Jayson’s Reviews > Percy Jackson and the Singer of Apollo > Status Update
Jayson
is finished
Notes:
(1) I hadn't even heard of this until a few days ago. It's not in any companion books.
- The tone's interesting. It's more middle-grade, like "Percy Jackson and the Olympians," not quite young-adult like "Heroes of Olympus."
(2) This reminds me of "Percy Jackson and the Staff of Hermes."
- There, Percy and Annabeth have their date interrupted by Hermes, here it's Grover's birthday outing interrupted by Apollo.
— Jul 26, 2023 11:55PM
(1) I hadn't even heard of this until a few days ago. It's not in any companion books.
- The tone's interesting. It's more middle-grade, like "Percy Jackson and the Olympians," not quite young-adult like "Heroes of Olympus."
(2) This reminds me of "Percy Jackson and the Staff of Hermes."
- There, Percy and Annabeth have their date interrupted by Hermes, here it's Grover's birthday outing interrupted by Apollo.
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- As with The Staff of Hermes, the god asks Percy to find something that's gone missing.
- Interesting how both stories take place at around the same time, during that short three months after Percy and Annabeth became a couple, but before he got his memory wiped and sent to Camp Jupiter by Hera.
- This one was published second, which is curious because, following essentially the same formula, you'd expect the later story to be an improvement. However, this one isn't nearly as good.
(3) The story's pretty simple. Kind of a version of capture the flag, where Percy and Grover chase a (literal and figurative) songbird around the city.
- It's a quick burst of a plot, more a bunt than swinging for the fences.
- No one's really in danger, there's no monster to fight or terrible consequences for failure (at least, relatively speaking).
(4) Where this story falls short is the absence of banter between the main characters. Here, Percy and Grover just go straight into a mission without much conversation or witty back-and-forth.
- It's more absurdist sight gags than anything: the magical lyre conjuring up miscellaneous items. It's the same sort of humor as The Kane Chronicles, which didn't really work for me either.