Review of "House of Hades" by Rick Riordan -- spoilers galore

I have a few go-to recommendations for kids who think they don't like to read. The Percy Jackson books are among those go-tos: funny, smart, packed full of references that will reward kids who read the source material (Greek mythology)... these are just terrific books for kids. They're also fun for adults who enjoy mythology and like Riordan's wink-and-smirk attitude about how a lot of it would translate in the modern world.

House of Hades is the fourth book in the second series, Heroes of Olympus. It follows the five of the seven demigod heroes (and their protector, satyr gym teacher Coach Hedge) on their voyage from Rome to Greece aboard the Argo II. The other plot involves the main heroes of the first series, Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase, as they try to escape from Tartarus.

How is it? Eh. Three thumbs up and an eyeroll. I generally liked it, but there were a lot of problematic parts.

Fair warning, I review with spoilers.

Character
With seven points of view, the characters are starting to get a little short-shrifted here. There's a lot going on, some of which didn't have to do with the seven prophesied POV heroes, so along with those seven (Jason, Piper, Leo, Percy, Annabeth, Frank, Hazel), you're getting a little sidelong glance at Hedge, a much fuller exploration of Nico, and even the return of Calypso (last seen in Battle of the Labyrinth, five books ago). None of this is bad, but ten character arcs and seven points of view contained in two action-packed and separate plot-lines, you often feel kind of jerked around from one place to another.

Not that there's not some good stuff. I think I was happiest when Leo was interacting with Calypso. It felt like a breathing space, and I felt like we actually got the right length there. Leo, in general, seems to be the new character with the most natural, lifelike work about him. Almost everything in the Tartarus plot (Annabeth and Percy) worked like a charm, as they're both dealing with things that, even as very powerful demigods, they aren't remotely prepared for. I like that Riordan doesn't tinker with their relationship a lot. Exploring them as devoted to each other is much more interesting (and DIFFERENT) than wondering what big nasty thing is going to come around the corner and smack them apart.

The more problematic character stuff happens with the Argo II. Nico di Angelo is keeping his promise to Percy to get everyone to the doors of death, and that's interesting (he's a fan favorite for a reason), but, much as I like seeing him again, he's not one of the main characters in this series. His half-sister Hazel is, and that would have been a good way to deal with him, but instead, we get Jason spending a lot of time watching him and dealing with Nico's "big secret" (he has a crush on Percy) rather than Jason dealing with a fairly big point of his plot, which is the fact that he's feeling more Greek than Roman, and has to make a choice at a pivotal point. When it came time for Jason to make this choice, it came off as strange, because instead of dealing with that conflict in himself through the story up to that point, he'd been commenting on Nico's plot. Nico's sister Hazel, who had less internal conflict and a real plot of her own, might have been a better choice for viewing Nico. She could have found out in the process of him helping her. And Piper... fandom didn't take to her, and there's a very clear sense that she's being pushed off the bus here to make room for elements the fans do like. You really shouldn't be able to see those wheels turning. Frank Zhang gets some good moments, but I'm still kind of indifferent to him.

Setting
Tartarus is amazing, full stop. As Percy and Annabeth deal with the extremely unpleasant side of the underworld (they realize that they are actually walking on the body of the primordial god Tartarus), Riordan gives a hellaciously detailed experience of it for the reader. The smell, the burning lungs, having to drink fire. There are creatures beyond anything Percy and Annabeth have needed to deal with, including creatures who revisit them with the pain of the foes they've defeated across the rest of the series. Possibly the strangest was Annabeth having to deal with Calypso's anger and loneliness, which was maybe a bit too close to her re-introduction to be as effective as it might have been, but was still a scary moment. There are black pits and armies of monsters and... elevator music. The last stage of hell involves riding up an elevator playing that pina colada song. (Pure Riordan.)

Calypso's island of Ogygia is a re-visit, so there's not as much description this time around (Riordan assumes at this point that you've read the others). Still, it's given enough of a sense of place that Leo's sojourn there has a lot of dimension to it. I hope he does come back.

We're in and out of Bologna too quickly to have much of an impression. Venice gets more, but I'd have liked a more visceral explanation. Somehow, everything that's not Tartarus or Ogygia feels a little generic.

Theme
With as many threads going on as there are, the theme is a little disjointed, but I'll say a lot of the threads end up with the idea that choices have consequences, but you need to make them. It doesn't fit *every* line, but it's prominent enough to call it a theme.

Style
Riordan's style is always great. The elevator music from Tartarus, random lines that mention "explosives and high velocity pineapples," the mix of modern and ancient, all with the humor that's been part of the series from the top... there's nothing to complain about with the style. It's strong, it's consistent, and it's just great.

