Maus

Art Spiegelman wrote Maus, a 298 page comic book about the holocaust from his father's point of view. But the characters instead of Jews, Nazis and Polish people, are mice, cats and pigs respectively. In the book, Art Spiegelman's character is interviewing his father about the holocaust for his book. I liked this book because of the interesting drawings and because Art's father didn't want to talk about certain parts of the holocaust like people in real life. The choice of the comic book format was interesting because the drawings reinforce the ideas presented in each comic book text box. The animals as the characters were good choices because cats eat mice but also it made it kind of a children's book, too. It was pretty realistic and I recommend it because I learned a lot about the holocaust from it.

Battle of the Labyrinth

In the fourth installation of the Percy Jackson series, Battle of the Labyrinth which is 368 pages, Percy finds out that Nico DeAngelo is the son of Hades from the past. He was stuck in the Lotus Hotel and Casino and although time passed, Nico did not age. Luke gloats about attacking Camp Half-blood through the labyrinth. The whole camp decides to guard the entrance after a capture the flag game in which Percy finds the entrance to the labyrinth. Percy, Tyson, Grover and Annabeth go looking for Daedalus's workshop in the middle of the labyrinth so they could take the string of Ariadne before Luke does. In the labyrinth, Percy and the others find a hundred-handed one whose race is a cousin of Tyson's race. They also find a demon jailer that has poisonous swords and is a dragon woman. When they find Daedalus, they discover they knew him all along. Daedalus's dog, Mrs. O'Leary, leads them back to camp. Meanwhile, Daedalus battles Luke who comes to take the string. Daedalus dies in the battle and Luke succeeds in taking the string. When Luke gets to camp with tons of Kronos's men and the dragon woman who they falsely thought they had killed, there is a giant battle because the camp is defended by dryads, nyads, and the campers who utilize traps. The camp wins after sustaining many injuries and deaths. After the battle, Annabeth uses Daedalus's computer to make many advances in weapons and technology. This is the best book in the series by far because there is a lot of action, betrayal and surprises. Rick Riordan did a great job on this book!

The Titan's Curse

Titan's Curse is a 312 page book written by Rick Riordan. The third installation of the Percy Jackson and the Olympian series introduces two new demi-gods, Bianca and Nico DeAngelo. When the hunter goddess, Artemis, shows up with her cult of maiden warriors to help Percy fight a manticore, Bianca joins Artemis's hunters. Percy speaks with Artemis and having been told that there is a monster that she must track alone, Percy leaves with the hunters. However, Artemis is gone for along time and during her absence, her lieutenant, Zoe Nightshade has a dream about Artemis being trapped. When Artemis's hunters call upon Camp Half-blood for help, Annabeth, Thalia, Bianca and Percy set out to find Artemis and discover that she is being held captive by Atlas, Kronos's war general. Normally, Atlas would hold up the sky but he tricked Artemis into holding it for him. After a gruelling battle with all of Luke's men, the good guys get Atlas back under the sky and Luke falls off the mountain. I liked this story because it was full of action.