The Battle of the Labyrinth

The Battle of the Labyrinth by Rick Riordan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

In the penultimate entry of author Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, the namesake demigod protagonist is at an orientation of a school his mother wants him to attend the subsequent school year, and just like in prior books, things go awry with monsters in cheerleaders’ disguises seeking to off him, Camp Half-Blood being a prime target for the forces of the Titan Kronos. Grover the satyr also faces the threat of revocation of his searcher’s license unless he finds the god Pan, and an entrance into the titular Labyrinth constructed by Daedalus is found below the Camp.

Percy also has a number of dreams throughout the book, among them involving King Minos interrupting a conversation between Daedalus and his son Icarus. In the middle of their navigation of the Labyrinth, Percy and his friends encounter a ranch with horrid conditions for the animals, which prove carnivorous as well. They also encounter the Sphinx, which asks random trivia questions instead of posing riddles, with the group eventually finding Daedalus’ workshop. During the book’s events, the mortal girl Rachel helps Percy and company, and a council ultimately decides Grover’s fate.

The book ends with a few battles and Percy’s fifteenth birthday, and is overall another fine addition to Riordan’s series, given its enjoyable blend of fantasy, mythology, and contemporary America, with a few twists throughout the narrative. There are also a few locations visited I’ve actually been to, such as Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico, and could certainly visualize it and other places Percy and his friends encounter during the story. Some fecal references at one point mar the book’s events, but otherwise, I would recommend the fourth Percy Jackson book to those who enjoyed its precursors.

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