Stephy Read Percy Jackson and the Olympians: Sea of Monsters by Rick Riordan

"Families are messy. Immortal families are eternally messy. Sometimes the best we can do is to remind each other that we're related, for better or worse... and try to keep the maiming and killing to a minimum."

About

Written by Rick Riordan and published in 2006, The Sea of Monsters is the second book in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series. 

Go read my ramblings about the first book in the series here.

Content/Trigger Warnings

Violence

Abusive Parent

 

Ummm... that's all I can think of. If anyone knows any that I missed let me know.

Characters

Most the characters from the first book come back for this one. And a new character is introduced! 

 Percy, Annabeth and Grover are back. Grover has a smaller but no less important role in this one. 

Clarisse is back with a bit of a bigger role. And she's less of a bitch... 

Ares is a dick. Just... yeah... dude is still an asshole.

 

Writing

Writing is fantastic. Again, simple without making the reader feel stupid. 

Plot

Thalia's Tree has been poisoned, and Percy is going to get to the bottom of it. Even though he's told not to leave camp. That is just a small detail. It'll be fine. 

And it is! Percy, Annabeth and their new friend, Tyson, are off to save Camp Half-Blood, and Grover. Because Percy has also been having weird dreams about Grover being in trouble. So they have to save him, too. Because no way is Percy leaving his BFF behind.

 Romance

Well, a cyclops thinks he's going to marry Grover but the relationship falls apart when the cyclops learns that Grover is a male satyr not a female cyclops. 

Other than that... no romance.

Overall Thoughts

 Writing reviews for these books is hard cause i really don't wanna spoil anything. I want everyone to read these books and be surprised by every twist and character introduction and all that shit. So while I wanna gush about the various characters from Greek mythology that show up, another part of me doesn't wanna say anything. Ugh. 

Anyway!

This book is a great follow up to The Lightning Thief. It starts with a game of deadly dodgeball and keeps the excitement going until the last page. Which, little bit of a cliffhanger. Because that's what Rick Riordan does...

Everyone should read this series. I said it before, and I'll keep saying it until I die. Not even joking, I will probably be on my death bed trying to convince someone to read these books.

 

 That's all for this one.

Stephy Read Interview With the Vampire

 

 “For what can the damned really have to say to the damned?”

 

 About/Summary

Published in 1967, Interview With the Vampire is the first book of the Vampire Chronicles. The book focuses on a vampire, Louis, telling his "life" story to a reporter. 

Content/Trigger Warnings

Death

Child Death

 Slavery

Underage vampire (this gets a warning because sometimes it gets a little weird when you remember Claudia has the body of a five-year-old)

Lestat (he gets his own warning... like seriously)

Emotional manipulation

Characters

I'm sorry, but the characters in this book are all horrible. Just, horrible little creatures that entertain me greatly. Like, who knows what kind of shit Lestat is going to get up to. He doesn't even know! It might be heartbreaking, it could be hilarious, but no matter what you will not be able to look away cause that man is a car crash.

Also, I love Armand. He is baby. I love him.

And one of the main characters is just called The Boy through the entire book. Which, rude, Louis. Ask for his name before whining to him for 10 fucking hours straight.

 

Setting

Book is mainly set is New Orleans and Paris. And technically San Francisco cause that's where the room is where Louis whines at Daniel (that is the reporter's name, unlike Louis's rude ass, I care) for an entire night. 

Writing

Anne Rice's writing isn't for everyone. Sometimes it's not even for me, if I am perfectly honest. I am not saying it is bad. I am saying some people might not enjoy it. 

Plot

The entire plot was Louis, a 200-year-old vampire, telling a random guy how shitty it is being a vampire. That's it.That's the plot. I mean, other things happen, but the main plot is vampire is whining about his existence.

Romance

Louis and Lestat were totally a couple. A toxic couple. But still a couple. 

How diverse is it?

The only people of color were slaves.

 

Overall Thoughts

No thoughts about this book will ever top when my kid was reading it, they burst into my room and shouted "Lestat baby-trapped Louis!" You could have the most thought-provoking insight for this book and I will look you straight in the eye and go "Lemme tell you about the time my kid was reading this book". 

