PJO: The Lightning Thief Review

 

ISSUE 03 - - - - - - JUNE 2026
Welcome to my first ever no-spoiler review on my blog! I'm still pretty new to official reviewing, so this format is a work in progress. Today, I'm going to go over my rating of Percy Jackson #1: The Lightning Thief. 

My rating: 4.25/5 stars

Middle Grade, 384 pages

Tropes:

-urban fantasy
-Greek mythology
-a quest
-found family
-chosen one

To Start off:

Was I a huge KOTLC and Maze Runner and Hunger Games AND Warrior Cats fandom kid at 12 years old? Yes. Did I also see all the edits of PJO and all the fanarts on Pinterest? Yes. Did I ever read these at that prime preteen time of my life? No. Therefore I am taking it up on me this summer to read the entire first series of the Percy Jackson world. So expect more reviews!

Also, don't kill me, but I did watch season one of the TV show before I read this, so the plot twists were not a surprise and I was sort of expecting everything that happened, which is why I rated it 4.25.


What worked for me:

Percy's HUMOR. The unique narration kept my attention the entire time. Also, the other characters (especially Annabeth) were so so good. THE CAMP SETTING >>> And of course the chapter titles were so iconic. They felt like clickbait but when you get to the chapter you're like oh! This actually happened! He did actually vaporize his pre-alegebra teacher!


What didn't work for me:

Honestly I can't think of anything that I didn't like about this book. Sure, as I said before, I expected everything that happened but that's only because I watched the show before. 


Finishing thoughts:

"Then why don't you rate it 5 stars Christine?" you ask. Well well well, it appears you don't know my rating system very well, because rating books 5 stars is a VERY, VERY, VERYYYY rare event in my world. I am a very picky rater. Sorry not sorry.

I would recommend this book to anybody who has a short attention span, or anybody who liked any of the books that I mentioned above, especially Keeper of the Lost Cities for the "living in another world but still in our own world" kinda world building. I would recommend this book for ages 10+, as long as they understand that the Greek gods aren't real!

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