The Lightning Thief

This was one of my favorite books when I was a kid, so I was pretty devastated by how much I disliked this book this time around.

First off, I feel I did no favors for Rick Riordan by reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone right before this... They are eerily similar and Percy Jackson is unmistakably the weakest of the two by a significant margin.

I'm a certified hater and with that already acknowledged— The Lightning Thief is just lazily written. Grover and Annabeth are basically just Ron & Hermione coded and even Percy lacks much substance...

In regard to the story, not much honestly happens. After the quest begins, it felt like the characters were simply just wandering around waiting for something to happen. Their encounters were random and lacked any sense of threat.

Worst of all was the finale. What the fuck was that? The betrayal from Luke was so haphazardly thrown together. Dude was fine and all the sudden he's an asshole? And of course, he's the villain that does the whole “I'm the villain and FINE I'll tell you my whole plan” routine... Ugh, just so frustrating that the ending was so messy.

From my memory, I think I remember feeling that the series gets better after each book— I really hope that's the case because this book has set such a low bar.