The House of Hades by Rick Riordan
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Disclaimer: Do not review before reading Mark of Athena. May contain spoilers.
This book took me over a year to read. I got this book a month after it was released and started reading it as soon as I got it. But then with school I started letting it sit there forgotten because it just wasn’t captivating my interest like the other ones had. It seemed like nothing was happening. Even the character growth seemed to be boring and almost non-existent. I just wasn’t interested in who he had narrating or what was going on. Normally I start out with what the book is about but this seemed like it needed to be said first.
This book picks up right where it left off in Mark of Athena, cliff hanger and all. It follows the same seven demigods only now they are split in two main locations. The ship, and Tartarus. Percy and Annabeth have to find their way to the Doors of Death and unchain them from their location. Jason, Hazel, Leo, and the others need to find the House of Hades and do the same. Percy and Annabeth are stuck in Tartarus, this is really the more exciting of the two paths to the Doors while reading the book. The crew, have a more uneventful trip for most of the book. It’s interesting in the first couple of chapters, when Leo gets separated from the group and the ship gets damaged. But after that things slow down a bit. Once it hits the point of slowing down, you are begging for the narrator to go back to Percy or Annabeth.
So I would still say that yes I liked this book enough to finish it. But I feel like it could have made the character growth that was happening happen a little bit faster. I think the biggest problem was with the Leo chapters. They just went by so slowly. This may change depending on how much you like Leo, but I thought it could do with much less of him.
Overall recommendation: Read the book so you can get to the end. Once you suffer through that lagging middle part it definitely picks up.
mercury205
Boredom and Words of Nothingness 