LoveReading4Kids Says
Shortlisted for the Independent Booksellers Book Award 2011
Best-selling author Rick Riordan who created Percy Jackson has once again created some non-stop thrilling action in this headlong adventure as the Egyptian past comes alive and threatens two present day children.
Carter and Sadie, the children of world famous Egyptologist Dr Julius Kane, have no idea what to expect when their father invites them to a special night at the British Museum. Carter and Sadie watch horrified as Dr Kane’s experiment goes horribly wrong causing the Rosetta Stone to explode bringing forth Set, an Egyptian god, who banishes their father, and causes them to flee for their lives.
In alternate chapters, Carter and Sadie tell the desperate story of their survival as they travel across the world to save their father. The reborn power of ancient Egypt is a fascinating and dramatic force to be reckoned with. (9+)
LoveReading4Kids
Find This Book In
| Suitable For: |
|
| Recommendations: |
|
The Red Pyramid Synopsis
Carter and Sadie have nothing in common but their parents: their father Dr. Julius Kane, a brilliant Egyptologist, and their mother, a famed archaeologist who died under mysterious circumstances when they were young. The siblings barely know each other, but one night, their father brings them together at the British Museum, promising a 'research experiment' that will set things right for their family. His plans go horribly wrong. An explosion unleashes an ancient evil - the Egyptian god Set who banishes Dr. Kane to oblivion and forces the children to flee for their lives. Now orphaned, Carter and Sadie must embark on a dangerous quest - from Cairo to Paris to the American Southwest, to save their father and stop Set from destroying everything they care about...
About This Edition
| ISBN: |
9780141384948 |
| Publication date: |
4th May 2010 |
| Author: |
Rick Riordan |
| Publisher: |
Puffin Books an imprint of Penguin Books Ltd |
| Format: |
Hardback |
| Suitable For: |
|
| Recommendations: |
|
About Rick Riordan
A World Book Day Author 2019
Rick Riordan is an award-winning mystery writer. He lives in Boston with his wife and two sons. Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief, Rick's first novel featuring the heroic young demigod, was the overall winner of the Red House Children's Book Award in 2006 and is now a blockbuster film franchise, starring Logan Lerman.
Rick Riordan is also the author of the #1 New York Times bestselling Percy Jackson and the Olympians series for children and the multi-award-winning Tres Navarre mystery series for adults.
For fifteen years, Rick taught English and history at public and private middle schools in the San Francisco Bay Area and in Texas, USA. In 2002, Saint Mary’s Hall honored him with the school’s first Master Teacher Award.
His adult fiction has won the top three national awards in the mystery genre – the Edgar, the Anthony and the Shamus. His short fiction has appeared in Mary Higgins Clark Mystery Magazine and Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine.
His Percy Jackson series features a twelve-year-old dyslexic boy who discovers he is the modern-day son of a Greek god. The Lightning Thief was a New York Times Notable Book for 2005 and winner of the Red House Children's Book Award 2006. Film rights were purchased by Twentieth Century Fox and a feature film version was released in 2010. The Sea of Monsters was a Child Magazine Best Book for Children for 2006 and a Publishers Weekly and BookSense national bestseller. The third title, The Titan’s Curse, made the series a #1 New York Times bestseller, and the most recent title, The Battle of the Labyrinth, had a first printing of one million copies.
Rick Riordan now writes full-time. He lives in San Antonio with his wife and two sons.
To find out more about Percy Jackson - visit www.percyjackson.co.uk
A Q AND A WITH RICK RIORDAN
• Where did you get the idea for Percy Jackson?
My son Haley asked me to tell him some bedtime stories about the Greek gods and heroes. I had taught Greek myths for many years at the middle school level, so I was glad to comply. When I ran out of myths, he was disappointed and asked me if I could make up something new with the same characters. I thought about it for a few minutes. Then I remembered a creative writing project I used to do with my sixth graders — I would let them create their own demigod hero, the son or daughter of any god they wanted, and have them describe a Greek-style quest for that hero. Off the top of my head, I made up Percy Jackson and told Haley all about his quest to recover Zeus’ lightning bolt in modern day America. It took about three nights to tell the whole story, and when I was done, Haley told me I should write it out as a book. I had a lot to do already, but I somehow found the time to write the first Percy Jackson book over the next year. I just really enjoyed writing it. The story was such fun, and so different from my adult fiction, that I found myself spending a lot of time on it. Now, I’m sure glad I did!
• The Lightning Thief deals with magic and the Greek gods. Are you worried about censorship?
In Western Civilization, we’ve always had an uneasy mix between Classical mythology and Judeo-Christian values. As a culture, we tend to believe in one God, but we also grow up steeped in these wonderful old stories about the Olympians. As long as we recognize them as stories that are part of our heritage and long-since stopped being any kind of serious religion, I don’t see the harm in learning mythology. In fact, I think you have to know Greek myths to understand where our modern culture came from. It’s part of being an educated member of society. The Lightning Thief explores Greek mythology in a modern setting, but it does so as a humorous work of fantasy. I’m certainly not interested in changing or contradicting anyone’s religious beliefs. Early in the book, the character Chiron makes a distinction between God, capital-G, the creator of the universe, and the Greek gods (lower-case g). Chiron says he doesn’t want to delve into the issue of God, but he has no qualms about discussing the Olympians because they are a “much smaller matter.” The gods of Olympus are archetypes. They are deeply embedded in and inseparable from Western thought. The book pays tribute to the legacy of Olympus as one of the roots of our culture.
• Have you ever been to Greece or Italy, or are you planning to travel there?
Yes, I’ve been to both Italy and Greece, but only after I finished the Percy Jackson series, which is ironic. One doesn’t need to travel there, however, to appreciate the stories from mythology. Those are quite universal.
More About Rick Riordan
