The Lightning Thief Graphic Novel Review

I'm a big fan of Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson books. I read all 5 of the first series and all 4 of the Heroes of Olympus. And, like other fans, I'm impatiently waiting for the final book - Blood of Olympus, to come out next fall. I bought The Lightning Thief graphic novel purely because of the shipping deal Amazon has. If you spend $35 or more, you get free shipping. If you don't, you can get clobbered. The main item I wanted from Amazon was a travel clock which cost a little over $10 and, the shipping would've been half the price of the clock. As I didn't care for that, I looked for $25 worth of other items so, I could get the free shipping. As I like Riordan's books, one of the items I decided to get was The Lightning Thief graphic novel.

The graphic novel was released on October 12, 2010. So, it's a bit late to review the thing. Still, I thought I'd put in my 2 cents worth. The novel has 128 pages and cuts out a lot of bits (the meeting with Medusa and the Tunnel of Love episodes come to mind) to keep it that short. That's something I didn't like about it. In one case, they even changed the story. Close to the end, Percy has gotten Zeus's master lightning bolt back BUT, he's stuck in California and, the big meeting between Zeus and his father Poseidon is going to be taking place above Manhattan. He has to get there pronto. In the novel, he raised the airfare by playing on people's sympathies while in the graphic novel, he apparently get's one of Hades minions to spring the money to fly him back.

The artwork in the graphic novel is good. The story does move along in the graphic novel like it does in the novel. I liked seeing what the characters looked like. I found the bit where Luke tries to figure out who Percy's father might be funny. Price wise, I paid $7.67 for my copy which I thought very reasonable. However, I still wasn't wiped out with the story in the graphic novel. I like the full length book version a LOT more than the graphic novel.

Overall, I found myself disappointed with the graphic novel. I wish it were longer so they didn't cut out as many bits. Personally, I wouldn't recommend it. Stick to the book version, it's a LOT better than the graphic novel. Happy reading all!