Board Thread:The Trials of Apollo/@comment-40112776-20190928182907/@comment-5279400-20190929225003

Housedunn wrote: So probably my favorite part of the book is that Rick Riordan actually doubled down on Jason’s death. My biggest fear going into the book is that he would find away to bring him back, through his revival or making him into a minor god would cheapen the effect of his sacrifice, while also breaking Zeus’s character, cheapening the Seven’s while ruining the whole Godhood thing. (Only 5 demigods became gods off my head and only two made it through their feats). There is no good way to have home come back effectively that I can see except for one (*cough *cough Jason Grace origin story). I was extremely appreciated tho that his death had such a lasting effect on the story, helping to drive to plot forward and be a lasting motivation to Apollo. It was the first real “death in the family” and the story really pushes that perfectly. Other than that I really enjoyed the book. Rick’s book are still a joy to read tho there is a couple little nitpicks that I have.

1) I personally didn’t really like that Reyna became hunter. I always felt like she was the bad ass that was married to her job and even though she never had guy luck, one day she found the perfect one for her, and since it was interpreted that only a mortal can love her, even though that every single person around this hypothetically male would be better fast more heroic and more beautiful than him, he would still be worth it cuz he is near and dear to her heart. Too sappy? Eh oh well

2) I pretty much despise every fake death there is, so even though frank’s is about the least painful of the majority of them, I still don’t know how to feel about it. It felt like a weird contrived death with a weird contrived way of him coming back. The only couple reason i’m like “eh” on it instead “ugh” is that we had an major death in the pervious book so it seems like a little break before the absolute firestorm that is going to be book five and that the battle was not consequences free.

3) the wakanda reference was absolutely hilarious, but it messes with the lore because infinity war came out in 2018 and the story should take place in 2010 so unless if there was a marvel comic with wakanda depicting something similar released in 2010 or infinity war came out in 2010 in the riordanverse, we would have some little timeline issues for us to debate in the future ( semantics I know)

Overall I really enjoyed the book tho, and for the entire series of far I have steady grown more and more to like it. TOA is really taking an identity of its own as the really Dark story of the riordanverse. We’re really see consequences and sacrifices never see in uncle rick’s works, tho I have yet to personally put it over any of his other series, except for HOO ( cuz I still don’t know what to feel bout that series lol)

Edit: oh another gripe is hazel being chosen for praetor. Absolutely nothing against her, I love her to death, but every single person we know that we know was praetor was from the 5th cohort. Jason, the Michael dude, I-don’t-know-bout-Reyna-but-it’s-heavy-implied-tho, Percy, Frank, and now hazel at all 5th. They could still bring Jason Grace back or make him a minor god. Hades COULD resurrect Jason in exchange for Caligula, maybe even the entire Triumvirate. I really hope they do. I love Jason and he's one of my favorite characters. Reyna being a Hunter makes perfect sense. She had difficulties in the romance department so she wants to never go through that pain again by becoming a Huntress.