The seven heroes of the prophecy have been united at last.has arrived in New Rome and the journey to the ancient lands can officially begin. Tensions remain high as the Greeks and Romans are forced to put aside old prejudices in order to work towards a common goal. None are more conflicted than Annabeth Chase. She must shoulder the burden as leader of the quest, but also has a special task from her mother Athena. Once in Rome, Annabeth must find the long-lost Athena Parthenos statue. Wisdoms's daughter must walks alone as the Mark of Athena burns through Rome.As usual, spoilers of plenty beyond this point. Turn back now if you don't want any of that.As you may have guessed, Annabeth gets a bit of a special focus throughout this book. Well, Percy, Piper and Leo get chapters from their perspectives, but Annabeth is really the center of this particular book. After two and half books, Annabeth and Percy are reunited, and it feels so good. We also finally get an answer to a question fan have been pondering since: what did Percy and Annabeth do about the grey streaks in their hair from holding up the sky? Turns out they did nothing, but the grey is starting to fade, so no big deal. It certainly isn't unusual for younger people's hair to grey up well ahead of schedule; so not like it would be too hard to explain. I got my first grey hairs when I was a teenager, and early grayness is a bit of a genetic trait on my mom's side of the family...yeah, it sure will be fun when I'm thirty and have a head of completely grey hairs, but I digress.Anyway, we finally get a look inside Annbeth's head, but it just felt off to me. She came across as far more self-conscious, critical and insecure than in previous books. Now, granted, you could argue that, since the original series was from Percy's perspective, it was a bit biased. You could even make the case that Annabeth was making an effort to hide these sides of her in order to appear strong and in-control. Still, it just feels off to me. One of the most egregious instances was when the heroes are in Charleston, South Carolina. Aphrodite/Venus is having a tea party with Annabeth, Piper and Hazel. Annabeth thinks to herself about how fattening all the sweets are...um, what? I'm pretty certain that Annabeth gets a lot of physical exercise, particularly when it comes to training to fight monsters.For that matter, I'm pretty sure keeping in shape is mandatory for all demigods. As the movienoted, fatties are always the first to get eaten during a monster attack. Having Annabeth go "OMG, so fattening" was so stereotypical, for a teenage girl, it was downright painful; especially given that she wasn't even hinted to have that mindset before. It was also way out of character that she needed Frank to explain Chinese fingercuffs to her, even if she was distracted at the time.Also, let's talk about Athena and Minerva. Athena/Minerva has tasked Annabeth with finding the Athena Parthenos so that she can reclaim the honor the Romans strip of her by reducing her to a minor goddess. This is flat-out incorrect. Minerva may not have had the war goddess aspects of Athena, and she was certainly more focused on the domestic arts, but she was by no means a minor goddess. The Capitoline Triad, three of the most important gods in Rome, consisted of Jupiter, Juno and Minerva. The Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, arguably the most important temple in all of Rome, honored these three gods. Minor goddess my ass! This is especially glaring given Riordan's usually impeccable attention to mythological accuracy.I promise I'll get to the positives in a minute, but we got one more negative to cover. We get more insight into the American Civil War, as it pertains to demigods. Apparently, the Romans supported the South because the Ancient Romans kept slaves. Jason admits it wasn't one of the Roman demigods' finer moments. This is rather odd, considering that the Ancient Greeks also kept slaves. I should here note that slavery in Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome was different than slavery in Antebellum America. Greeks and Romans practiced colorblind slavery; if you were a barbarian (read: non-Greek/Roman) or were a conquered enemy, it didn't matter what color you were, you had potential to become a slave. In pre-Civil War America, by contrast, slavery was entirely race-based.Okay, you've had your vegetables, now it's time for desert...unless you like vegetables and hate sweets. In which case, scratch and verse what I just said. I considerto be one of the best books in The Heroes of Olympus, along withand. I loved that Reyna and Annabeth, and by extension the other Greeks and Romans, finally got to interact with each other, and that the series finally starts to get into international territory.Annabeth's navigation through the catacombs of Rome was awesome from start to finish. She's the only member of the seven without any powers, but that didn't slow her down. The scene where she encounters the lares who are followers of Mithras was particularly amusing. She doesn't know much about their religion, and mostly gets by by guessing at at the symbols they used. This is a nod to how scholars know basically nothing about Mithraism, and what little we do know comes from archaeology and educated guesswork. I also liked that the Athena Parthenos, an actual historical artifact, was central to the plot of the book. Really great to see more Ancient Greek history being incorporated into the series.The scene at the Pillars of Hercules was particularly well done, especially when Jason and Piper meet Hercules himself. Turns out that, over the years, Hercules has grown rather cynical, jaded and a bit of a jerk. This has particularly relevance when you think back to, and the gods' offer to make Percy a god. You can almost see Hercules as a shadowy image of what Percy could have become. That makes Percy's wish that he could have been the one to meet Hercules carry that much more irony. Back in, Percy said that Hercules was his favorite hero, because of how relateable he found him. Had he taken the gods up on their offer, he might have related to Hercules on a whole other level.We also learn that there's an undersea camp for children of the aquatic gods, except children of Poseidon, run by Chiron's brothers Aphros and Bythos. I know they had the rule about Poseidon's kids, but come on, Percy should have