[Reading]Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief

Today, I’m really glad that I’ve finally finished reading the first original English novel — the first novel of Percy Jackson and the Olympians series: The Lightning Thief — although it is of a low reading level (for elementary school students) for native speakers.

At the very beginning, the book I wanted to read was the first novel of A song of Ice and Fire — A Game of Thrones. I have to admit it’s a little bit harder for me to read this book than The Lightning Thief. But it’s not so difficult that I’m not able to read it. And although I’ve watched the TV series of GoT, I’ve never been worried about spoilers because of my ephemeral memory. However, I have no idea why I didn’t feel motivated to continue reading. So, at last, I decided to read Percy Jackson series as recommended by other English learners from the 1point3acres forum.

Now, I don’t regret my choice and even feel thankful that I made that choice. This book made me interested in Greek Mythologies (I even went to watch a documentary of Greek Mythologies) because a lot of characters and plots refers Greek Mythologies as blueprint. For instance, the most powerful Gods are Zeus, Poseidon and Hades and their weapons are Lightning bolt, Trident, Helmet of Darkness, respectively. Thus, if you have some knowledge about Greek Mythologies previously, you will be able to figure out how the story will go on without further reading. However, there is still some difference. For example, Medusa was actually raped by Poseidon in Athena’s palace by force instead of she falling in love with him in this novel. Although Medusa wanted to keep her virginity, after she and Poseidon were caught by Athena, Athena cursed her and turn her beautiful hairs to serpents.

As for the plot, there are some flaws. However, since it’s a for child, we should not ask too much of it. At least, it always carried some foreshadowing and never made me feel bored. Back to my original purpose, I just want to learn English and English/Western culture through reading. From this perspective, I indeed learned a lot about grammar and good phrases. However, it might take a lot of time to summarize them all, I will definitely do it because this is the most important phase of learning from reading. I hope I can share my summary when I finish it. It’s not some kinds of professional notes, but it witnesses the learning progress of an English learner who is aspire for improving his English, especially writing and speaking. And I hope it will be at least a little bit helpful to some of you guys!