flirts with the idea of staying forever with the beautiful girl instead of returning to Annabeth and their quest. Heck, Percy even finds the empousae attractive, at least until they turn into one-legged vampires.

I liked The Battle of the Labyrinth, honestly, I did, but after finishing it, I didn't feel compelled to pick up The Last Olympian right away. Does that say more about me or about the quality of the book? I'm not sure. I'm guessing that Percy Jackson and I will reach the end of his story together some day, but I want to read some books for adults first.

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