Nabila

When Percy's mom finds out, she knows it's time that he knew the truth about where he came from and that he go to the one place he'll be safe. She sends Percy to Camp Half-Blood, a summer camp for demigods (on Long Island), where he learns that the father he never knew is Poseidon, God of the Sea. 

Soon a mystery unfolds and together with his friends—one a satyr and the other the demigod daughter of Athena - Percy sets out on a quest across the United States to reach the gates of the Underworld (located in a recording studio in Hollywood) and prevent a catastrophic war between the gods (Goodreads).

My name is Percy Jackson. I'm twelve years old. Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York. Am I a troubled kid? Yeah. You could say that.

Title: The Lightning Thief (Percy Jackson & the Olympians #1) 
Author: Rick Riordan
Genre: Middle Grade, Fantasy, Mythology
Goodreads rating: 4.28
Pages: 377
Publication: 2006 by Disney Hyperion
Source: Book Depository | Amazon | Popular | Google Books
Reading format: Paperback
Review type: Non-spoilery

My Goodreads review (click)

Hi. I never planned on writing a book review for this series because it's already a big name in the book and film industry, with huge followings. But with the TV show coming, I kind of feel the urge to promote the series. I just want more people to read the series because it meant so much to me, and I first read it as an adult too! Just a note, this is only a review of the first series, strictly only Percy Jackson & the Olympians, not including the Heroes of Olympus and the Trials of Apollo. There is a similarity in terms of the writing between this series to the other series, though. So here's my review of the series:

Let me begin the review by talking about the writing. It was written in first POV, meaning that we see the story from Percy's eyes. The writing itself was very easy to read and follow, there were no hard terminologies and you can easily read this even if your first language is not English since this series's target audience is middle-grade peeps. There was also no poetic bits, so it made a very easy and quick read. I never tried listening to the audiobooks, but that would actually be a good idea, since the writing was so engaging, as it was told as if Percy is telling a story to us! It made the reading experience even more fun because he was a funny narrator. And if you're only starting to read fantasy books, this book will be good for beginners!

The world-building and the magic system was also very easily understandable. You basically know all the basics within 50 pages of the first book. This series sets in a world where all the Greek mythology thingy was real. Zeus, Poseidon, Hades, Hercules, name any of them, they did exist in this world. And since this is a middle-grade book, no you don't need to have prior knowledge regarding Greek mythology because you'll learn everything from the series. 

Plot-wise, in each book, the story would start with Percy and his friends having a new quest, them finishing said quest and the ending. Every book is an action-packed story with funny commentaries from Percy. And everything was also set in a short time period, which can feel very fast so if you're quickly burned out, I would not recommend binge-reading the books in a week despite how short all the books actually are. My experience binge-reading this was awesome but it was also tiring. There was also a very minimal romantic subplot and it only started on Book 3, I think? The series started when Percy himself was only 12 so that made sense.

Sure, the adaptation sucks but these three did such great jobs portraying the characters. If we can age down humans I would've cast them for the TV show.

I apologise for the fangirling that is about to happen but now, I'm going to talk about the (beloved) characters. In this series, we have three important characters; Percy, the main character, his best friend, Grover and Annabeth, the only reason both Percy and Grover were still alive by the end of the series. I loved all of them. I think that it's not a secret that this series was applauded for its diversity, in that the majority of the characters in this series were with ADHD (attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder) and were also dyslexic. I think that there is more diversity in the latest middle-grade books, but it wasn't very common during the time this book was first published. It was a very interesting and new perspective for me when I started reading this book because my reading list wasn't exactly filled with lots of diversity back then. 

I'm not ashamed to say that I turned 10 when I started reading this and Percy Jackson became my ultimate comfort character in a heartbeat. I can cry talking about him. He's like a little brother that I'm really rooting for. He's just an overall a very nice kid. He's not perfect but he has a heart of gold. I loved being inside his head because he thought of the funniest things during the most inconvenient times. He's just a very lovable character. And his character development... CHEF'S KISS!

With Percy comes Grover, the ultimate sidekick. If Percy was funny, Grover was the utterly hilarious character. He's supposed to be Percy's guide but he was just as clueless as Percy was. Nonetheless, he was a very persistent character throughout the series. I don't want to say more about him because it will be a spoiler but I just know that everyone that reads the book will definitely love him.

I'm saving the best for the last. Obviously, Annabeth was the 'mom' character. She was the smartest among the three, intelligent, had a wonderful strategic mind. I loved her with my absolute being, her 12-year-old self was even smarter than the 19-year-old me. She also shows great character development; by the end of the series, she was just as courageous and genius as she was at the beginning of the series, but she learned to open up more. And I'm not kidding when I said that THEY WOULD ALL DIE WITHOUT ANNABETH.

So... was it worth it reading the book as a grown-up?

For the people who want to introduce this series to their little ones...

While we're here... books from Rick Riordan Presents are just as great and more diverse, from own-voice authors!

Wow, it's February already. Happy Chinese New Year to those who are celebrating! I saw a lot of posts on Twitter saying how January was going so slowly in the middle of the month and those guys couldn't be more wrong. I'm thinking about starting monthly wrap-up posts again this year. It's my favourite kind of post to write and I miss posting regularly. It's also a good way to summarize and document my month in one go. But that's just a plan I had, on the top of my head, we all know I'm not the one to go through with my plans, especially since I'm on my third year of university already and I'm swamped with work. Here's how my January went:

I turned 21!

