The Sea of Monsters (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #2)

5/20/2017

The Sea of Monsters (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #2) by Rick Riordan

Blurb:

Percy Jackson's seventh-grade year has been surprisingly quiet. Not a single monster has set foot on his New York prep-school campus. But when an innocent game of dodgeball among Percy and his classmates turns into a death match against an ugly gang of cannibal giants, things get . . . well, ugly. And the unexpected arrival of Percy’s friend Annabeth brings more bad news: the magical borders that protect Camp Half-Blood have been poisoned by a mysterious enemy, and unless a cure is found, the only safe haven for demigods will be destroyed.

Review:

Only one more day to go. Surely even I couldn't mess that up.

As usual, I didn't have a clue how wrong I was.

This was so delightful. I practically flew through this book and it was pretty much the best book I could have wished for at the moment.

Thalia had gotten herself turned into a pine tree when she was twelve. Me … well, I was doing my best not to follow her example. I had nightmares about what Poseidon might turn me into if I were ever on the verge of death – plankton maybe. Or a floating patch of kelp.

The Sea of Monsters, and this might make this book sound slightly boring but I assure you it is anything but, is the perfect studying book. Not only is it that "short with fairly large font" kind of book, which is always nice to read when you're busy – because reading those gives you the active sense of having accomplished something and that's quite motivating – it is also action-packed, light-hearted, adventurous, and interesting.

The action-packed part goes great in combination with the light-hearted part because it means that it's pretty much the perfect "break book". It keeps your interest without being too obtrusive. When you read ten pages during a break – which I did – you feel satisfied with the progress of the story, don't feel too bad for having to study for another half an hour, and are excited to continue reading which keeps the motivation flowing. (In case you haven't guessed it: this has been a very productive day for me and super happy/relieved about it.)

The adventurous and interesting parts also go together nicely because they help dragging your head out of the mist of technical terms and weird Theory/Theorist names. That way my head stayed clear and fresh and I don't even have a headache – sadly, I'm prone to having those during studying-weeks.

Now, apart from the whole obnoxious "I'm such a poor student and have to study a lot but, nonetheless, can't go a day without reading much more than I should"-scheme I've got going on here I also want to add that I finally really do feel like I've moved on from my movie-blurred view of Percy Jackson – I've seen the second movie but only once and I thought it was so bad I forgot most about it in no time – and have been able to appreciate this book for what it truly is: an awesome book full of heroes and monsters and monster-heroes and hero-monsters and some gods and, like, one normal human being. Also, it felt like this book really upped the humor quite a bit which is always great in my book, I don't know whether that was just me, though.

Annabeth volunteered to go alone since she had the cap of invisibility, but I convinced her it was too dangerous. Either we all went together, or nobody went.