The Throne of Fire.

The Throne of Fire

by: Rick Riordan



Ever since the gods of Ancient Egypt were unleashed in the modern world, Carter Kane and his sister Sadie have been in trouble. And now their most threatening enemy yet - the chaos snake Apophis - is rising. If they don't prevent him from breaking free in a few days' time, the world will come to an end. In other words, it's a typical week for the Kane family. To have any chance of battling the Forces of Chaos, the Kanes must revive the sun god Ra. But that would be a feat more powerful than any magician has ever accomplished.

Awesome Main Characters: CHECK

Sadie: In this book Sadie was both more annoying and vastly more loveable as a character. But isn't that kind of what thirteen-year-old girls supposed to be like? She returns in this book as brave, funny, silly, and sometimes frustrating. But in the end you root for her. You want her to win battles and accomplish things. Yet again, I am impressed with how well Rick Riordan is able to write from a girl's perspective. She seemed like a typical thirteen year old girl who just happened to have to fight evil Egyptian gods and such. I love that about Riordan's books, the heroes are just normal kids in unusual and challenging circumstances.

Carter: Carter became much more of a leader in this book. He manages to be both incredibly smart and a little dense at the same time. I appreciated how even when he was tempted to tap into Horus' power or take matters into his own hands, he was smart enough to accept his role and help others accept theirs. Again, I loved watching Carter and Sadie's relationship develop even more. They learned in the last book how to be brother and sister and in this book they learned all the responsibilities that came with that. I love that Sadie now knows Carter's true name.

 

Extraordinary Supporting Characters: CHECK

Bes: Bes made his way into being one of my all-time favorite gods in any of Riordan's books. He was funny and kind of sweet. He reminded me of a less smash-y Coach Hedge in a great way. And his sacrifice may have hit me pretty hard...It was very "Ron Weasley" of him. He also made me laugh out loud on more than one occasion (a dwarf god scaring people away by wearing a speedo? Now that's hilarious). Sadie described him best when she said,

"He had an enormous, colorful, ludicrous, wonderful personality..."

Menshikov: For the record, I never said his name right in my head the first time I read it (not just the first time I read his name, every single sentence it appeared in I had to go back and reread so I could get it right). Besides that, he was a completely convincing and disturbing villain.
Ptah: Another character that made me laugh out loud. "I am not the god of spit." end of story.
Walt: The poor dear. When I first met him I didn't really like him, I didn't dislike him he just seemed kind of annoying. Then as we got to know him I realized that he's really a sweetheart. He really cares about Sadie and it's adorable.
Desjardins: Once again, Riordan shows you a antagonist that is mostly fighting against the goal of the protagonists and yet, he shows you why you should about this character anyway. He was a good guy just trying to live up to the legacy of his family. In the end he made the right choice and sacrificed his life to maintain order.
Khnum: Adorable in a giant-who-is-confused kind of way.
Jaz: I want to see more of Jaz. She was a small character, but she made a big impact on the story. You didn't know much about her and yet her almost dying hurt. I wanted her to make it so I could learn more about.

The Action: CHECK

The first sentence of the chapters were dangerous to read. You find yourself both laughing and wanting it to be explained. Take, for example,

 

"It's disturbing to wake up as a chicken. "

 

Now tell me that doesn't make you want to find out exactly what is happening in this chapter. So if you read that you could easily find yourself sucked into another piece of the story.

Once again Riordan shows his skill at writing fight scenes. You can picture exactly what is going on because he doesn't weigh down the scenes with unnecessary detail. The fight scenes easily form in your mind like a movie rolling.

 

Fantastic Setting and Plot: CHECK

Riordan expanded the world that he built in The Red Pyramid quite wonderfully in this book. The Ren added an interesting aspect. I'm interested to see if any other parts of the personality show up since we've seen both a person's ba and ren. I was definitely not expecting Amos to become Chief Lector or really any of the twists that happened in this book, like with Walt's "little problem." I'm excited to see where the third book takes this series and how Riordan manages to tie up all the loose ends.

 

PERCY JACKSON REFERENCES: CHECK

You know, I'm starting to think that Riordan just LOVES messing with his readers, first he sends Percy and Annabeth straight into the depths of Tartarus and force us to wait a year for that to be fixed. Then in this book he kept throwing in Percy Jackson references just for the fun of it. Examples,

 

"Once I thought I saw a flying horse."

 

"I wished I had sea god powers..."

 

Needless to say, I freaked when I read these sentences! PEOPLE, THIS IS WHY I LOVE RICK RIORDAN. And I'm even more excited for The Son of Sobek short story with the crossover with characters from these books and Percy Jackson. I have a feeling it is going to be awesome!

 

Quotes:

 

"Chaos feeds on weak leaders, divided loyalties."

 

"Maybe that was all we could do: keep on trying, keep on believing we could salvage something from the disaster."

 

"Chaos is impatient. It's random. And above all it's selfish. It tears down everything just for the sake of change, feeding on itself in constant hunger. But Chaos can also be appealing. It tempts you to believe that nothing matters except what you want."