Lately my tastes have been straying away from young adult fiction, mainly YA fiction that's geared more towards adults than kids (which I think ruins it most of the time), but this movie looks pretty good, see here, so I decided to listen to the book first before I take my kids in February.
My review will be short.
It was okay.
But as a side note, I probably shouldn't have listened to it, as I was not a fan of the reader. His voices seemed too cartoonish, like they were straight off of Sesame Street, and kept reminding me this book was for kids (you know like Trix), and I think I'd have liked it better if I'd have just read it and invented my own voices in my head. I plan on reading the rest of the series eventually and see if my little theory holds true.
Kudos to Riordan for keeping the content in this one for young adults. Imagine a young adult book that is actually for young adults! Perish the thought!
As for content, just think Harry Potter/Greek mythology, but I like mythology (I am a huge Clash of the Titans fan after all), and even though it's not half as good as Harry Potter as far as predictability and character development goes, I will give it full marks for excitement. It was good fun. Any kid would like this book. And the movie looks even better. Maybe we'll even see it on the first weekend. For me that's really saying something.
3 stars.
5 comments:
Too bad you didn't like the book. :( Hopefully you will enjoy the movie more.
This one looks interesting everytime I run across it, but I haven't read it yet. Thanks for the tip about the audiobook. A bad reader can just kill a good book.
Thanks for the tip. I'll read it instead! I'll let you scope out the movie for me, too. :p
Yes, Lula, the reader makes the difference. Remember that Seinfeld episode when George gets a book on tape and the reader sounds just like George? Of course that made George crazy, but I found that I actually like my own voice in my head. I enjoy a good audio book now and then and the reader can make it or break it. I'm currently listening to one that is making me crazy, but I'm almost done. Like you, I think I would have heard the voices much differently in my head, but that's the way all art is. We interpret things differently and that's what makes the world go around.
Sorry I steered you wrong on Percy Jackson, and I'm already planning for the movie to be whacked compared to the book (with the exception of Pierce Brosnan!)
Yes, definitely read instead of listen to it. But I wasn't steered wrong. It was an appealing book. And Pierce Brosnan - if only the good ones didn't get old, sigh...
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