I had orginally checked out, Percy Jackson and the Olympians: Lightning Thief: The Graphic Novel (Percy Jackson & the Olympians) by Rick Riordan at my son’s request. As often happens at my house, I end up reading these books as I read most things that cross our doorstep. This one I did enjoy.
In this fantastic world, mythical gods still exist and still sire children. To keep these children safe, they are sent to a weird sort of camp. Percy, the main character, discovers he is the son of a god when his mother drops him at the camp right before her death. Then, a series of threats to the world force him to embark on an epic adventure.
Certain parts of this books were glib the way children’s books sometimes are, for example, the death of his mother causes no tears, only a sort of befuddlement. The book plays into our cultures current fasination with fatherhood, much as that is a evolving role. In this case, the father is awesome and great, but distant and perhaps indifferent. Many young people can relate with this as well as his parents’ separation.
The book moves rapidly and stays true to its imaginative space. There is a variety of creatures yet the author is able to incorporate them into the modern world either with disguises or explained away by tabloids.
It’s interesting how well this is played out here, especially after just seeing Wrath of the Titans
Eugenia Bone, 2011, Rodale Books, non-fiction. Steve saw this book in the Star Tribune. He got it from the library, and then, of course, I read it as well. We both really liked it and got it as a shared Christmas gift. I found the chapter about the future of truffle cultivation really interesting, but really this book goes into every aspect about fungi – except identification.
by Ana Homayoun, 2010, Penguin Group, non-fiction. Hmm, I wonder why I checked out this book from the library. Is there a particular person I was thinking of? Anyway, this is fairly helpful book. Some things I had already figured out, like limiting electronics while my kids studied. If you don’t have a lot of time, most of the information I was interested was in Chapter 5: organizing binders and planners. The first few chapters deal with anecdotes and the last few with special circumstances, which fortunately we don’t have. It is an easy book to read and I will reread Chapter 4, 5 and 8 again to solidify what I read in my mind.
by Timothy Schaffert, 2002, Penguin Putman Inc., fiction. I read the first few chapters of this book on the chapter a day emails I get. The first few chapters were very engaging and the premise was nice. He does maintain that sort engaging style through the whole book. He also captures the feeling of the feckless late adolescence – early 20s time in life. However, although things happen in this book, they don’t seem to affect the characters. The two main characters seem unchanged by the one meeting her mother after a long period of abandonment and the other one being separated from her sister for the first time. There is a lack of stake in this book that I think is its failing.
by George Friedman, 2011, Random House. His basic premise is the United States is a global empire and the president is the emperor. He defines what he means by an empire, and his reasons for believing the United States is one. Then he goes on to make deep detailed predictions on how the United States will be interacting with the world in the next decade. He goes through every important country in the world, and several that I didn’t even realize their importance. He talks about historical influences on modern situations that I had not considered such as the triad of power of Russia, France and Germany, and how that affects modern foreign affairs. He talks about cultural and economic pressures. All in all, it is a comprehensive study of geopolitical pressures in the next decade.
April Journal 