The Heroes of Olympus

The Heroes of Olympus

Logo of the series
The Lost Hero (2010) The Son of Neptune (2011) The Mark of Athena (2012) The House of Hades (2013) The Blood of Olympus (2014)
Author	e-book
No. of books	5
Preceded by	Percy Jackson & the Olympians
Followed by	The Trials of Apollo

The Heroes of Olympus is a

The series can be read as a standalone volume, but is meant to be read after Percy Jackson & the Olympians. Riordan introduces Roman mythology in the series alongside several new characters, primarily from the Roman Camp Jupiter. The first book of the series, The Lost Hero, was published on October 12, 2010.^[4] The final entry in the series, The Blood of Olympus, was published on October 7, 2014.^[5] The story is continued in the sequel series The Trials of Apollo.

Plot

The Heroes of Olympus is centered around a

Seven demigods—

The novel begins by introducing Jason Grace, Piper McLean and Leo Valdez, three newly discovered demigods who travel to Camp Half-Blood in response to a prophecy. They set off on a quest to prevent the rebirth of the giant king Porphyrion and rescue Piper's father, who has been kidnapped by another giant, Enceladus. Jason, who has amnesia, also begins to remember pieces of his past throughout the book - most importantly, that he comes from a Roman camp for demigods. Camp Half-Blood resolves to seek out this other camp both to gain allies in the fight against Gaea, the giants' mother and commander, and to locate the missing demigod Percy Jackson.

The Son of Neptune

The novel opens with Percy Jackson, struck with amnesia, discovering Camp Jupiter and meeting several Roman demigods. After receiving a prophecy from Mars, Percy, Frank Zhang, and Hazel Levesque travel to Alaska to stop the rise of the giant Alcyoneus and free the god Thanatos, whom the giant has captured. After successfully completing their mission, the group returns to Camp Jupiter to defend it from yet another giant, Polybotes, and his army. After repelling this invasion, the demigods from Camp Jupiter go to meet the delegation from Camp Half-Blood arriving in the flying ship known as the Argo II.^[6] This book is set in June.

The Mark of Athena

After the Argo II unintentionally fires on Camp Jupiter, the seven demigods of the "Prophecy of Seven" — Percy Jackson, Annabeth Chase, Leo Valdez, Piper McLean, Jason Grace, Frank Zhang, and Hazel Levesque — rush to escape the angered Roman campers. The Argo II is damaged, and the group splits up to find supplies to help Leo fix it. Hazel and Leo go out to try to find

In Tartarus, Percy and Annabeth travel towards the "Doors of Death", the only pathway back to the mortal world, with help from

While Reyna, Nico, and Coach Hedge travel towards Camp Half-Blood (where the Romans are preparing to attack the Greeks), the seven of the quest travel to Athens. With help from the gods, the demigods defeat the giants in Athens. They then return to the fight on Camp Half-Blood, where Leo sacrifices himself to defeat Gaea. He is later resurrected by his bronze dragon Festus and goes to find his crush Calypso. Unaware that he is alive, Camp Half-Blood and Camp Jupiter mourn his loss, determining to become allies and prevent such a deadly war from happening again.^[9] This book is set in the second half of July.

Supplementary works

The Demigod Diaries

Released August 14, 2012,^[10] The Demigod Diaries is a collection of short stories. Similar to The Demigod Files, it contains some new stories with character interviews, illustrations, puzzles, and a quiz. The four stories include:

• "The Diary of Luke Castellan":
  Luke Castellan meet Halcyon Green, Luke receives his knife, and the pair encounters Annabeth Chase. The events of the story take place roughly five years before The Lightning Thief, the first book of Percy Jackson & the Olympians.^[11]
• "Percy Jackson and the Staff of Hermes": Percy Jackson and Annabeth are sent by Hermes to retrieve his caduceus from the fire-breathing giant Cacus. The story takes place between The Last Olympian and The Lost Hero.^[11]
• "Leo Valdez and the Quest for Buford": Jason Grace, Leo Valdez, and Piper McLean confront a group of Maenads while searching for Buford the table, who has run off with an important piece of the unfinished Argo II. The story takes place at Camp Half-Blood between The Lost Hero and The Son of Neptune.^[11]
• "Son of Magic":
  non-canonical to the series itself by Riordan, with the events depicted in it directly contradicted those in The House of Hades and The Blood of Olympus, was written by his son Haley.^[12][11]

