The Throne of Fire
by Rick Riordan
The Kane Chronicles, book two
by Rick Riordan
The Kane Chronicles, book two
Ever since the gods of Ancient Egypt were unleashed in the modern world, Carter Kane and his sister Sadie have been in trouble. As descendants of the House of Life, the Kanes have some powers at their command, but the devious gods haven't given them much time to master their skills at Brooklyn House, which has become a training ground for young magicians.
And now their most threatening enemy yet - the chaos snake Apophis - is rising. If they don't prevent him from breaking free in a few days' time, the world will come to an end. In other words, it's a typical week for the Kane family.
To have any chance of battling the Forces of Chaos, the Kanes must revive the sun god Ra. But that would be a feat more powerful than any magician has ever accomplished.
First they have to search the world for the three sections of the Book of Ra, then they have to learn how to chant its spells. Oh, and did we mention that no one knows where Ra is exactly? (description taken from Rick Riordan's website)
Though I liked The Red Pyramid, it was definitely not my favorite book by Rick Riordan. I love Egyptian mythology and Riordan is a great author, but I was not a huge fan of the alternating chapters and had trouble getting into Carter and Sadie's voices.
I think that not only did Riordan improve in this volume, probably because he didn't have to do quite so much world set-up, but I also appreciated the story a lot more as an audio book. Kevin Free and Katherine Kellgren were really great reading this book. They both made things exciting and believable.
This was a fast-paced, exciting and magical adventure. I loved the introduction of new gods...especially Bes, the dwarf god...I think he's my new favorite character. It was also really cool to see the vulture goddess, the baboon god, the hippo goddess, and "Sunny Acres," a retirement home for the aging gods. The different parts of the Duat that the siblings travel through to find Ra are also really cool.
I cannot wait to see how things are finally resolved in the third and final book of the trilogy...and in the meantime, I'm really looking forward to The Son of Neptune that will be coming out this fall!
Full disclosure: Audio book received to review for AudioFile
Looking forward to reading this once it gets into the library!!!
ReplyDeleteDoh! The first book in this series is still on my TBR list. I'm going to need to get on that now.
ReplyDeleteWay to put on the pressure ;-)
This book, like the last is told from the points of view of dual protagonists: Carter Kane and Sadie Kane. For kids, this may be a bit daunting, as the switch back and forth involves two distinctly drawn characters with different voices. I like it, because my son, who normally shies away from books with female protagonists, is absolutely willing to read this.
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