Favourite TV show of the month: The Red Sleeves

My first book of the year: The Invisible Life of Addie Larue.

I started working out again...

I'm at the end of my fifth semester!

A literal presentation of how I was doing, mentally, in 2021. (credit)

It's the 8th of January by the time I'm writing this, and I think it's not too late to say a happy new year to all of you! I haven't been posting a lot on this blog and to be honest, I don't know when I will start posting regularly again. I miss writing, planning it and the thrill of everything, hopefully, everything in my life will ease off sooner so I can get back on blogging.

2021, for me, was a roller-coaster that was going downhill with only tiny ups. I wanted to improve on so many things, I wanted to learn a lot of things but because everything was going downhill, I could only focus on surviving. It was not the worst year of my life, but it sure was the loneliest year and one of the hardest years.

In 2021, I started living alone for the first time, managing the house, paying bills and everything and I got to say, adulting is freaking hard. I was also busy with studying, doesn't have any transportation option except for Grab (which is freaking expensive), still paranoid of COVID-19 so I didn't get to go out a lot or even virtually socialize with my friends (we were all busy). For the first 3 months living alone, I felt like I was going insane. The only things that kept me sane were sitcom shows🙂

Losing interest in what I was studying due to a massive burnout certainly didn't help either. My life mission for the first 7 months of 2021 was just to survive, and that included my study. And the result was... well, obviously, not great. I had a week and a half of breakdown right after I got my result for the semester. I blamed myself again and again, but at the same time, I was aware that I did great just by surviving. 

Only when my semester break started that I had the time to process everything that happened since the end of 2020; living alone, how fucked up my social life had been since COVID started, my study burnout. It was a hard but very necessary process for me to continue my life and my third year of study, carrying pieces of baggage that were piled up for months would not help in me trying to grow.

Despite my failures and not so much improvement in parts I wanted to improve, I'm still thankful that I survived everything. Things were so hard for me for months but the fact that I still woke up every day to take care of myself. I tried, I tried and I tried to live better and maybe the impacts of what I did were not as big as I intended them to be, I still tried and that's enough. I can keep trying and maybe someday soon, I'll see the positive results I want to. 

And I hope that if you also feel like you didn't achieve much last year, you do know that survival alone is an achievement and we should be proud of ourselves. May 2022 be the year where, if not everything goes as we plan it to be, at least some of our plans can be done successfully. Happy new year!

Sending you a virtual hug because you did great in 2021! (credit)

I haven't written a post of my favourites for so long! I missed it so much. It's one of my favourite kinds of posts to write, actually. So people, how was your November? As I'm writing this, I'm one week away from my mid-term exams and two weeks away from my mid-semester break. I'm a third-year student now, doesn't time fly so fast? It seems like it's only yesterday that I started my foundation. Life has been understandably hectic, but so far, it's bearable. What gets me through this mentally-exhausting month is of course my family and so many other things that brought so much joy to me.

favourite thing #1: my youngest brother's hug!

A warm hug from a person you love goes a long way. My youngest brother is seven, and since he's still at a cute, pamper-able and hugable age, I'm not going to waste the time I have left to baby and pamper him and stuff. So now, every time I'm taking a little break from doing my assignments or revising, I go out of my room and go hug and baby him.

favourite thing #2: k-on!

I FREAKING LOVE THIS ANIME. Okay, it's not my favourite anime ever or even favourite of the year, but it brought so much joy to my inner child self. I didn't have a chance to watch this anime when I was a child, I think it was on Animax (?) and we didn't have that channel and I'm so grateful I got to watch it now that I'm older and everything is so accessible through the internet. This anime is the cutest thing ever, it made me pick my guitar up again and just radiates nothing but warmth and joy. It got me through the toughest week of November. On a side note, do recommend me any anime that has the same vibe as K-On, I tried starting another anime but kept failing😭

favourite thing #3: red (taylor's version) album

Red is one of my favourite albums from Taylor and I was just... so happy that I got to re-experience the album all over again with the addition of some song we haven't heard before! I was one of those Swifties that wanted nothing but to listen to the full version of All Too Well for years and THE 10 MINUTES VERSION DIDN'T DISAPPOINT AT ALL, AND IT'S EVEN ADDICTIVE. I can play only that song on repeat for a week and won't be bored of it. It's definitely is my favourite song off Red. However, if we're talking about the other From The Vault songs, my favourite is definitely Nothing New. That song👏🏻 Not gonna get into details, but it's just so relatable👏🏻

favourite thing #4: naturals tea tree pre-shampoo clay mask

I dyed my hair three times this year. I know some people who dyed a hell lot more times than I did in a year and although those people's scalps weren't affected so much, mine was affected. My scalp got so itchy all the freaking time and I wanted to wash my hair every day. Thanks to Naturals Tea Tree Pre-shampoo Clay Mask (no I'm not sponsored), my scalp is getting better. My scalp feels healthier and cleaner and I'll never stop using this product for my scalp.

favourite thing #5: cosmos album by my favourite man, b.i

Before I say anything, go stream Cosmos music video for clear skin! I mentioned his debut album a few months back in a post and during that time, I didn't expect his second album to come so fast. I was so happy when he announced this album. Music-wise, the songs in this album are actually very, very good. It's a no-skip album, and I'll be saying this even if I'm not a huge fan of him. As opposed to his first album, in this album, we're served with feel-good happy songs that make you feel like you're in love as well as some hip-hop songs with sick beats for you to hype yourself up with.