The Mark of Athena discussion

Okay. Don't get me wrong. I LOVE LOVE LOVE this book (except the ending... >.<) but it just took me so long to get into and didn't really hold my expectations at the beginning. I'm not exactly sure why I thought this, but some of the things that bothered me that I noticed were that they never really mentioned how Percy lost his curse of Achilles. I remember Percy mentioning/thinking it once throughout the whole book, but I would think that Annabeth would be kind of surprised if her invincible boyfriend was suddenly (well, I guess not really suddenly) not exactly invisible.

Also, Percy never actually met Hercules but he did think and hear about him. It kind of bothered me that he never once thought of what happened with Zoë - you know, the whole Hercules-betrayed-her-and-she-joined-the-hunters thing.

I don't know; I might just be over-thinking this, but a couple of my friends that were super excited about it are sort of disappointed, too (they actually haven't finished it yet.) I just wanted to see if anyone else had thoughts like mine.

I was thinking the same thing!!!

Because if I was Percy and I had the chance to meet Hercules I would have beaten the crap out of him because of what he did to Zoe.

Well, I wouldn't say I was dissapointed, but it didn't feel as amazing as I had hoped, but we did have an entire year to dream about what would happen, hope and predict, so that may be why.
One thing that did bother me was how short Annabeth's quest was. It just seemed so... Easy.
I also wish Frank had been more 'there'. He didn't feel that strong of a character in this book.

I think my expectations was just too high. I was so excited for this. I mean, that Son of Neptune cliffhanger was intense and everyone was excited to read about the reunion, Annabeth and Percy's and the Greek and the Roman's. Then the cover was pretty misleading. I really did enjoy it. But I think some parts of the book could have been easily cut out. It was too long. Riordan seemed bent on giving the Seven obstacles on every single leg on the quest.
Then there was that mystery of Sammy/Leo and that wasn't even as big as I thought it was going to be. Plus the kind-of-love-triangle felt awkward.

I didn't even think about the whole Zoe and Hercules situation. I completely forgot about it.

I agree with you, Anna-Cosette, in regards of Frank not being a strong character. I don't even like him but I felt bad that every time he was in a scene, he came across as this bumbling baffoon (no offense).

Anna-Cosette wrote: "Well, I wouldn't say I was dissapointed, but it didn't feel as amazing as I had hoped, but we did have an entire year to dream about what would happen, hope and predict, so that may be why.
One thi..."

my view exactly!

Julia wrote: "Okay. Don't get me wrong. I LOVE LOVE LOVE this book (except the ending... >.<) but it just took me so long to get into and didn't really hold my expectations at the beginning. I'm not exactly sure..."

Percy lost his curse of Achilles in SoN. When he crossed the river into Camp Jupiter.

I think there are several minor problems that stem for a couple larger issues.

We know this was not the last book of the series, but it had all the serious feeling that the Last Olympian did without the pay off of it being the final book. It lacked much of the humor we expected also.

We also know that there aren't one but two books left, yet this book felt like a part one of two. Which makes the ending even more awkward. The previous endings may have seemed like cliff hangers, but in reality were simple teases at what was coming next. this was a flat out cliff hanger. It is a moment that as a fan haven't felt from any of the other series he has written.

You also get the sense that there might just be too many main characters. Each has to have his or her moment, but we as readers are focused on a select few. The a hodgepodge ending to let each and everyone get their moment at the end leaves it a bit muddled. The end of the book is always the worst part to not live up to expectations.

Paula wrote: "Julia wrote: "Okay. Don't get me wrong. I LOVE LOVE LOVE this book (except the ending... >.

Percy lost his curse of Achilles in SoN. When he crossed the river into Camp Jupiter."

Yeah, I know, and in the Mark of Athena they never really mentioned it. Like, the last time Annabeth had seen him, he was invincible. Then when he came back he just wasn't. It just kind of bugged me how they never talked about that.

Oh, and I agree with how people say that Frank wasn't that strong of a character this book. There were so many times when I was just like, "Aww, Frank! I'm sorry!" :( And though I love Leo, I love Frank, too, and that made it kind of weird.

I also agree with Nels, the part where you want to focus on each of the characters, but there are just too many. Maybe there's another reason for only having three on a quest normally... :)

Katrina wrote: "I think my expectations was just too high. I was so excited for this. I mean, that Son of Neptune cliffhanger was intense and everyone was excited to read about the reunion, Annabeth and Percy's an..."

I do agree with the too many obstacles thing. I felt like the met too many gods as well. It needed a 'little quest' in it. Like in the Titan's Curse, they are still focused on stopping Kronos, but they were also trying to find Annabeth.
It just felt so "next thing after the other", not everything flowed.

Like some others have said, maybe it's to many main characters. I liked it when the point of view was from just one person or two. With so many we missed some of the things they did and it just seemed unnecessary that they fought monsters (like when Leo and Hazel met Echo, and the others went off to get whatever and then we just learn that they fought some sort of monster. It felt weird not knowing what happened)

The not mentioning the curse of Achiles really wasn't that huge a thing for me because there was a sit down that had both sides telling their story. It really was only a page saying that each side retold what they went through, but how much really was needed. Was it perhaps a little too glossed over...maybe, but stopping the story before it even begins to get lost in what has already happened would have dragged the book down even further.

