I picked up the entire Percy Jackson box set on a whim when I saw it on sale and decided to give it a try. It’s a middle grade book, but like Harry Potter anyone can enjoy it. I loved it!

It definitely had some similarities to Harry Potter, but it’s also totally different. Percy has always gotten in trouble as a kid by events that seem to be completely outside of his control, but just keep happening to him. He’s been diagnosed with ADHD and dislexia and has been expelled from a dozen schools. When he’s in the 6th grade, mythical creatures start showing up everywhere and attacking him and he suddenly finds himself dropped off at Camp Half-Blood, a summer camp for demi-gods.

That’s right, Percy, along with all the other kids at the camp, are half-blood children of the Greek Gods. Around the 6th grade the monsters start becoming aware of their power and attacking the kids, so they are transported to Camp Half-Blood to train to defend themselves against monsters.

Percy doesn’t know who his father is, but it pretty quickly becomes obvious and he is asked to go on a quest to recover Zeus’ master bolt, which has been stolen, and return it to him before the solstice, only 10 days away. Percy accepts the quest and heads off on adventure with his school chums Annabeth and Grover and gets into a whole lot more trouble along the way.

First of all, Rick Riordan’s writing is great! It is hilarious and I couldn’t help but chuckle to myself from the first chapter onwards. Harry Potter has humour in it, but it has a more serious tone, which is what I was expecting from Percy Jackson, but this was definitely the funnier read and had humorous elements throughout the entire story.

That’s not to say it didn’t have action, it definitely had a ton of action. Percy seems to go from one bad situation to the next and you can’t trust anyone he meets. I really liked both Annabeth and Grover. Annabeth is the daughter of Athena and is a bit of a brainiac and Grover is a Satyr who likes to eat tin cans and provides even more comic relief throughout the story (also, his name is Grover, LOL).

Emotionally, I don’t think this had a whole lot of depth, but it’s the first of 5 books, so I’m expecting a lot more character development in subsequent books and a bit of a darker story line, although please stay funny! I probably won’t get to the rest of the books for a while as I have a million other things on my TBR I want to read, but I think these are quick books I’ll pick up whenever I’m in the mood for a laugh! I wish I’d had these when I was a middle schooler!

FUN FUN FUN!