The Kane Chronicles, The, Book One: Red Pyramid [Import] [ハードカバー]

Going into this book I had very high expectations. After all, the Percy Jackson books are such a wonderful and unique offering in children's literature. They are funny, witty, filled with action and adventure, they breathe life into some of my favorite myths... They are hard to top. Pretty much this book is what would happen if the 39 Clues series and Percy Jackson books had a baby. There is alot more information being tossed out in this book than in Percy Jackson, but much more fun and mythology than the 39 Clues.

In this first of the Kane Chronicles, Riordan again does a great job of combining humor with action and adventure. This book as a lot to explain in terms of the mythology it is based on, I think most readers on average know less about Egyptian mythology than Greek. However, Riordan again explains it in a way that brings it to life. And once all of the ground work is laid in terms of what is going on in the story everything zooms along at a really fun pace.

Carter and Sadie Kane were raised separately after the sudden and tragic death of their mother. Carter has spent the last half dozen years traveling the world with his father, a noted Egyptologist. Living out of a suitcase and never staying in one place for long, Carter is quiet and a little socially awkward. Sadie on the other hand was raised in London by her grandparents. Even though she's the younger of the two she has a much more forceful personality than her brother. She is loud, wears combat boots and streaks her hair with crazy colors. Carter and his father only are allowed to see Sadie twice a year.

Carter and Sadie barely know each other when the actions of their father leave them on a crazy adventure with only a cat, named Muffin, to help them out. Not only is the crazy chaos god, Set, after them also an ancient group of wizards is tailing them across the world.

Riordan again does a great job of pulling ancient mythology into the modern world. He really grounds his story and makes it believable. By the end of the book you really know the characters and are ready for their next adventure.

Another fun thing about this book is that instead of having one narrator he allows Sadie and Carter to alternate every few chapters. Their voices are very different and how they see things is very interesting. It also sets up a lot of the humor.

In spite of its size (its around 41 Chapters long) I think anyone who enjoyed the Percy Jackson books will find themselves loving this book as well.

I'm only giving it 4 stars because it took me until maybe chapter 15 to really get into the book, there was so much information that it slowed down the narrative for me.

I know I am a little late catching up to the Kane Chronicles, but I must say that I love the new series by Rick Riordan and I'm very happy that he's switched from Greek to Egyptian mythology. I always felt that his books were great tools to enlighten and interest youngsters on ancient history, which is a nice touch. This series carries the history torch as well. Thought this first book was great and it did keep me interested but every once in awhile a few of those 41 chapters dragged, which is why I gave it 4 stars. The story could have been tightened up a bit and it would have been more engaging. Still, it was a fun read and I am sure others will enjoy it. I hope they turn this series into movies as well. Should translate nicely.

I know Rick Riordan can do better than this since he already has with the Percy Jackson series. I won't compare the two, but I will say that excellent children's books do exist, and this is not even close. Ancient Greek mythology and ancient Egyptian culture are probably the two most popular subjects that exist. Most people find them fascinating. I was very excited when I heard about this book and have been waiting to read it for some time. When I found out more about it I was even more excited. A coming of age story with magical powers thrown in on top of the ancient Egyptian theme-awesome. So what went wrong?

First, no character development. There are two narrators, a brother and sister, and they don't really have their own personalities. They go through the motions, complete tasks, and have conversations, but there isn't much there personality wise. Sure, one of them dresses in combat boots, and the other one is a bit bookish, but that's all we get. In other books the characters have clear personalities. Examples: Fablehaven, Harry Potter, or even the Percy Jackson series. Each character is distinguishable and unique. That is not the case here, and the book suffers from it. I really think authors need to know that a long drawn out action sequence is just not good enough.

Which brings me to the second problem with this book, the plot. There is a bad guy that wants to destroy the world and the main characters have to stop him. Not too deep, but not much different from the general plot in the other books I mentioned. What makes it a problem in this book? The way plot is developed. The characters go where they are told to start the novel. Then, they run into someone that tells them to go see someone else. They go see that person, who then leads them to another person. Get the idea? In the middle of this there will be some danger in the form of a monster or a dangerous location. A book that consists almost entirely of go here do this, go there do that, fight something, go retrieve something, then go talk to this person, is just not good enough. I've played those video games before, they are boring.

My third issue is the bad guys. Why is it that children's books never have deep, intelligent, powerful, bad guys? They are always cardboard muahaha style baddies, and The Red Pyramid is no exception. When the bad guy decides to have a long drawn out conversation in the middle of a fight I cringe. The bad guys are just too cheesy in this book, and it's sad. I guess if the main characters have no depth, then their enemies can't be expected to have any either. The super powerful Egyptian entities are no better. They are all eccentric, and some come off as stupid. I don't appreciate powerful beings acting like five year olds. I don't understand why the author chose to portray them that way, it is certainly not funny to me. I guess having Bast constantly reference Friskies is supposed to be funny, but I personally didn't like it.

The last issue that I will mention is progression. I like my characters to mature and progress, but again, if they have no personalities, there isn't much to improve upon. The plot was agonizingly slow as well. I was getting tired of the book by the third of fourth person the characters met, and there was at least twenty more to go at that point. If the interactions with these new characters had any effect on the outcome of the book I may have been more interested. Instead, they simply pointed the characters in the direction of the next task.

I can't think of a single thing I enjoyed about this book except maybe the beginning before the danger came into play. I really am sick of books where the characters go through the motions and complete task after task. I've read other books where the entire thing feels like one big chase scene, and this is no different. I won't be continuing with this series, and it's a shame because the author could have done so well with the ancient Egpytian theme. Instead, he chose to trivialize everything in a weak attempt at humor that just didn't work for me.