visited them. Underwater stuff is his wheelhouse. I wouldn't have minded if Frank and Leo tagged along, I certainly think that Percy should be taking his friends on more underwater adventures, but he shouldn't be missing out. Also, if Poseidon kids can't come to the underwater camp, why was Triton one of their alumni? Maybe he was so bad they banned all other Poseidon kids? Whatever the reason, I feel that the underwater camp was seriously under utilized, especially since it never reappears after this book.I also think it's a shame that Poseidon never really appear in this series, apart from when he was with the other gods. How would he come across to demigods other than Percy? Would he still be a nice god, or would be see a darker side of him? What does Poseidon think about Annabeth being a daughter of his rival Athena? Is Neptune pretty much the same as Poseidon, or does he have a different personality? There's a lot of potential that never really got tapped.As I've previously mentioned, I listened towhen I was taking a school-sponsored trip to Italy the summer before my junior year of high school. In a way, seeing Percy, Annabeth and the gang having adventures in Rome felt things coming full-circle in a way. It brought back memories of that trip. Well, I didn't have to fight monsters and giants, or go on any quests for the gods, but you get the point.I enjoyed getting to see Bacchus when the seven stopped in Kansas. I never thought I'd miss Mr. D so much, but Camp Half-Blood just hasn't felt the same since he left. Like the song says, sometimes you really don't know what you got til it's gone. I do hope that he will appear inat some point. Hmm, if Dionysus is Mr. D, does that make Bacchus Mr. B?Now let's talk about Coach Hedge. My biggest question about him is, well, why do the seven even need him? They're clearly more than capable taking care and defending themselves. About the only thing I can think he'd be good for is making sure the seven aren't fooling around and having sex, or anything like that. I bring that up because there was that one scene of Percy and Annabeth falling asleep in the ship's hold, and then getting discovered by everyone else. Now, they never outright say it, but based on the way everyone else was reacting, I think there just might be a chance that Percy and Annabeth were getting a little frisky. Hey, Riordan would have had to keep that sort of thing under the radar.Now let's get a bit more speculative. Coach Hedge is much more aggressive than the other satyrs at Camp Half-Blood. In Greek Mythology, satyrs were very lustful and wild, a sharp contrast to the ones at Camp Half-Blood. This could be because Riordan wanted to keep things family friendly. It could be, but what if there's a slightly darker reason? What if the satyrs are that way because they've been neutered, except for studs used to replenish the population? Hmm, nah, I'm probably reading too much into that.Speaking of satyrs, let's touch on Grover's absence. Grover was a key part of the originally series, especially in the trio he formed with Percy and Annabeth. You can see them as the Freudian Trio; impulsive Percy as the Id, brainy Annabeth as the Superego, and Grover as the Ego who mediates the two approaches. You can also see them as a reflection of the concept of Mind, Body and Spirit. Grover is the Body; he, like all nature spirits is intrinsically bound to the physical world. Annabeth is the is the cool and calculating Mind. Percy is the impulsive and passionate Spirit, but also embodies it in his empathy and compassion for others, and his drive to defend them.The point I'm making is, I think this is why the seven, in the combination they stand, rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. Grover, a key part of the original series core, has been completely sidelined, and his absence is felt very much. Strange isn't it, one satyrs life touches so many other's. When he's not around he leaves a awfully big hole. We'll touch about this more in, butsees some notable character development for Percy. He's the heart of the seven, the one who binds them all together. He's an Id transitioning into an Ego. This does make sense; he's old, wiser, more experienced and more mature. Yet at the same time he's still the Seaweed Brain we all know and love.Alright, I've put it off for long enough, let's talk about Jason. I'd really hoped that this book would clear up his characterization and give him some development. Yeah, that did not happen at all. My biggest problem with Jason is that he runs foul of "show, don't tell". We are told that Jason feels conflicted, we are told that Jason is drawn to Camp Half-Blood, we are told that he is a great praetor. We are told all of this, but we are never shown any evidence of this. Again, a prequel short story set at Camp Jupiter might have helped out here. It appear that his personality was...well, not having a personality. The Ancient Romans prized stoicism, it is true, but this is not a case of that. It just comes across more as lazy writing and a lack of planning.One thing I noticed was that the seven didn't really work as a whole collective unit, but they did work in certain combos. For example, I was surprised at how well Hazel, Frank and Leo gelled together, especially towards the end of the book. It's kind of like how you can have ingredients to make a soup, and maybe they work in certain combos, but don't really work together as a whole. This will become a bit of a reoccurring theme as we move forwards. Just keep that in mind. Also, Leo's great-grandpa being named Sammy means that we finally got a character named Sam! Well, I thought that was significant anyway.And of course we have to talk about the ending. Percy and Annabeth falling into Tartarus...I mean, damn. I did not expect something like that. That was Thanos snaps his fingers level of "damn!" Of course, we'll discuss that more in depot in our next retrospective. And I'm also going to take a moment to plug the audiobook version Now let's analyze the cover. We see Percy and Jason riding Blackjack and Tempest about to duke it out. The storm is gathering as a pair of owl eyes, obviously symbolizing Athena, watches over them.I hope I didn't sound too nitpicky.is one of the core three good books of, and I enjoyed it very much. Well, I think that should do it for now. Join me next time when we take a look back at. I will see you all then.