The Blood of Olympus

Duality is ever-present in Greek mythology. Anything that can be helpful also has the capacity to be harmful, and vice versa. The goddess Demeter is a prime example: Her control over harvests means that she can either make the earth abundant or make it barren. In the case of heroes, their excessive gifts can be both helpful and harmful. The strength of Achilles, for example, makes him a great warrior who can bring success in battle, but his invaluable strength also makes him potentially harmful: When he removes himself from battle, his absence makes his fellow warriors vulnerable.

In The Blood of Olympus, duality functions as a recurring motif. As in the Greek myth narratives, Riordan applies the concept to his characterization of gods and heroes. The Olympians and various other divinities—for example, Kymopoleia, Hades, and Apollo—can be both harmful and beneficial, depending on the circumstances. Each of the heroes has a gift that could also become a flaw. For example, Percy is so loyal to his friends that he may not realize the ways his help can become a hindrance at times. Annabeth is so logical that she doesn’t know how to rely on her instincts.

Riordan also infuses the notion of duality into how characters interpret events that happen to them. Reyna initially interprets Orion’s appearance toward the end of the novel as a sign that her mother has rejected her prayer, but she subsequently embraces Orion’s appearance as a sign that her mother has answered her prayer by giving her a way to prove herself worthy of the war goddess’ patronage. After Nico turns Bryce Lawrence into a spirit, he initially interprets his friends’ dismay as a sign that they can’t be friends; later, he realizes that his friends’ dismay can coexist with their respect for and loyalty to him.

In The Blood of Olympus, “the curse of Delos” refers to flowers that grow on the island of Delos. These daisies, handpicked by Apollo, are an ingredient in the physician’s cure, which can restore life to someone who has died. The demigods go in search of the cure because one of them is fated to die during the quest, and they want to ensure that the death won’t be permanent.

When Artemis and Apollo’s mother, Leto, was ready to give birth, no city wanted to accept her, since doing so would incur Hera’s wrath. Only Delos, then a floating island, welcomed Leto, and the flowers bloomed in the aftermath of the twins’ birth. However, their birth also caused the island to become rooted, which could be interpreted as a curse. As a sign of celebration (for Artemis and Apollo’s birth) and mourning (the island’s loss of floating), the curse of Delos symbolizes the interconnection of life and death, beginnings and endings that exist within an eternally recurring cycle.

This idea of interconnection is important in The Blood of Olympus in several ways. It reflects Riordan’s structural approach, which employs cliffhangers at the end of almost every chapter as well as from one book in the series to the next and even from one series to the next. Defeating the gods and demigods at the Acropolis ends one challenge, and contending with Gaea’s awakening begins the next challenge. In addition, The Blood of Olympus ends with a reference to Zeus punishing Apollo, which is the subject of the next series in the Percy Jackson universe, The Trials of Apollo. On a content level, all of the demigods confront death and fear of death throughout the series in one way or another: For example, Leo chooses to sacrifice himself for his friends, Piper is willing to commit to detoxifying the Nymphaeum (in The Mark of Athena), Percy travels through Tartarus with Annabeth (in The House of Hades), Reyna throws herself on top of an explosive arrow, and Nico accepts his father’s suggestion that some deaths can’t or shouldn’t be prevented.