How has J.K. Rowling not sued?????

I just finished a book that I bought in the children's section of Barnes and Noble. It is about a young boy who has black hair and bright green eyes who goes and learns about special powers he had no idea he had at a boarding school.

Okay, so it wasn't a boarding school, it was more of a summer camp that can double as a school if the kids have no where to go during the school year. And Percy Jackson is not a wizard. He is a demi-god.

The book I am talking about is Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief.

The buzz that I had heard about the book before I bought it was that it was as good as Harry Potter. Upon finishing the book, I am left to conclude: as good as? Not exactly. Ripped off? Definitely.

I understand that all literature is inspired, but there is a fine line between inspiration and plagarism.

The book definitely had some unique aspects. It places the Olympian Gods of ancient Greece on Mount Olympus. That was not the original aspect, obviously. In this book, Mount Olympus is located at the top of the Sears Tower. I had not actually read any present day adaptations of Greek Mythology, so that was quite interesting.

But as mentioned before, did Percy really need to have black hair and bright green eyes? Did he really need to go off on an adventure with his best friend and a girl who was not really their friend but was a lot smarter than they were? I could have done without it. At least make the best friend the girl, and the brainiac the boy. And would blonde hair really have killed him?

That being said, it definitely had some redeeming qualities. For instance, it teaches kids that learning disabilities such as ADHD can definitely be a strength instead of a weakness. Percy is dyslexic as well, though that is more of a hindrance. It is reasoned away that all of the children of the Gods are dyslexic because their minds are programed for ancient Greek. Will this get dyslexic children thinking that they might be the children of the Olympians? Maybe. But hey, I looked outside on my 11th birthday waiting to see if my Hogwarts letter had arrived yet. It is obvious that the children who are old enough to read this book will be old enough to differentiate between reality and fiction. Hopefully.

Was it a terrible book? No. Would I recommend it to kids Percy's age? Definitely. It was a fairly exciting story with a lot of action. It is something that they might actually want to put down their video games to read? Possibly.

Would I recommend it to adults? No, but it wasn't written for adults.

The audience it was written for could and, judging by the fact that it was a best seller and the movie that will be coming out this month, do enjoy reading it immensely. And for that, despite my complaints, I will give it a positive rating.

The Heart of a Chief

I know this was not on my list of To Read books, but I read it anyways. I had to for class. And it made me do some thinking. My class is about diverse children's literature. I expected these books to break down stereotypes. Well, so far I am disappointed. I felt like this book did nothing but reinforce them.

It is about a young Native American boy, in the sixth grade. He lives on a reservation, but is in a general public school, instead of going to school on the Res. This book follows his life over the first semester of school that year. He does school projects and talks with the council of the res. He lives with his grandfather and great aunt.

None of these things by themselves shouts stereotypes. Except that he lives with his grandfather because his father is an alcoholic. He talks to the tribe council because they want to build a casino. The only thing that is not necessarily reinforcing stereotypes is his class project is about changing the school mascot from the Chiefs to something less demeaning. However, even this is shown reinforcing some stereotypes. At one point, someone who is in his group, who is white, gets punched by someone who wants to keep the name. He responds to this by saying that he had a run in with "white hostiles". This seems to create a stereotype against white people at the very least. The only black person even mentioned abandoned her son because she was on drugs.

It was a fairly well written easy to read book, that can be used to talk about modern day Indian Reservations, because there are parts that are encouraging. It shows the children learning their Indian language in an effort to keep it alive. It shows an Indian family that still has two parents and the kids all living together happily, even though it is just one. But if it is used in children's classrooms, I feel like the teachers would have to be very careful about the stereotypes that are still cemented within the pages.