The Hidden Oracle (Trials of Apollo, #1)

by Rick Riordan

[sa090]

If I had to rank which mythology I enjoy the most out of Rick's take on them then without a doubt, Greek would be on top. However, that doesn't necessarily mean that every installment in it is going to be a great one.

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Please don't let that start wrongfully imply that the book was garbage, it was okay, just not as great. It's very easy for me to get immersed in Rick Riordan's world and the chapters are pretty short that it makes me feel like I'm reading faster which makes pulling away pretty hard. The thing is, the minute I stop reading, I find it difficult to actually want to come back to this story. I'd get lazy, I'd think of putting it on hold for a bit or I'd find something else to do before I told myself that enough is enough and I finished it in a couple of sittings.

The main issue I have here is Apollo. I really disliked reading his thoughts and how oh so amazing he thinks he is, I found him hard to swallow when he appeared as a side character in the earlier books so with him in full view, it's insanely difficult for me to actually care enough about him to want to see him succeed rather than see him disappear as soon as possible, he's also pretty cringeworthy for me so there's that unfortunately. This ehh part of the book didn't disappear for me at all, it's just in the last 10 chapters of the book the scenes were moving so quickly to wrap it up that it wasn't as easy for him to be himself in a huge degree which in turn made this book more enjoyable for me.

I'm not saying that those chapters were the only ones with that of course since there were other similar instances sprinkled through the book but those 10 chapters had a lot of them that they flew by in less than 30 minutes. The good thing about this approach with his character though is that any character development is going to be very easy to see and while he's not there just yet, Apollo is slowly learning how to be a better Apollo. Therefore, I really hope that one day I'm going to really enjoy his character.

The story in itself doesn't feel that original anymore, it has a few similar elements to earlier books in the series that it doesn't deliver that wow factor anymore for me which again made it a good read, just not on the same level of awesome entertainment as his earlier books in the series delivered for me which could ultimately lead back to the protagonist and my impression of him. I did enjoy seeing and hearing about our old heroes, makes me excited for the Ship of the Dead this October and of course meeting the new faces in the series was interesting in its own way.

Final rating: 2/5