Plot
The plot, on the other hand, kind of dropped the ball. Not the Tartarus plot, which was great, but the Argo II plot... it was, literally and figuratively, all over the map. Is it about Hazel learning magic? Why is Jason so prominent when he's not doing much? Is Piper doing anything? Is all-powerful Frank going to be... all-powerful? (Spoiler: Yes.) Why is Hedge sending so many iris messages? What's going on with Leo? Is there another army of the dead to raise? Will Nico have to spill his secret to Cupid in order to raise an army? None of these things is bad, but since this plot is only half the book, it's less than three hundred pages for more plots than you can shake a stick at.

A lot of it had the unfortunate sense of Trying to Give the Fans What They Want. Perco shippers? Hey! Nico's got a crush on Percy! Will that keep you happy? Leo finally gets the girl, and she's awesome-sauce and he deserves her way more than another hero who had a shot. (This came off well, but it's definitely a fan-wish.) Here's Bob the Titan from the out-series book Demigod Files! Weren't you just wondering what happened to him? And Piper, um... okay, she was going to be big, but isn't she a big silly with her magic cornucopia and no plot at all? Feel free to ignore her, since you're going to, anyway. And Frank can't be pudgy and short! No... he gets the magic blessing of Mars which turns him all studly. And Hazel does lots of magic!

I don't want to act like this is a bad book. It isn't. It's an interesting enough story, and I adore the series enough that I don't mind the occasional disjointed entry. But it is disjointed. I hope the next book -- presumably the last one in Heroes of Olympus -- comes together a little more strongly. I think it will. I still hold up the last book of the first series, The Last Olympian, as the best I've ever seen an epic YA series resolved (I skeptically raise my eyebrow in your direction, Jo Rowling and Stephen King), so I trust Riordan on that count.

Review of Carrie 2013

There was no way I wasn't going to go see Carrie.

It was the first Stephen King book I read, though many were out by the time I was old enough to read Stephen King. I always liked it. I've seen both of the other movie versions, and liked them.

So, I had to go see it.

On the question of, "Why did they need to make it again?", I'm afraid I'll be very disappointing and say, "Why not?" It's a good story. I've seen and read a lot of Cinderellas (including Carrie), and a lot of Sleeping Beauties. I've lost track of the "Little Red Riding Hoods" that I've read. Why wouldn't someone else tell Carrie? All three versions have something to offer. None of them really reaches the level of the book, but then, I should probably give up on the idea of Hollywood being able to properly adapt a book.

This particular one just updates the source material to 2013. So, how did it do?

I'll break it up by the classic five elements of fiction.

Character
The characters themselves are pretty much the characters known from the book, though some names have changed. ("Helen" was barely current in 1974, for instance (though I do know young Helens), and has become Heather, which weirdly just places it around the '80s; the Thibodeaux twins have also been given updated names.) Chris Hargensen is still the alpha bitch, Sue Snell is still the misguided do-gooder, Miss Desjardins is still the sympathetic gym teacher. (Though the 2002 version is the only one that pronounced it properly -- day-zhar-DAN; this one goes with Dess-jar-dins, which I guess is probably what it would eventually turn into. The 1976 version just gave up and called her "Miss Collins.")

Carrie and her mother are still the primary figures in the story. Julianne Moore is much more restrained in her performance than other actresses I've seen in the part, though she comes out with a little scenery caught in her teeth. Chloe Grace Moretz, I think, does a good job with Carrie, and, being fifteen, certainly looks the part more than Spacek or Bettis did. (And no, Carrie was not supposed to be ugly in the book. The mean girls called her ugly, and after years of hearing it, she believed it, but the more disinterested characters, like Tommy, describe her as oddly pretty, with a bizarre and unsuccessful effort to hide it.) The relationship here hews closer to the book in its details, beginning with Carrie's birth as theorized in the novel.

The bully characters -- primarily Chris, Tina, and Billy -- are a bit flat. Billy gets back a little of his agency here, and what screen time he has, he fills pretty well, but never entirely manages to scare me. Chris going off on her "right" to attend her prom, and to bully Carrie... well, on the latter, they took the interesting tack of not having her so much indifferent and hateful as having her fully believe that there's nothing whatsoever wrong with what she did, and Carrie pretty much deserves what's coming to her. Chris believes herself to be the one wronged.

I think there was some shortchanging on background events. The scene with the Morton and Desjardins facing up to Mr. Hargensen didn't come off very well. The threat in the book to countersue on Carrie's behalf was much more effective than the little charade they give here, where they offer to let Chris off if she hands over her phone and proves there wasn't a video on it (more later on this). They both, basically, come off as very weak. The fact that none of the actors in the scene exactly commands the screen probably doesn't help.

