In a world where myths fly off the pages into reality. When the Gods you read about appear before you, telling you that you are not whom you once thought you were. If you read Rick Riordan books before (Namely the Percy Jackson series) you know all about the Greek Gods and Goddesses who live above the empire state building in Manhattan, New York. But what is going in Brooklyn? Brooklyn has its own Gods sprouting up over the place, bring the birth of civilization and their Gods along with it.

Carter Kane is used to being the youngest person to ever enter a tomb. At age eight, after his mother died Carter and his father Dr. Julius Kane, an Egyptologist who specialized in the translation of ancient spells, started traveling the world due to Julius’s work. Carter never mind it, after all traveling the world was what some kids dreamed of doing. Julius taught Carter to always look his best as, after a certain age a man of their race had to look his best at all times no matter what. So unlike normal fourteen year olds Carter wore khaki’s and button down shirts anywhere as they went from 3am flights, to walking to a dig site. Only two days every year did Carter have to share his father with anyone else, it was those two days they flew to London to visit his twelve-year-old sister Sadie, who after their mother died was sent to live with their mother’s parents. Even though Sadie looked nothing like her father and brother (she had caramel hair and blue eyes like their mom), the siblings also knew almost nothing about each other. Carter could almost pretend he did not even have a sister, and that it is always been just him and his father. All of that changed when the night they visit Sadie and went to see the Rosette Stone. Breaking the stone, their father disappeared, leaving the two children alone. Carter, who has never been away from his father for more than a few hours, has to find him, and the only people to help him is estranged uncle Amos (who leaves without him) and Sadie, whom he does not even know.

Sadie never knew her mother. After all, she was only six when she died. Moving from their home in Los Angeles, Sadie was told by her grandparents that they took her father to court for custody over her, yet they never fought for Carter. Sure Sadie liked her life, her grandparents had a nice flat, she had her mates, but it just never fitted her. Carter got to spend every day with her father, and because of that she resented him, both of them. How come her father never tried harder to get her to stay with him? How could he settle just seeing her twice a year? “Dad had practically abandoned me at age six, after all. The necklace was my one link to him. On good days I would stare at it and remember him fondly. On bad days (which were much more frequent) I would fling it across the room and stomp on it and curse him for not being around”. Sadie soon realizes that looks are not what makes a family, and neither does blood. As she grows closer to Carter she learns parts of her history that was kept away from her, and the reason Carter was kept away from her too, all in the hope of rescuing their dad and saving the world while they are at it.

Rick Riordan is known for his fascinating story of a twelve-year-old boy who found out his father was Poseidon and the adventures that follow suite of that. So why could he not do that again? Riordan releases his new series The Kane Chronicles following brother and sister pair and their adventures as Egyptian Gods come to life and the magic that comes with it. The story starts off with a warning (aww how cute!) as the setting is the two of them recording their adventure and hoping they fall in the right hands by leaving them in a locker that only certain people can find. The writing was good (as it is meant for nine to twelve year olds) kept fast pace even for a book in its length (516 pages). The hardest part was telling what character was telling the story. Taken by two points of views, Sadie was easy to tell in the beginning due to her British words of bloody, mate, flat, and so on, until later in the book when she stopped using them. The age when you think about it all is ridiculous as Sadie is only twelve, and Carter is not much older at fourteen. Still they were born for this in the way and going back to Riordan’s early example, Percy was only twelve as well and he did it without an older sibling. The first in this trilogy it is interesting to see where Riordan will take this series and the fate of the Twenty-First Nome.