But aside from that... This isn't my favorite book from the Vampire Chronicles. I enjoy it, but I tend to find myself thinking "oh gods, shut up Louis..." a lot while reading it. 

Another thing, I need to know how long Louis and Armand traveled together. How long did Armand have to deal with Louis just... going through the motions and probably talking constantly about how beautiful Lestat was? Poor Armand for dealing with that. 

Also, I need to know is how long Lestat, Louis and Claudia stayed in New Orleans. And if it was longer than five years, how did nobody notice the three weirdos that didn't age? And did anyone notice the amount of death that happened? Louis says they have to kill to feed, which, fine, whatever. So that was at least three dead people a night. At least 90 dead people a month. That's over a thousand people a year. I know this took place way back in the day, and the mortality rate was higher back then, but still. That is a lot of dead people that no one seemed to notice or care about. 

 

I think that's about it... Stay tuned for me to ramble about the drama that is Lestat de Lioncourt some more. Cause that boy is just drama in human form.

6 Things I Did That Won't Get Their Own Post - Part 4

 Hello there.

I did some things that won't get their own blog post, again.

 

Monsters of West Virginia 

by Rosemary Ellen Guiley

 Really interesting book about various cryptids and such that have been spotted in West Virginia. Speaking of cryptids of West Virginia, they are starting up a Grafton Monster Festival.

 

 

 The Legend of Korra 

 This is not getting a blog post just cause I was super slow writing up the post for Avatar and would need to rewatch before doing a whole post about it. So, if I ever get back on Netflix (or buy the DVDs), I'll do a post for it. Otherwise, I'm just gonna say this show was really good. I loved Korra and Bolin. Glad to see members of the original group. Missed Sokka. Also glad that we almost got a lesbian romance.

Mortal Kombat (1995)

 Oh my gods. This movie is so bad. I love it! But shit, it is bad 😂😂

Okay, it's really not that bad, all things considered. Plot is solid. Acting wasn't too horrible. I've seen worse, at least. Good characters. Special effects were probably awesome in 1995. But, by today's standards, it's kind of shit. I still love it though. 

Mortal Kombat: Annihilation

  Again, so bad, but I love it. Also, I forgot how horrible Baraka looked. Holy shit that was bad. Gods I love these movies.

 

 

Girl Explorers by Jayne Zanglein

 Good book. Really interesting and informative. I just can't figure out how to ramble about it for a full post. I do recommend it to anyone who is interested in history. Especially history that is focused on women doing things.

The Strange True Tale of Frankenstein's Creator Mary Shelley 

by Catherine Reef

 This book was really good. I only knew things about Mary Shelley through Tumblr so it was interesting to learn more. But no blog post for this one because it will just be me going off about Percy Shelley, Lord Byron and how the past was the worst. I do recommend it if you wanna know more about Mary Shelley though. 

Book did have a great opening paragraph.

That's all for this one.

This Week I...

 Tis Saturday.

Guess we'll see what I did this week.

 

Wrote

 Just worked on blog posts this week.

Read

 A lot!

I finished The Stand, Good Omens, a book about Mary Shelley and the Star Wars book I was reading!

Which means I got to start new books. 

On the Kindle I started Ellie Jordan, Ghost Trapper, which is pretty good so far (and free for the Kindle...).

Started reading a true crime book and I'm not really digging it so I'll probably not finish it...

Watched

 Just Shoot Me - saw this was on Roku and decided to put it on. Some episodes are missing, which made me sad. But considering I was mostly using it as background noise while I read, it wasn't that big of a deal. Also, I forgot how much I enjoyed this stupid show.

The Storyteller - Saw this was on Max and was like "Yes, I do want to watch John Hurt tell stories to a puppet dog". Fun kids' show from the 80s.

The Storyteller: Greek Myths - Same basic premise as the original, but this time it's Michael Gambon telling Greek myths.

Played

 Nothing.

 

Posted

An Animal Crossing Post.

 

Anything Else?

 Not a damn thing.

 

That's all for this one. Not sure what Wednesday's post will be.