"The Mark of Athena"- Thoughts, Inferences, and Predictions

I started to learn a lot more about two characters in particular- Hazel and Leo. Though they are not the main characters in the book, Hazel and Leo are still very significant in the plot. Both have a very important role in as for they are two of the seven people who are destined to stop Gaea from taking over the world. In many ways, Hazel and Leo are very alike. One way is that they both had very dark pasts- Hazel was resurrected from the dead by her brother and Leo had a harsh aunt who put him into foster care and was really mean to him. Also both have a encountered Nemesis, who is the Goddess of Revenge, and she told both of they about their responsibilities or fates that are going to occur in the future; Hazel has to go and rescue Nico, for he will die in six days, and Leo is the odd man out and he will need to fight through many hardships in the future. No that I have declared them to be quite similar, I think that Leo, who actually thinks that he is the odd man out will realize that he is not really that different from Hazel and he might stop those thoughts from contaminating his brain. 

I think that Nico, Hazel's brother, will be saved by Leo, because during the mini quest to get materials for the ship, both Hazel and Leo develop a friendship. And with that friendship, Leo will feel obliged to save Nico. Though there is not too much evidence to back up that prediction, I surely think that Leo will rescue Nico. That prediction is for later in the book, but for now, I think that after Leo and Hazel return to the Argo II, the other will be back and they will head to Rome to save the entire Rome as well as Nico. This can be thought through logic; if they cannot head back to the Roman demigod's camp and they have nothing really to do at Camp Half-Blood, their only other option in order to advance their plan to stop Gaea and go to Rome.

I think that at the end of the book, the Roman demigods will realize that some took control of Leo, who made him attack the Roman camp. Since the Roman are following them, I think that both of the groups will travel to Rome and, meet there. However, they will later realize that Leo was being controlled by someone else. So far, I think that this a great book and encourage everyone to read this series.

"The Mark of Athena"- The Highlights of the Book (So Far)

I am around pg. 95 in the Mark of Athena and so far, the book is extremely interesting and many unexpected things have happened just in the first couple of chapters. Rick Riordan is extremely good at plot twists and changing the story line at the most hyped-up times. For example, after the Greek and the Roman camps unite to destroy Gaea, the most unexpected thing happens- Leo, who somehow became demented for a little while, used the Argo II and shot at the Roman camp. The Roman think that the Greeks came to attack them right now and they are now fighting. Since the Greeks were outnumbered, they retreated and Percy, Annabeth, and a couple others board the ship a leave. They later realize that Leo has been possessed and someone made him attack the camp.

At first, I thought that after the Greeks and Romans unite, no one within the camp would cause the alliance to break apart. But, of course, what I didn't expect happened. I even thought that they would just team up and kill one cyclops, Gaea's children, at a time. I believed that the only other problem that would occur is the prophecy of the Mark of Athena, which wasn't well described in the book, but was mentioned. Apparently, once a son of Athena went to Rome and came back mentally ill. I really don't have an explanation about what the Mark of Athena is, but since Annabeth is the daughter of Athena, I think that something bad will happen to Annabeth.

Another interesting point is that when Leo and Hazel go to find celestial bronze and lime, they encounter Nemesis, the Greek and Roman Goddess of Revenge. Nemesis started saying that she would be the only God that could help them on their quest, because Hera, their former "mentor" is being chased by the Gods for failing to unite the Roman and Greek demigods and causing them to get migraines, since it is hard to be both the Greek and Roman version of themselves. So after Nemesis asks them if they need help, she says that Nico, Hazel's brother, is going to die in six days if they don't find him and save him and she also talks about something bad that is going to happen to Leo.

This lead to suspense for the readers and it made me very intrigued, because I wanted to keep reading to find out more about their obscured fates and also about the Mark of Athena. Again, Rick Riordan is so good at plot twists that he just forces the reader to keep reading and reading his books. He leaves the reader with limited amount of information and then he literally make the reader keep thing about what the obscured thing is. For example, I just kept thinking and thinking about what the Mark of Athena is and about Nico's and Leo's fate. Overall, I think that the two main point from this reading that Rick Riordan leaves the reader thinking about is what the Mark of Athena is and the fates of Nico and Leo.

Please comment on this blog post and maybe even discuss about what these two things are about and if you already know, don't ruin it for those still reading.

The Heroes of Olympus- Thematic Statement

 

The Heroes of Olympus is a series on Greek mythology where two demigod camps, Greek and Roman, have to overcome their hatred of one another in order to stop Gaea, the goddess of the Earth, from taking over the world. Though there is a lot of mythology and action in this series, the theme is quite applicable in the real world, maybe even in daily life. The theme that I have drawn from what I have read so far in the series is that teamwork will help achieve seemingly impossible goals. Throughout the series, it emphasizes the fact that the Greek and Roman camps can only stop Gaea from taking over the world with unity between them. In fact, in the Mark of Athena, the Greek camp is putting their differences and hatred with the Roman camp aside and approaching them to ask for help or, in other words, an alliance. After all they both have one goal: to stop Gaea from taking over the world.

