Percy, Hazel, Frank, Leo, Piper, Jason, and Annabeth are finally together. They hoped to be able to speak with the Roman camp peacefully, but then the Argo II randomly attacked Camp Jupiter during the meeting. Now, the Roman camp is preparing for war with Camp Half-Blood. The team would like to focus on preventing the war, but there are bigger issues to worry about, such as members of the crew being randomly possessed. Nico is also in danger and only has a few days to live, so the first stop on their quest is to save him. Annabeth also receives a quest from her mother, where she must follow the Mark of Athena. She would usually be up to the task, but after months away from Percy, she is scared of losing him again.
These quests will lead the seven demigods to the Doors of Death.
This book was so far the only HOO book that I can honestly say that I really enjoyed reading. The pacing seemed just right, and the plot seemed really interesting. Nevertheless, I do have some complaints.
Annabeth. As I was reading, especially close to the end, I felt that all she cared about was her “Seaweed Brain” Percy. She was acting like a normal 17-year-old girl, but that just seemed so out of character for her to me. I expected her to be happy that she was reunited with him, but then still be…Annabeth? In the other books, even though she clearly liked him, she was still very independent. Now, she seemed to almost second-guess herself in some situations as she thought “I’m going to be separated from Percy!” The only thing that still made her my favorite character in the book was the fact that she stayed on task for her quest without becoming a damsel in distress. If she did that, I don’t know what I would have done.
Secondly, I felt that certain monsters in this book were just too easy to defeat. All of them are either just dumb, or they have some sort of “flaw” that makes them super easy to defeat. Every time a scene started to get the slightest bit intense, it seemed like someone would have the magic off switch and be able to fix everything or kill every monster without even breaking a sweat.
Nevertheless, I did enjoy reading this book. I realized that while the two books before this had qhat seemed like a lot of filler, I now understand that some of the filler was necessary. I feel like I truly know and understand some of the characters in this novel.
My favorite part of this book was definitely Annabeth’s individual quest because I loved seeing her use her smarts to overcome her fears.
I am glad that this series is coming to a close in about 1000 pages because I am super excited to move onto the Trials of Apollo and the Magnus Chase series. I also hope to be able to finish the Kane Chronicles trilogy that I began to reread last year. The PJO series and the HOO continuation have been a long journey, and I am glad to start to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
Overall Rating: 4/5