Review of The Throne of Fire by Rick Riordan

The Throne of Fire

The Kane Chronicles, Book Two

Rick Riordan

May 2011

Sadie and Carter are aboard the sun boat.
Ra's throne is glowing behind them!
You can also see creepy scarabs at the bottom...

In Book One of the The Kane Chronicles, The Red Pyramid, we meet totally awesome brother and sister Carter and Sadie Kane.  Carter has spent his life traveling the world with his father, who is an Egyptologist.  Sadie lives with their grandparents in England, because, sadly, their mom died when they were young.  When something goes terribly wrong and their father disappears, Sadie and Carter are taken by their uncle, and they discover that they are descended from two lines of pharaohs- and they are Egyptian magicians!  They work together to save the world, but learning about their new life is full of challenges in unexpected places.

In Book Two, Carter and Sadie again have to save the world- this time from the rise of Apophis, an evil snake (aka Chaos), and to do this, they must find the sun god Ra, who hid himself away long ago.  A host of fun trainees (including a cool healer named Jaz and a charm-maker named Walt) and a very strange god who smells like curry help them out, but ultimately it comes down to Carter and Sadie to get the job done.

While I enjoyed Book One, Book Two is really excellent.  The Throne of Fire has a faster pace, and I really enjoyed the adventure that the kids go on.  There are also several intriguing subplots, including Walt's secret, Sadie's crush triangle (try competing for a girl with a god!), and Carter's anxious search for Zia, which provide a change of pace from the main story.  I also like the switch off on narration between Sadie and Carter.  As usual for one of Riordan's books, there is a lot of humor- the god Bes is quite entertaining- just wait until you read about how he scares away demons! 

Here is a quote that I particularly enjoyed: "Our camels plodded along.  Katrina tried to kiss, or possibly spit on Hindenburg, and Hindenburg farted in response.  I found this a depressing commentary on boy-girl relationships."  Too true.

There is really nothing that I would change about this book, except I was really sad when it ended! The ending definitely makes you eager for Book Three to come out (2012!!).  I recommend this series to readers who enjoyed Percy Jackson, readers who are curious about Egyptology, and readers in 6th-9th grade- appealing to both boys and girls.

For more information, see The Kane Chronicles website here!