“Blood of Olympus” Could’ve Been Better

The final book in the “Heroes of Olympus” series just came out, and it’s slightly disappointing compared to other Riordan books.

The+final+installment+in+the+Heros+of+Olympus+series+has+its+highs+and+lows.

Photo Courtesy of Ryan Deitchman

The final installment in the “Heros of Olympus” series has its highs and lows.

Lauren Bander, Columnist

After ten years of writing about the world of Greek (and five years of Roman) demigods, Rick Riordan closes his “Heroes of Olympus” series with “The Blood of Olympus,” which came out Oct. 7. It’s the finale; closing up all the loose ends and plots of characters we’ve created an emotional connection to (whether it’s a good connection or a bad connection). Readers of the series are finally ready to release the anticipation of waiting each year to find out what will happen to their favorite characters. Their questions are answered: Who will make the ultimate sacrifice? Will Gaea rise? Will the Camp Half-Blood and Camp Jupiter battle? Will everybody be happy in the end?

It is obvious that I like this book seeing as I couldn’t put it down for three days immediately after getting it, but that doesn’t mean I wasn’t slightly disappointed. As the finale, you expect the book to be long and exciting throughout, but it didn’t have that factor. With only 502 pages (compared to some of the other books that were closer to 600), there wasn’t enough content and some of the scenes were cut too short. One chapter was only two pages long. Fans are also disappointed with the lack of perspectives, as the past two books, “The Mark of Athena” and “The House of Hades,” included chapters from the points of view of all seven major characters. No matter which character you loved the most, you were sure they were going to be included and that they would be sharing their part of the story. However, this time, we only had the points of view of three of the previous major characters, Jason, Piper, and Leo, and two new ones, Nico and Reyna.

But I was happy with the addition of these new perspectives, just not the subtraction of the other ones. Nico and Reyna weren’t just two random characters thrown in there; their place made sense. It gave diversity and suspense to the story, as they were on a different but still related adventure than the rest of the characters. I would be frustrated when one character got themselves into trouble at the end of their chapter and had to wait through another’s separate adventure to get back to the other. But it was a good frustrated. It proved to me that my interest had been peaked, and I wasn’t just reading because of the other books. What did annoy me, though, was that the writing could go from super exciting to anticlimactic within the turn of a page. One minute, the characters would be battling a god or monster, and the next they would just be hanging out.

That’s not where the inconsistencies stopped. This takes place almost a year from the final Percy Jackson book, “The Last Olympian,” and some of our beloved characters were present in that book. Yes, they have changed due to recent events, but their good qualities weren’t taken away. Percy, for example, had an inspiring, thought out battle speech in the final “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” book, but had a five-word battle cry in this one: “Greeks! Let’s, um, fight stuff!” While there was a purpose behind the lack of words (Riordan was showing the difference between Greek and Roman camps), it wasn’t enough to change an admirable quality about a character that, previously, hadn’t shown any sign of losing this attribute. Percy had always been able to make people believe in themselves, and that was not evident in that important situation.

Don’t get me wrong, the book was fun to read. The characters didn’t lose their signature sassy voices or their own unique perspectives on life. The points of view were very distinctive, making sure you couldn’t confuse one with another. Each character had their own set of physical and emotional problems that kept me wanting to read more. However, I don’t feel that this book was up to some of Riordan’s previous standards. It wasn’t as focused as other work of his. This finale disappointed me, and hopefully Riordan will redeem himself with some upcoming projects including a Norse series, “Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard,” coming Fall 2015, another mythology book narrated by Percy himself, “Percy Jackson’s Greek Heroes,” out Aug. 18, 2015, and more.