Daughter of the Deep…Sequel to 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

Rick Riordin…It all began with The Lightening Thief

Many years I ago I read The Lightening Thief by Rick Riordan. From that point on, I was hooked to Riordan’s books. I have read The Lightening Thief series and The Heroes of Olympus series, which are centered around Greek mythology. I have read The Kane Chronicles, which center around Egyptian mythology. Then, Riordan teamed up with other authors that he felt would be better suited to write about different cultures. From these books, I have read two of the Tristan Strong books by Kwame Mbalia (focused on African mythology) and City of the Plague God by Sarwat Chadda (focused on Mesopotamian mythology).

Riordan sets his books in the modern world with characters that the readers connect to from the very beginning of the books. The books are filled with adventure and suspense from beginning to end. He writes the types of books that kids AND adults might try to read in one night, because they cannot put the book down. He also writes books that both kids and adults enjoy reading. I often hear about Riordan books talked about in a similar way that people would walk about J.K. Rowling, C.S. Lewis, or J.R. Tolkien. The beauty of these books is that while Riordan writes absolutely engaging stories, kids and adults are also learning about mythology connected with different cultures. If you have not read any of his books, I would definitely recommend them,

Now that I have gushed about Riordan and the books he is known for, I am going to talk about a book that looks very different than his other books. Daughter of the Deep is not connected with any type of mythology, but it does build on the novels written by Jules Verne. The protagonist of Daughter of the Deep named Ana Dakkar finds herself at the beginning of the book watching the school (HP Academy) in which she attends and lives being destroyed by falling into the ocean. Through many twists and turns, she learns that she is a relative of Captain Nemo and that they must find Nemo’s Nautilus to find the answers they seek. Ana gains confidence in herself and her abilities as she problem solves. Her classmates follow her lead as they find the Nautilus and recieve answers to their questions. Daughter of the Deep is different than Riordan’s previous books, while at the same time including all the elements that make his books so great.

I am not going to go into a lot of detail about 20, 000 Leagues Under the Sea, but I will say that I was glad that I had read 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea before reading Daughter of the Deep. After reading Daughter of the Deep, I think that I may read Jules Verne’s The Mysterious Island. I would definitely recommend reading Jules Verne’s books before reading Daughter of the Deep or after reading it.