Sword of Summer
2.8 stars. Sloppy. Sloppy. Not sure how to write about this, usually I read a book like this and I’m instantly gunning to read the rest of the series stat. But my impression is that I’ll get to it when I get to it, which might be in a couple months or a couple years and after I’ve forgotten anything that happened in this book so I’ll be disappointed in the lack of exposition in the follow up when usually I’m annoyed. Like the author didn’t think I’d remember something I binged the night before *scoffs*.
Magnus is an interesting character that I’m not sure I really understand or want to understand. His best friends are middle-aged men from what I can tell and a half-Muslim girl who either wears the same hijab every single day or has forty of the exact same one. Not only that irked me, but the representation of Muslims seemed a little short-sighted here (sorry Riordan). I do not practice Islam, nor do I have any especially close friends that do, but I feel like researching some general practices and pillars of the religion and their direct associations with ancient nordic culture might not actually be that difficult.
Besides my take on ancient religion and those that survived into modern times, the writing was a bit lazy. If you want a super fast, thoughtless read. Go ahead and pick it up. But if you want the same level of lore-saturated fiction as Percy Jackson or Tristan Strong then you have come to the wrong book series.
Hammer of Thor
3 stars. Uh. I don’t know what happened. Did a bunch of teens get put in deaths path and free a literal monster just because someone wanted better streaming for their binge addiction? Or was it more the child bride that irked me? I don’t know, it was ok I guess. Read it yourself and see.
Ship of the Dead
3 stars. I have read them all. That was unforseen, but I needed more lighthearted easy going ya lit in my life, so here we are. In the beginning, I was like “oooh, here’s Riordan using PJ as a lazy writing tactic AGAIN. But then he wasn’t there for even a chapter so *shrug* I guess that’s fine. Anyway, I just felt like the struggle wasn’t real. Since Magnus is the MC it almost belittled Alex and Sam’s trauma of having a horrible parent and getting to serve justice. The story and lore were interesting enough to push me through it though, so that goes for something. But it wasn’t my favorite.
Mel Reviews Books 