The Lost Hero

The Lost Hero

By Rick Riordan

The Lost Heroes (Book 1)

The Lost Hero is a 2010 fantasy-adventure novel written by Rick Riordan and is based on Greek and Roman mythology. It is the first book in the series The Heroes of Olympus, the second series about demigods and Camp Half-Blood. It was preceded by the Percy Jackson & the Olympians series, which focused solely on Greek mythology.

The book received generally positive reviews, and managed to win the Barnes & Noble Best Book of 2010 and landed on five bestseller lists, not including charts in the United Kingdom. The book is the first within the Percy Jackson universe to use Riordan's new style of writing, third person narration, where the point of view switches between the main characters- Jason, Piper, and Leo.

Characters

• Jason Grace: A demigod son of Jupiter. Jason suffers amnesia at the beginning of the book and is inclined to call the gods by their Roman names. He owns a coin that turns into a sword or a lance depending upon heads or tails, although it is destroyed during their quest. He is 15 years old and Thalia Grace's younger brother, although Thalia was born under the Greek aspect of Zeus while Jason was born under the Roman aspect, Jupiter. Jason was offered to Hera as a champion at the age of two, which later provoked Thalia to run away from home. Before the start of the book, he lived in Camp Jupiter, the Roman counterpart to Camp Half-Blood. He harbors feelings for Piper McLean, but at the end of the book it is hinted that he was romantically involved with a girl named Reyna before.
• Piper McLean: A demigod daughter of Aphrodite and Tristan McLean, a Cherokee movie star. She is Jason Grace's girlfriend and has a dagger named Katoptris, previously wielded by Helen of Troy. She also has the rare gift of charmspeak, the ability to persuade anybody to do anything. She is 15 years old and her eyes change color from green to brown to blue. She has choppy, uneven brown hair that she cuts herself, refusing to make it neat.
• Leo Valdez: A demigod son of Hephaestus and Esperanza Valdez. Leo claims to be Jason's best friend at the beginning of the book, and although that was a trick of the Mist, he and Jason do become good friends as they get to know each other on their quest. He has a magical tool belt that will produce any tool he requests that can be found in an average mechanical shop. Leo repaired the bronze dragon Festus. He can also create fire from nothing, a rare ability sometimes given to Hephaestus's children. He had a crush on Khione, the goddess of snow, and on Thalia Grace, Jason's elder sister.
• Gleeson Hedge: A satyr who was assigned to watch over two demigods, Piper and Leo, until they could be safely brought to Camp Half-Blood, and suddenly has to guard a third, Jason. He is taken captive after saving Leo's life twice, and later watches over Piper's father after he is rescued. Gleeson is first mentioned in The Last Olympian in a letter to Grover Underwood.

Plot

As the book starts, Jason Grace awakens on a school bus, unable to remember who or where he is, or anything about his past. He is sitting next to Piper McLean and Leo Valdez, who know him by name and say they are his girlfriend and best friend respectively. All three are part of a class field trip to the Grand Canyon, and after they arrive, a classmate Dylan turns into a Venti (Storm Spirit) and attacks the trio and their trip leader, Coach Gleeson Hedge. In the ensuing fight, Jason surprises everyone, including himself, when his Gold coin turns into a sword which he uses to battle the storm spirit. During the fight, Coach Hedge revealed himself as a satyr and was captured by the spirits as they fled. Soon after the fight, a flying chariot appears in order to save the three, but one of the people in it, Annabeth Chase, is upset when she discovers that her boyfriend, Percy Jackson, who mysteriously disappeared, is not there as she expected. Annabeth, seeking Percy, was told in a vision from the goddess Hera to look there for the "guy with one shoe", but this turns out to be Jason, who lost his shoe due to the storm spirit attack. Jason, Piper, and Leo are told that they are demigods and are taken back to Camp Half-Blood where they meet other Greek demigod children like themselves.

There, Leo is revealed as a son of Hephaestus, Piper as a daughter of Aphrodite and Jason as a son of Jupiter, though Hera tells him he is her champion. In the Aphrodite cabin, Piper is horrified to discover that the head councilor, Drew, is abusing her position as well as rare gift of charmspeaking (which Piper also possesses) to take advantage of the other Aphrodite campers. In the Hephaestus cabin, it is revealed that Leo has the rare ability to conjure fire (a power that has not been seen for centuries), but does not use nor tell anyone about it out of guilt about his mother's death seven years prior. Meanwhile, Jason finds out about his sister Thalia Grace. She is the demigod daughter of Zeus and is a Hunter of Artemis. Shortly after they arrive, the three are given a quest to rescue Hera. In the woods, Leo discovers a mechanical bronze dragon (made by the Hephaestus campers long ago) that he names Festus (Happy) and starts to repair him. Piper, Jason, and Leo soon discover that their enemies are working under orders from Gaea to overthrow the gods. Thalia and Jason meet each other again for the first time ever since Jason was captured by Hera when he was an infant