Wow, people! Over the holiday weekend, Ink Spells sneaked past 100 followers!! Very cool. I will have to ponder some way to celebrate this. Possibly another book giveaway? Or a true contest this time? Hmm … I’ll get back to you on that.
Meanwhile …
The Red Pyramid!! This is the first book of a new series by the crazy-popular Rick Riordan, author of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series. Now if you’re a Percy fan like me, you may have some trouble with this book. It is both similar to Percy (boy and friends brother and sister, on a quest, beset with Greek Egyptian gods, where they discover they are half-god-bloods possessed-by-gods), and maddeningly NOT Percy (hilarious fly-by-your-seat madness vs. down-to-earth magical realism). Although I kept waiting for the sarcastic half-blood to make an appearance (he does not), humor was dispensed in ample doses by a sarcastic Sadie (“Just because you cannot discern my wit, doesn’t make me sarcastic.” Thank you, Sadie.) I suppose this is the price to be paid for having already written a fantastic book with a compelling hero.
RL: 4.5 CSM: 10+ Rating: PG Content: comic-book violence, peril of characters
However, Book One of The Kane Chronicles does not disappoint, and is the wonderfully rich story of Carter and Sadie Kane and their adventures around the world, trying to save their father from Egyptian gods, and possibly bring back their mother from the Land of the Dead. An amazing amount of Egyptian mythology is crammed into this hefty book, and a few times I felt like I needed a scorecard to keep track of all the players. “Another lot of daft, arrogant gods. Brilliant!” as Sadie Kane would say, in her fantastic British voice, which Riordan captures so well.
The violence in The Red Pyramid is on par with the comic-book variety in The Lightning Thief – a lot of hacking and slicing of demons and gods, turning them into sand or mist. There is some peril (“Some peril. Did you even read the book?” Yes, Sadie, I read the book. Please stop interrupting.). Ok, a lot of peril, but our young protagonists come through unharmed. Did I mention that this book has alternating, first-person, point-of-view? Riordan breaks the rules successfully with his distinctive voices for Carter and Sadie.
Fourteen-year-old Carter and twelve-year-old Sadie both have mild love interests in this book, which I’m sure will grow as the series continues. But it is barely touched upon, with no kissing or even serious puppy love. Riordan also touches on racial experience in this novel, with Carter and Sadie being biracial (their mother is white and their father is black). Because of the differences in the kids’ skin tone, they have very different experiences of the world, and I thought Riordan handled this extraordinarily well.
Overall, fans of Percy Jackson will love this book. While advanced readers will not be challenged by the reading level, they might be by the length (516 pages!), but more importantly, they will be fascinated by the depth and detail of the Egyptian gods and magic that Riordan brings to life. I heartily recommend The Red Pyramid for readers ages 8+.
I decided I needed to follow Rick on Twitter, and found that he’s launching a new series The Lost Heroes (more Olympians) and that The Kane Chronicles has a rockin’ website, with an awesome amount of information about Egyptian lore and games for the kiddos. There’s also a link on his blog to the Theoi Project, an effort to catalogue all kinds of information about Greek Mythology in literature and art.
Ok, I’m insanely jealous of Rick as a writer – not only does he entertain, he educates and enthralls legions of children with his bestseller books. Time to get back to work on that middle grade manuscript … *clackity clack clack*
I am a huge Rick fan as well. He lured my son into the magical world of books and now he's there to stay!
@Cindy Yes, Rick can't write them fast enough for my boys! 🙂
I'm reading the first The Lightning Thief right now. Entertaining, for sure, but I'm not into it as much as I thought I'd be (guess that means maybe I've grown up too much). Sounds like he's beating a bit of a dead horse here (which I would do, too, were I in his shoes), but I do like the Egyptian motif.
I've actually written a few stories w/ Gods in them… my fave one, who hopefully will make an appearance somewhere someday, is Loki, the quintessential trickster.
@Bane I'm sure Riordan's publisher said Dude! Write more of that stuff that's making us buckets of cash! Can't really blame them for that. 🙂
I would love to read your story with Loki sometime!
Congrats on the followers! You so deserve them!
Hey, I left you a blog award on my blog!
@Cynthia Thanks for the award! I need to get busy handing those out! 🙂
I just started it. It made the rounds in my class the last two weeks of school. The boys that finished it were frustrated that they have to wait for the next one. I need to finish it soon because E said he needs it back to pass on to other friends. That says it all. Boys are waiting to read!
Aww I'm sad that it doesn't have the fly-by-your-seat madness! That was what I loved most about Percy Jackson. Still really excited to read this one though! And OMG thank you for telling me about the new Olympians series!!!!! SO excited!
@Kyle I love it when kids find a book to get passionate about! 🙂 p.s. teachers are some of my favorite people – I'm going to have to check out your blog!
@Bookish I know, right? And my boys are going to go nuts over the new Heroes series – I haven't told them yet, because it doesn't come out until October! 🙂
My 4 year old and I are reading Percy Jackson right now and she loves it! I got Red Pyramid on audiobook last night and can't wait to start it!!
@Jennie Oh! I wonder if Sadie's British accent will come through on the audio? Cool.
I hope to finish The Red Pyramid soon. I'm enjoying it immensely. I'm also glad to hear there's no kissing, making it a true MANLY MAN'S book!
@Carl LOL! Yes, but no promises about future books. Riordan seems to be headed that way. 🙂
Hi Susan,
I'm way late jumping into this discussion but I couldn't miss a chance to talk Percy Jackson. I'm a Percy fan thru and thru so I didn't enjoy TRP nearly as much. Once I decided to just accept that it wasn't like PJ, I could relax and enjoy. My class went totally nuts for it. I bought a couple of copies and at least ten of my students purchased it the first week after I read them the opening chapter. It was really fun to look out across the room and see their heads buried in the book. We're all looking forward to The Lost Hero.
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