thinking about percy in botl finding a different solution to cleaning the stables bc he felt bad about the idea of throwing his weight around and pressuring the river spirit. thinking about him feeling bad about getting worked up and cleaning elissons river. thinking about him trying to avoid getting angry at eudora because it's not her fault and she's trying to help. thinking about how much of the pjo universe operates on the rules of "i am stronger/more important so you must do what I want" and how hard percy tries to circumvent that and how hard he works not to be a bully
today i'm thinking abt percy asking for his mother's blessing so he can either die in the river styx or die shortly after by fulfilling the prophecy and her response was to come up w a sign to let her know if he lives
I think part of the reason why Percy Jackson is such an easy main character to love is because, outside of the whole mythology thing, is the fact he’s just a random dude. So many books have characters with these overly tragic backstories or unrealistic lives, but Percy’s story doesn’t really feel like that. When the reader meets him, he’s just a regular middle school boy. He likes candy, he cheats on his homework, he’s only got one close friend, and he’s just trying to make it to the end of the year without getting kicked out. Like, sure, most people won’t relate to him fully, but it still feels easier to understand him than most other book series. I also love that it doesn’t change even as he ages and gets more involved in the world of mythology. In SOM our intro is him taking final exams; in TTC he’s getting embarrassed by his mom; in BOTL he’s trying to go to the movies with his best friend/crush; and even in the final showdown book we start with him trying to enjoy the end of his summer vacation. He’s such a great character because, at the end of the day, he’s just a teenager trying to live his life.
I love how the Disney adaptation of Percy Jackson and the Olympians does such a good job from the outset of emphasizing that Percy might be half god on Poseidon’s side, but every instinct in him that makes him a hero is because he is Sally Jackson’s son.
As much as I make fun of Percy for being down bad from day one what I really love is that he truly thinks this is regular friend behaviour. He’s unleashing his inner wattpad mafia boss for Annabeth, has her picture on his mirror, promises he’d burn down Olympus for her, seems offended there’s ‘another’ boyfriend and thinks it is purely platonic. And the best part is Percy is such a loverboy in all meanings of the world that that genuinely is understandable because he is simultaneously going to the sea of monsters for Grover, having Grover’s picture on his mirror, telling Grover he looks beautiful in a wedding dress, embracing Grover like the husband he presumed missing at sea and being so soulmated to his best friend that they dream together.
Book two for the @fandomtrumpshate craft bazaar was a binding for the series the darkness of the depths is forgotten in the surf which is a Percy Jackson series by poisedwalrus. I know next to nothing about Percy Jackson, but the recipient agreed that cool colours and an ocean motif would work, so off I went.
More pictures and yammering below the cut
The cover design was drawn by me and then cut by machine so the edges would match up. Cloth used is all Duo, and the shades used are Polar, Dusk, and Dragonfly. Once they were cut I lined the edges with gold acrylic paint, and then pasted everything to a sheet of rice paper, mosaic style. Page edges were decorated using gold acrylic ink, and then buffed with beeswax.
Endpapers are marbled momi, which i always love using, and endbands are once again hand sewn with Japanese silk. I completely forgot to take a good picture of them this time.
The series title page is another double-layered one using paper vellum. The same photo was used for both the vellum colour print (that's the unaltered photo), and then put through a graphic filter to print as a black-and-white drawing (that I then lined with more gold ink) on the text paper behind it. Story title pages are simpler, but I also forgot to take pictures of those.
Look, I finished this book at like 9:30 at night and then immediately started packing it for shipping. That I remembered to take pics at all is a minor miracle.
Titles on the cover were stencilled via adhesive vinyl and gold paint. I tried to fit them on the spine but absolutely could now get them to fit at a size that was still legible.
Lastly, this one was a bit of a typesetting challenge because there are poem quotes at each chapter beginning, and since the book is legal-quarto, there wasn't a lot of page real estate. I think they came out well though.
Guess what else I didn't take pictures of.
Anyway, very fun project. I was super pleased with the cover result, and even more pleased that it wasn't turned around at the border, since it was sent after the tariffs went into effect for everything.
And that is all from the FTH Craft Bazaar for me! Thank you to everyone who organized or bid.
Percy listens to those whale noises that people use to sleep and he just listens to them like a podcast.
And any time he hears someone like Annabeth listening to them he's like "Wow Daphne is really something else. Honestly I can't believe she would do that"
And like she's like "what?"
And Percy just translates the entire thing to her and instead of calming sounds to help her concentrate she now has Percy tell her all the whale drama which she is oddly immersed with.