Ria wrote: "They did mention the curse.
In the son of neptune, hera tells percy in the beginning that if he wants to get to camp jupiter, he's gonna have to go through the little tiber. that water will wash h..."


We know they mentioned it in the previous book. The comment concerns this book. The point of contention is that those arriving from camp Half Blood don't know. As well as Anabeth having a different Percy she is seeing in a long time. With so much happening since they last saw each other, many feel there should have been more interaction in this book concerning it. In general they kind of glanced over everything that happened previously in the series and kept pushing forward.

i loves the first two books in the series, i understood the whole one Greek hero loses his memory and lands up in a Roman camp and vice-versa. But i was kinda disappointed that Percy and Jason didn't really have any conflict. i wanted more about Nico too. Piper was pretty cool though.
I couldn't understand anything about the statue of Athena bringing peace between the camps either.

Sophy wrote: "i loves the first two books in the series, i understood the whole one Greek hero loses his memory and lands up in a Roman camp and vice-versa. But i was kinda disappointed that Percy and Jason didn..."

Now that I think about it, it's a little hazy why/how the two camps will be reunited because they got the statue back. Are they going to be happy that they have it back and just forget about the fact that the Romans stole it? From the sound of it, most of the demigods didn't even know that there was s statue missing.

Can we please talk about Piper? I honestly don't understand what her role is in the prophecy. She's supposed to be the mediator between the two camps and use her charmspeak to get everyone to get along. But every time she tried to use it, she ends up getting too overwhelmed by the person's/crowd's emotions. It would be cool if it worked on monsters but apart from the eidolons, the monsters/evil gods would be all, "nice try little girl but that charmspeak doesn't work on me!" am i the only one who feels like she's kind of useless?

There was a great amount of action and everything else in this book, so dont get me wrong, IM IN LOVE WITH THIS FRICKING NOVEL, but it felt a little to factual, like he's setting up the rest of the series. But, i only felt like this the first half when it was a little slow, but once it picked up...:) the book 0verall was just "Rick-ish". he has a certain voice in his writing and I love it.

I feel the same way... the whole book was just a little bit disappointing. I didn't like the lack of action and the overflow of emotion and love. But maybe if Riordan went a little bit in depth with the emotions it would have been a little better.
I was pretty angry at the end. I almost ripped my perfectly new hardcover copy in half, LOL
Nah, I cherish books. Never even thought about that

Truth be told, I am really disappointed with these last few books. I absolutely loved the first Olympian series. I was so excited when I found out Percy and Annabeth would be in the spin off. They are the only ones that make these books bearable for me now. I think the new characters are kind of bland/lacking personality.
I am also SO glad that someone brought up the Hercules part. I thought there would be this amazingly epic fight between Percy and him, but the whole Zoe business wasn't even mentioned. And she was one of my favorite characters.

No!

I loved the original series. It was easier to focus on one main character, easier to relate to and like. The Heroes of Olympus series in general for me, disappoint me. The new characters are quite bland. Annabeth in my opinion is only okay as a supporting charatcer. Percy is eh, his fear of drowning just made he just groan. I like Leo though since he is sort of like Percy in the first series. The story itself had way to much romance. I understand that they are teens now, but the story focused way to much on it. It should of been toned down. Also how Leo attacking the camp with the Eidolon just seemed lazy to me. Also, some characters just seem useless and they do not belong there. Maybe its to early to tell though. The book didn't have much humor and it was very slow paced. I don't understand how the statue can help them have peace anyways or how it can help destroy the giants. Also all the monsters all seem the same, with huge egos and with a simple conversation to trick them. Anyways, just my thoughts.

nah, I actually think this was Rick's best book he's ever written. Flawless. Absolutely perfect.

Yeah, I agree.

One thing that annoyed me was that Percy Jackson's character was getting butchered. He is shockingly arrogant and loses some character development from PJO. Like you said, forgetting about Zoe was one, but another was his experience with Bacchus whose Greek self reached a truce with Percy in the last series. I got annoyed when he was being a smartass around Mr. D's Roman form because he never did that kind of stunt in the first series.

I didn't like Piper because she was swooning too much about Jason and being too irritating in general.

Villains were very disappointing save Chrysaor. The twin giants were jokes and the Spider Queen was defeated a little too easily (kudos to Annabeth for defeating her without powers though). Heck, even the dim Polyphemus from Sea of Monsters was more of a threat than the giant buffoons.

Leo was good though and actually got character development. Reyna was pretty decent too.

I was a little disappointed with it. MoA wasn't Uncle Rick's best. The character development, like Masked Lunatic said, was pretty bad. The plot jumped too much, and there were many times when they were just sitting doing nothing on the ship, or we'd hear about adventures but not see them

The problem with the series is the number of main characters. I liked how MoA started. First few chapters were as good as anyone could ask for, but once the adventure started the book started to get a little scattered. With each of the first two books there was a principle character that grounded it(Percy,Jason) with a couple of others to fill in gaps and add perspective. Putting them together and adding Annabeth as a third main left the book without the same solid focus of the previous books.