Greeks

• Percy Jackson: The 16-year-old son of Poseidon from Camp Half-Blood. He is the narrator and main protagonist of the preceding series Percy Jackson & the Olympians. In The Son of Neptune, he is depicted fighting amnesia, given to him by the goddess Hera, during which his only memory is his girlfriend, Annabeth Chase.
• Annabeth Chase: The 16-year-old daughter of Athena
  , credited as "the smartest girl in camp" by Percy. She is also a gifted and dedicated architect.
• Piper McLean: The 15-year-old daughter of Aphrodite. She is one of the few children of Aphrodite who have the rare hereditary gift of "charmspeak" (the ability to magically convince people to do what the person in question says) and is described as beautiful by Jason Grace. She carries a knife called Katoptris (previously owned by Helen of Troy
  ) that shows her visions of the future. She begins dating Jason during the series.
• Leo Valdez: The 15-year-old son of Hephaestus who can summon and control fire, a rare ability. He is famous among his cabinmates for repairing the automated bronze dragon Festus, who had given more experienced campers life-altering disabilities. He leads the building of the Argo
  II.
• Nico di Angelo: The 14-year-old son of Hades. Born in the 1930s in Italy, his father Hades
  sent him and his sister to the Lotus Hotel and Casino, that sucked them out of time for decades, so he only feels and looks 14. He was the only demigod who had knowledge of both camps before the war.
• Gleeson Hedge: A middle-aged satyr
  , formerly a coach at the Wilderness School. He joins the crew of the Argo II as the self-appointed chaperone.
• Jupiter (Jupiter and Zeus are the same god in different aspects, making Jason a child of Rome and Thalia a child of Greece
  ).
• cyclops
  . He loves peanut butter and is the boyfriend of Ella the harpy.
• Rachel Elizabeth Dare: Camp Half-Blood's oracle. She is neither a demigod nor a legacy, but a regular mortal human who was born with the gift to see through the Mist. She is the current Oracle, being a vessel for the Spirit of Delphi
  .
• Grover Underwood: Percy's best friend, and a satyr; he and Percy have an empathy link that allows them to sense one another. He is also gifted by Pan
  , the lord of the wild.

• Jason Grace: The 16-year-old son of Jupiter who can fly, control winds and lightning, and create storms. He is a natural-born leader and was a praetor before Hera
  took his memory and sent him to Camp Half-Blood.
• Hazel Levesque: The 14-year-old daughter of Pluto (the Roman aspect of Hades). She originally lived in the 1940s before dying to stop the rise of Alcyoneus
  and later being revived by her half-brother Nico. She can control precious metals and stones, navigate underground, and manipulate the Mist.
• Frank Zhang: The 16-year-old son of Mars, the Roman aspect of Ares and a descendant of Poseidon
  on his mother's side. He has shapeshifting abilities.
• Reyna Avila Ramírez-Arellano: The 16-year-old daughter of the Roman goddess of war, Bellona
  .

Unlike the Percy Jackson & the Olympians series, which uses first-person narration solely from Percy's point of view, the second series is told in third person, with the point of view alternating between various main characters. In The Lost Hero, those characters are Jason, Piper, and Leo. Although initially uncertain how fans would react, Riordan later found that they enjoyed the new format, as it allowed them to learn more about each character.^[14]

Riordan says that "It was my way of letting them revisit that world in a fresh twist, but also to catch up with Percy and Annabeth and the rest of the gang from the first series".^[14] He also decided to include the Roman gods after many readers requested that Riordan write a new series on Roman gods, who are the Roman equivalent of the Greek gods, with some minor changes in personality. He pondered on how the Roman aspect of the gods would be after moving from Greece to Rome to America. After a while, "playing with that idea gave me the idea for the new series".^[14]

Publishing history

The Lost Hero, the first book in the Heroes of Olympus series, was released on October 12, 2010, as a hardcover, audiobook, and ebook.^[15] The initial publishing run consisted of 2.5 million copies.^[16] The book's official publication was preceded by several "sneak-peek" releases by Disney-Hyperion.^[17] A graphic novel version, adapted and illustrated by Orpheus Collar, was released October 7, 2014.^[18][19] Another graphic novel, was made for The Son of Neptune.

Follow-up series

A sequel pentalogy series titled The Trials of Apollo was released, with the first installment, The Hidden Oracle released on May 3, 2016. The second installment, The Dark Prophecy, was released on May 2, 2017.^[20] The third installment, The Burning Maze was released on May 1, 2018. The fourth installment, The Tyrant's Tomb was released on September 24, 2019. The Tower of Nero, the last book in the series, was released on October 6, 2020.

Achievements

Reception

The Lost Hero won the

ALA Best Fiction for Young Adults list of 2012.^[22][25]

See also

• Muses in popular culture

References