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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Rick Riordan
Read between
December 15, 2024 - January 12, 2025
“I also read sign language,”
Convenient
I could still smell the bitter almonds on Loki’s breath.
Hearthstone pointed to my pendant. Ask Jack. Instead of spelling the name, he made the sign for jack-in-the-box, which looked like a finger rabbit popping up from behind his hand. Sometimes sign language can be a little too literal.
Oh, is that Otis? Cool! Thor must be around here somewhere.”
Fanboy.
When I heard the name Thor, I thought about the guy from the movies and comics—a big superhero from outer space, with bright Spandex tights, a red cape, goldilocks hair, and maybe a helmet with fluffy little dove wings. In real life, Thor was scarier. And redder. And grungier.
“Join me for dinner! We can kill Otis and Marvin!”
It was a lot easier killing Marvin.
They’re like the…what is it? The League of Assassins in Arrow!
Thor regaled me with his theories about a hypothetical death match between Daryl from The Walking Dead and Mike from Breaking Bad.
“We’ll figure things out,” I promised. “I don’t know about normal, but I’ll do everything I can to help you get what you want—a place in the Valkyries again, your marriage with Amir, a pilot’s license. Whatever it takes.” She stared at me as if processing the words from another language. “What?” I asked. “Do I have goat blood on my face?” “No. Well, yes, you do have goat blood on your face. But that’s not…I was just trying to remember the last time anybody said something that nice to me.”
Hearthstone nestled the severed heads of the two still-dead goats in Thor’s arms like teddy bears. Never let it be said that elves don’t have a sense of humor.
“I don’t see that we have much choice,” I said, “since we don’t have anyone who can grow wings.” “I will push you off this mountain,” Sam warned.
Hearthstone grinned. Then his eyes rolled up in his head and he fell forward.
smiled. “So this horse is your nephew, Sam?” She glared at me. “Let’s not go there.” “How did your dad father a horse?” Blitzen coughed. “Actually, Loki was Sleipnir’s mother.” “What—?” “Let’s definitely not go there,” Sam warned. I filed that away for later research.
Only Sam didn’t seem ruffled. In fact, she seemed exhilarated. Her eyes sparkled and she couldn’t stop smiling. I guess she really did love flying, even if it was a near-death free fall on an eight-legged horse.
“I feel like Jack up the beanstalk,” I muttered. Sam laughed under her breath. “Where do you think that story comes from? It’s a cultural memory—a watered-down account of what happens when humans blunder into Jotunheim.”
Hearthstone saved us. His face became transfixed with horror. He pointed behind Gunilla as if Geirrod was rising from the rubble. It was the oldest trick in the Nine Worlds, and it worked.
If I see you again, I’ll cut you right down the dotted line.”
My pendant heated up against my collarbone. For an instant, I smelled warm roses and strawberries, as if I’d stepped through a pocket of summer.
Do you really belong in Valhalla, Magnus?
A Lovely Homicidal Sunset Cruise
My kind of night
The waist-deep water was so cold I imagined I would be singing soprano for the rest of the week.
“Okay, cool,” said Jack. “As long as you realize you’ll probably all die in agony and start Ragnarok, I’m down. Let’s do this!”
His eyes shone with a familiar blue light that sent a xylophone mallet down the back of my rib cage.
Sam sighed. “For a child of Thor, you think too much.” “And you, daughter of Loki, listen too little.
T.J. dangled four sets of handcuffs from his finger. “Here’s the thing, Magnus: Gunilla made it clear that if we don’t prove our loyalty to Valhalla by apprehending you, we will spend the next hundred years in the boiler room shoveling coal. So consider yourself under arrest, blah, blah, blah.” Halfborn grinned. “But the other thing is: we’re Vikings. We’re pretty bad at following orders. So consider yourself free again.” T.J. let the handcuffs slip from his finger. “Oops.” My spirits lifted. “You mean—” “He means, you idiot,” Mallory said, “that we’re here to help.” “I love you guys.”
I Love them so much
In the middle of their line stood Satan’s fashion consultant himself, the fire lord Surt, wearing a trim-cut three-piece suit of chain mail, a tie, and a dress shirt that appeared to be woven from flame—elegantly accessorized with a burning scimitar in his hand. He looked pretty good, despite the fact that his nose was still cut off. That fact, at least, made me happy.
“Tiwaz?” The Wolf snarled. “You dare attack me with the rune of Tyr?”
enemy. “I need to have a talk with my brother.” The fact that she could speak in lion form freaked me out even more than the fact that she had a lion form.
I DON’T KNOW WHY IT BROKE ME SO BADLY. I didn’t even like Gunilla. But when I saw Surt standing over her lifeless body, his eyes smoldering in triumph, I wanted to fall down in the pile of bones and stay there until Ragnarok.
Blitzen and Hearthstone collapsed at the bow. They started arguing with each other about which of them had taken the stupider risks, but they were so tired the debate deteriorated into a halfhearted poking contest, like a couple of second graders.
HE LOOKED LIKE a Hollywood Viking. He looked more like Thor from the movies than Thor did.
Every time we were in the woods on a summer day, every time the sun came out from behind the clouds, Frey had been there.
“Dad…” I wasn’t sure what else to say. Maybe I just wanted to try out the word again. I’d never had much experience using it.
Oh…So That’s Who Fenris Smelled in Chapter Sixty-Three
“Well!” Odin’s voice boomed. “What does a god have to do to get a cup of mead around here?”
We Are Subjected to the PowerPoint of Doom
This is the most Odin thing ever
I hung from the World Tree for nine days and nights, racked with pain, in order to discover the secret of runes. I stood in line in a blizzard for six days to discover the sorcery of the smartphone.”
He was slumped in the window of Geirrod’s palace. He had a silly grin on his face. His hands were making the sign for washing machine.
Ofc thats the photo they use for him
There I was: frozen mid-scream as I fell from the Longfellow Bridge.
looked at Sam and Blitzen and Hearthstone. I looked at my hallmates from floor nineteen—T.J., Halfborn, Mallory. For the first time in years, I didn’t feel homeless. I bowed to Odin. “Thank you, All-Father. But wherever these friends of mine are—that’s my home. I am one of the einherjar. I am one of your warriors. That is reward enough.”
Sobbing
