The Blood of Olympus | Book Talk

3:30 PM Ally M.G. 5 Comments

Warning: this review contains spoilers.

The Blood of Olympus is the final installment in Rick Riordan’s series Heroes of Olympus.

I have been following Rick Riordian’s Greek mythology series from its humble Percy Jackson and the Olympian beginnings. Year after year I have been following the stories of Percy and his fellow demigod friends.

Now it is officially over.

Frankly, I read the final book of the whole shebang rather late…A WHOLE YEAR LATER…mostly out of fear. I did not want these stories to end; I wanted to keep expecting a new book every year. I wanted to know what Percy, Annabeth and Jason were up to next …but now…it is over.

In the first four books of The Heroes of Olympus series Riordian built up suspense that one of the 7 demigods on the quest (Percy, Annabeth, Jason, Piper, Leo, Frank or Hazel) was going to die in the final book!  It is one thing for a story to be over, but it is another thing that a story is over with a canon death. Someone was going to be no more and I was not okay with that.

After finally reading the last and final book of the Greek myths installment I have to say that I neither happy nor sad. The Blood of Olympus did not live up to its previous brothers. While the previous were fun and exciting, keeping your fingers trembling at the end of the page ready to continue reading…The Blood of Olympus did not create that sensation, while I defiantly hooked on the story and wanted to know what happened to know what happened next it wasn’t a dire need of knowing like the previous books.

I was overly thrilled that Nico di Angelo finally got his own point of view, and ever more thrilled on how nicely his story arch ended. It was everything I could have imagined but better. Watching Nico finally achieve happiness, realize that his does have friends who care about him and finally letting his grief over his older sister Bianca go. It made my heart melt into a warm puddle of goo. If Nico is happy I am happy.

There were many points in the final story that made me happy; Nico’s happiness, Frank’s leadership, Percy’s goofiness, Reyna’s growth, Octavian’s death, Solangelo being canon.

Unfortunately, there were quite a few points that aggravated me into eternity. First of all the big final battle between Gaia, the God that wanted to destroy the whole world along side the Olympians, was just pathetic. One moment she rose from the Earth in the Camp Half-Blood hill ready bring death and chaos. Then the next moment she is caught my Festus the Dragon’s claw and is lifted very high in the sky. Piper charmspoke her to sleep, Leo and Festus exploded and that was the end of it. The big super villain Mother Earth was dead (well gone, because Gods can’t die). Five books of quests and torture and fear of Gaia and she came and went in less than 10 pages. 5 minutes in battle time if you want to get very technically. Zoop, she was gone just like that.

The battle the 7 demigods of the prophecy had with the Giants in Athens was much cooler and action packed than the battle with Gaia. I had to read that chapter twice just to picture it perfectly. Having Percy battle alongside his dad Poseidon, Jason with Zeus, Frank with Ares, Annabeth with Athena, Hazel with Hecate and Hades, Piper with Aphrodite, and Leo with Hephaestus. Even the Fates were in the battle! Three little old women were fighting giants with golden clubs.  It was like it was Christmas except that I wasn’t receiving any actual physical presents, just emotional presents.

I felt that Riordian did not achieve his best work, and it can seem a little disappointing to hard core Percy Jackson fans like myself, but The Blood of Olympus must be read. All good things have to come to an end, Harry Potter came to an end and now it is Percy Jackson’s turn.

“Leo didn't usually think of the ukulele as a sad instrument. (Pathetic, sure. But not sad.) Yet the tune Apollo strummed was so melancholy it broke Leo's feels.”