Even before the Mark of Athena, the Greek and Roman camps already seemed to have an alliance. Jason and his friends, Roman demigods, were saved by the Greek camps from a monster at the very beginning of the series. The Greek demigods, unknowingly, brought them to their camp, thinking that they were Greek demigods. Since Jason and his friends were brainwashed, they didn't remember that they were Roman demigods. Later in the Lost Hero, Jason and his friends help the Greeks defeat a Cyclops, a son of Gaea, and from there they formed an informal alliance. On the other hand, Percy, a Greek demigod, was rescued by the Roman camp and taken in there, thinking that Percy was a Roman demigod. Since he was also brainwashed, he couldn't remember that he was a Greek demigod. At the end of the Lost Hero, Percy helps the Roman camp and develops an informal alliance. Later in the series, we find out that the Greek/Roman god and goddess planned this out so that the Greek and Roman camps would work together to take down Gaea and put her back to sleep. Based on these two pieces of evidence, it is obvious that teamwork is emphasized and the fact that teamwork is helpful and needed to achieve a common goal.

One theme that is present in the book it that even rivals can work together. This theme is demonstrated in the book, because the Greek and Roman were straight-out hardcore rivals. In the past a lot of fights and wars have resulted in the growing hatred between them. However, they overcame the difference and united to overthrow and destroy Gaea's ambition of taking over the world. This theme is very applicable in life, because now a days, people have been prejudice and developed rivals by being insensitive. With applying this theme, there will be less rivalries, so there will be less of hatred leading to a more cooperative group and society that can help each other in achieving and overcoming a common goal.

Please, if you find anymore themes in The Mark of Athena, or even in the series, comment on this blog and put the theme in there and maybe even with evidence.

"The Mark of Athena"

 

After a year finishing The Sun of Neptune, I have finally moved on to The Mark of Athena. The past two books in this series are a little obscure, but I do remember the overall plot. Basically, the Greek demigods and the Roman demigods must overcome their conflicts and work together, in order to stop the evil Gaea, the goddess of the Earth. In the first book is basically in the point of view of Jason, a Roman demigod, and his adventure with the Greek demigods. The second book is about the adventure of Percy Jackson, a Greek demigod, with Roman demigods and it is told in Percy's point of view. At the end of The Sun of Neptune, the Greek demigods were making the effort to go to the Roman camp and unite with them. Now, the story continues.....

At the beginning of The Mark of Athena, the Greek demigods made it to the Roman camp and they informed the Romans that they must work together and stop Gaea and her children from taking over the world. The Romans were questioning the Greeks and that is were I stopped reading. I really haven't read enough to make any predictions, other than that the Greeks and Romans will unite to save the world, because I don't have enough information to form any other predictions of what this book will be about. So I will just start talking about Rick Riordan and his writing.

The following information was found on http://www.rickriordan.com/home.aspx, so for more information, go to this web page.

Rick Riordan was born on June 5, 1964 in San Antonio, Texas. He lives in Boston with his wife and two sons, Haley and Patrick. He has one dog named Speedy, a Basenji/terrier mix, and three cats. His favorite characters from his books are Grover, Bes, and Tyson, because he loves to write about them. In his spare time, he reads, plays the guitar, and travels with his family.

Rick Riordan taught English and History at public and private schools, which are located in San Francisco and Texas, for fifteen years. However, right now, writing is his full-time job in Boston. His is also the author of serval series including the Percy Jackson and the Olypians series, the Kane Chronicles, and the Heroes of Olympus. At first, he wrote mystery books that was intended for grownup; one of his mystery series was Tres Navarre series. As a bedtime story, Rick Riordan wrote The Lightning Thief for his oldest son. From there, he turned his books into children's fiction.

Blog Post Reflection

The quality of my writing has improved over the course of the trimester a lot. It can be seen in the aspect of the succinct sentences that describe the literary elements in more depth. The brevity of the sentences can be seen by the fact that I use more words and elaborate more of the complexity of the character, Hope, whereas in the second one, there is more than just one thing that I talk about. For example, I start talking about the effectiveness of the introduction, and then I make some inferences in just one paragraph. In the rest of that post, I talk about the difference in the introduction between The Kite Runner and The Lemon Tree and a connection between the book and another book, Touching Spirit Bear. Another reason that my writing skills is that I have increased the level of variation of the sentences. In the first post, there were many subordinate conjunctions. This similar sentence formation/ syntax made the post seem more monotone and insipid. But in the second post, the variation of the sentence made the post more interesting.  Also, the grammatical errors have decreased but not too significantly. The first blog post had some errors, but there weren’t too significant. In the final post, the errors were very limited to no errors at all. Therefore, based on these pieces of evidence, my writing skills have augmented throughout the course of the trimester.

