The Titan's Curse

     In The Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan, it all starts out when Annabeth, Percy, and Thalia go to a boarding school to help Grover bring two half-blood kids to safety at camp.  While at the school, the principal, who is a disguised monster, tries to steal the di Angelo children.  Grover, Annabeth, Percy, and Thalia immediately go to save them.  When it looks like the half-bloods are going to lose, they are saved by Artemis and her Hunters.  Unfortunately, the Hunters do not get there in time to save Annabeth from falling off the cliff with the monster principal.  When Percy, Grover, Thalia, Bianca di Angelo, Nico di Angelo, and the Hunters all get back to camp, Zoe, an immortal Hunter, gets called on a quest to go west and free the goddess Artemis and defeat the Titan Atlas.  As they go on the journey, Percy, Grover, Thalia, Zoe, Phoebe (another Hunter), and Bianca fight their way through places like the desert, where the junkyard of the gods is.  In this junkyard, Bianca steals a figurine and she ends up sacrificing her life to save everyone else.  Once the group gets close to the mountain in San Francisco where Artemis, Annabeth, and Atlas are, they go by Annabeth's house to tell her mortal dad how much danger she is in.  Afterwards, the team goes up to the mountain, but they first have to go through the garden of the Hesperides, the daughters of Atlas, where they face the Ladon dragon and find out that Zoe is also a former Hesperid.  Once they reach the top of the mountain, Zoe fights with Atlas, Percy continues the fight with Atlas after Zoe fails, and Thalia and Annabeth go after Luke and the General.  At the same time, Artemis is carrying the burden of holding up the sky.  When Percy's sword is failing him against Atlas, Percy switches places with Artemis and nearly dies from the burden of the sky.  Just in time though, Atlas is tricked back into the position and in that same moment, Luke falls off of the cliff.  Unfortunately, the battle was not finished in time to save Zoe, but Annabeth's father came to save her, and showed her that he cared a lot about her.  After the battle,  the remaining members of the teamheaded to Olympus for the meeting of the gods at the solstice.  There, at the meeting, Thalia joined the Hunters, and the gods held a celebration in honor of the successful quest.  After the party, Annabeth, Percy, and Grover returned to Camp Half-Blood to head home for the school year.  At camp, Nico learns that Bianca died and he becomes furious with Percy for letting it happen.  When Nico then splits open the earth to destroy the skeleton monsters that attacked, Percy realized that Nico and Bianca were children of Hades. 

     Like most stories, The Titan's Curse centers around a few central themes.  The themes present in this book are mainly friendship and loyalty.  Friendship and loyalty are shown by all of the main characters and many of the minor characters as well.  For example, when Annabeth is captured by Atlas and Luke in San Francisco, Percy does not just stand by and mourn her loss.  He immediately sets out on the quest that allows him to save her.  Similarly, Zoe the Hunter sets out on the same quest that permits her to save Artemis, her leader and the goddess of the Hunt.  Both of these acts show the danger and adventure that people are willing to go to in order to help their friends.  Loyalty to extreme standards is also portrayed.  Bianca di Angelo, a young Hunter,  gave up her life to help the members on the quest continue and succeed.  When she did this, Bianca did not think of what she was giving up, she only thought of how important the quest was and how much it meant for the safety of the half-bloods, Olympus, and the entire world.  Also, when Thalia was about to turn sixteen, which means that she could either help Olympus conquer the Titans or betray and take down Olympus, she instead became a Hunter, so she could never be another year older.  By becoming a Hunter, Thalia gave up her chance to be an adult and have a normal life.  This selfless action kept Olympus safe for a while and showed just as much loyalty to Olympus as Bianca did.  Amid all of the Greek mythology and old-fashioned battles, this book shows depth in its deeper meaning.  This book teaches almost everything about the ancient Greeks in the modern world, but it also teaches about loyalty and friendship and that through it all, these qualities matter most in the end.