Sue Snell (Gabriella Wilde) comes off pretty well. She's not quite as vague as the Amy Irving version or as badass as the Kandyse McClure version. Tommy gets the most credit here, actually taking actions on his own (as he did in the book), and both listening to Sue and not minimizing what she did. (He even gets his book line back about "What did Carrie White ever do to you?") This is handled nicely, and without changing the fact that he's clearly nuts about his girl. He even texts her during the prom to say he misses her.

So, good with the characters.

Plot
Not much to say about the plot. It's Carrie. Carrie is picked on, Carrie goes to the prom, there's pig's blood, then she goes on telekinetic rampage. I'd been led to believe that the end was some kind of weird tacked on bit of smarminess, but it wasn't. It was a change from the book, where Carrie seems to have caused Sue to miscarry, but the question of whether or not Sue was pregnant was definitely part of the story. And testifying in front of the White Commission forms a large part of the text. Granted, they soft-pedalled it, but I suspect that was about running out of time.

I was disappointed that they still haven't gotten around to the full destruction of Chamberlain -- the power lines in the streets, the townspeople all running around in their housecoats and slippers, Carrie praying in a church while the pews and hymnals fly around her... this is very well described in the book, and I was hoping that a big screen movie with a bigger budget wouldn't rush through it and just suggest in a couple of shots. Come on, people! These are money shots. I'll have to wait for the next version.

The build-up to Margaret's attack on Carrie is done pretty well, using the rule of three -- she first tries to kill her as an infant, then when she hears things moving around, then, well, prom night. The choice to use sharp objects to kill Margaret (per the 1976 version) rather than telekinetically stopping her heart (per the book) was disappointing. And I don't know why the order of events was changed. The drama of going out after that to destroy the roadhouses (along with Chris and Billy), then having the meeting with Sue in the middle of a field as she dies, was much better than just sticking them in the house and having Sue offer to help. Shrug. Not bad, but just not an interesting way to do it.

Setting
Here's the part that's most changed. Carrie, in this version, is a creature of 2013. I didn't think it was possible to top the horror of the bullying in the locker room, but Chris manages it by recording it on her cell phone and posting it to YouTube. This video is also played on the big screen at the prom while Carrie's standing there covered with blood. I like this addition. It adds to the sense that the psychological horror of "Blood Sport" is mirrored in the physical and supernatural horror of Prom Night. Unfortunately, it wasn't used as well as it could have been. Something like that would follow her everywhere, but she barely seems to know about it until it's shown at the prom. If it had gone viral (a review I read suggested that it had), she'd have been at the center of an extremely unwanted spotlight. It probably would have eaten up too much screen time if they'd done that, but a few nods to what a video like that would have done to her wouldn't have been amiss.

Other than the time setting, there were some weird choices with the physical setting. In fact, I can't tell what the setting is, exactly. The school appears to be in some kind of affluent downtown area (you can see fancy high rise buildings in the background when they're outside). It seems to be a very large school. The town they shoot seems kind of suburban, and Chris's house looks like a horrific suburban McMansion. But Carrie and her mom still seem to live on a small town street, Sue and Tommy go parking out in the country, and there's a pig farm in easy distance.

I don't understand the physical setting choices. The rural/small town setting isn't as important for Carrie as it is for some other King properties (Salem's Lot comes to mind), but much of the action is something that very much comes from a small town environment. Everyone being together in the same school since time out of mind is very small town. And come on -- kids who lived in the city or the 'burbs would break into a butcher shop for the pig's blood, not think about hauling themselves way out to Old Man Henty's farm to kill themselves a real pig. It's not a fatal flaw or a deal breaker, just kind of a headscratcher. I know more kids live in cities and suburbs than in small towns, but kids do still live out there in the hinterlands, and much of the action makes more sense in that context.

Theme
The theme is the same as ever -- someone pushed beyond endurance will eventually lash out. Unfortunately, we have not exactly learned this lesson in a few millennia of human history, and neither a bestselling novel nor any of the movies made from it are likely to change that.

Style
Only one of the three movies (the 2002, which was lovely up until the last fifteen minutes or so) has even tried to approach the epistolary style of the book. It's too bad -- it gave a much wider view of what was going on, and didn't ever lose sight of the center of the story. You get to see people's reactions who might not have been in the know, people who weren't close to anyone, but saw everything at a sidelong glance. You get to see how the story was pieced together by the White Commission, and how, in the end, they tried to pin everything on Sue, which is what explains why she's still mortally involved with Carrie so many years later (one of "excerpted books" is her tell-all, My Name Is Susan Snell). I'd guess it's harder to keep focus in a movie than in a book, but I'd still like to see someone succeed in this style of storytelling on the screen. I want to know if it can be done, even.

The style here is nothing to write home about. Lots of blood running through it, which fits with the book's symbolism, but actually overdoes it by a long way. By the time the pig's blood comes, you're kind of inured to it, or at least I was. Mostly, it's just competent directorial work. Nice job, nothing fancy.