                The main struggle that I had with this project was actually putting the thoughts of my book onto the post and meeting the requirements of the blog. I had to write about it in immense detail and write above and beyond, because I didn’t know how detailed I had to write it to fulfill the requirements. That was the only way to overcome this struggle. The way I tackled the other struggle was by writing all my thoughts on the book that I had that time. This helped me decide which thoughts were important and which are not important. The strength in my blogging is that I was very deep in the meaning towards the end and the blogs contained the important information that was each time I wrote about. I did not reach my reading goal, because I had a hard time finding the right book. I had many books in my mind that I really wanted to read, but unfortunately, I couldn’t get a hold of any of them. But through the reading of other blogs, I found some book that I am reading now. I used goodreads.com as a reference to good book just like the blogs. My reading skills improved with the increased level of analysis of each book. My analyzing is more in depth or in a more deeper meaning, because in that first post, the analysis wasn’t too sophisticated and was more an easy observation of the character’s behavior and feelings. In the second post, the analysis of the sentence, "It was my past of unatoned sins”, was more sophisticated than the first. There was a greater need of comprehension than the first one. Therefore, my reading skills have enhanced throughout the course of this trimester.

"Romeo and Juliet"- Act III

 

In Act III a lot has happened that changes the course of the play and propels the story forward. However, I will first start with a short summary of all the scenes and then discuss some literary elements in each scene. I will then end with some predictions and even tell what I would do if I were in each situation.

In Scene I, basically, Tybalt kills Mercutio in a fight and Tybalt is later slayed by Romeo. After Romeo runs away and hides, the Prince of Verona says that he will kill Romeo once he finds him. In Scene II, Juliet is informed by the Nurse that Romeo killed Tybalt. Then Juliet tells the Nurse to go and get Romeo. In Scene III, Romeo starts crying in Friar Lawerence's cell and then the Nurse comes in. She tells Romeo to meet Juliet and he tries to kill himself, but is stopped by the Friar. In Scene IV, Lord Capulet meets with Paris and they set the marriage date to the following Thursday. And finally, in Scene V, Romeo and Juliet meet each other. Then Romeo leaves and Lady Capulet tells her about the marriage. Juliet refuses and Lord Capulet get mad at her and calls her mean names. Afterwards, the Nurse advises her to marry Paris and Juliet says yes sarcastically. She then tells herself that she will kill herself if she is separated from Romeo. The Act then ends. As you see, the summary is very brief, so do not use this as a substitute for the real play.

There are a lot of literary elements that are present in this scene- most of which is irony. In Scene 5 of this act, Lady Capulet said that Juliet will be a bride and get a husband on Thursday, but Juliet already has a husband- Romeo. This is irony, because she is already married. Another piece of irony is that Juliet says that Romeo is very bad and starts calling him names. And right after that she says that she would rather marry Romeo than Paris. This is ironic, because she at on point started calling Romeo names and now she     would rather marry him. This is also ironic, because she is already married to Romeo. If you have any other examples of literary element, please put it on the comments.

"Is Bottled Water A Good Idea?"

As I was looking through an Upfront article, I saw a page discussing whether bottled water was a good idea. I was astounded after reading the page. They had a column that said that it was a good idea and there was another column that said that it was a bad idea. First, I will summarize what each side said and then I will give my opinion of the question.

The article talks about the good of bottled water as healthy and convenient. It says that sales of bottled water has tripled in the past 10 years, showing that bottled water is growing in popularity in the US. It also states that replacing sugary drinks for bottled water can eliminate more than 50,000 calories per year. Also bottled water has better environmental benefits than other bottled drinks. Therefore, since bottled water is popular, healthy, and environmentally beneficial, it is a good idea to have bottled water. 

The articles also talks about the bad of bottled water; for example, it not having great health benefits, consuming lots of resources, and economically expensive. Though water bottle companies say that bottled water is healthier, tap water has to be tested frequently on its quality. Also, transporting bottled water is not efficient. It also states that bottled water uses a lot of plastic and consumes lots of oil. Finally, water bottle companies earn $12 billion dollars per year, but that money could be used to improve tap water quality. Therefore, the idea of bottled water is not good. 

I think that bottled water is not a good ides, because it isn't too much healthier than tap water. Also, bottled water is 1,000 times more expensive than tap water. It also has bad impacts on the environment and consumes a lot of oil and resources. Again, I think that bottled water is not a great idea for these reasons and many others. If you agree or disagree with me, please feel free to comment below.