The Lightning Thief (Percy Jackson and the Olympians Book 1)

As a secondary English teacher, I frequently read YA books to see what I want to add to my classroom library.  I am rarely as entranced by a YA book as I was by this one.  I purchased this book but did not have time to read it, so I loaned it to a "test reader" and asked him to review it for me.  When he returned it, he said that it was "okay"--fairly high praise from a 7th grade boy.  Shortly after that, I was faced with state testing week and my homeroom in my classroom for four hours every morning--even though they were only testing for two of those days.  I decided to start The Lightning Thief with them, hoping to keep them at least quiet enough that they would not disturb the eighth graders nearby who were testing on those days.  My students--almost all non-readers--were practically falling out of their desks as they listened intently to the story.  Out of a class of 25, only about 3 of the students were not interested in the book, which we continued reading after testing week was over.  Two of the students even went to our school library that afternoon to check out the two copies IMMS owns--then the was a little chaos as others were rather unhappy that those two had gotten there first.  To me, that is the highest praise I can think of for an author--a group of non-readers fell in love with his book.

The hero of The Lightning Thief is 12 year old Percy Jackson, a demi-god, who must go on a quest with his friend Grover (a satyr) and Annabeth Chase, another demi-god, who becomes a friend as the quest goes on.  The trio must journey to the Underworld to retrieve Zeus's master bolt from Hades.  Over the course of their journey, the group fights several mythological monsters, including the Furies, mechanical spiders, and Cerberus.  There are appearances by some of the gods--like the motorcycle-riding, leather-wearing Ares--and some twists and turns.

Honestly, this is a book that I would recommend to both adults and YA readers.  I plowed through book 2 and book 3, but I am trying to make myself go slowly and savor book 4 since I will have to wait about a year before I get to read the last book in the series.  ARGH!