The Sea of Monsters

“Bull Number One ran a wide arc, making its way back toward me. As it passed the middle of the hill, where the invisible boundary line should’ve kept it out, it slowed down a little, as if it were struggling against a strong wind; but then it broke through and kept coming.”

These lines come during the battle on Half Blood Hill at the beginning of Chapter 4 and show how the border around camp is failing as a result of Thalia’s tree being poisoned. The bull here is a Colchis bull, a fire-breathing creature forged by Hephaestus (god of fire). Normally, the border around camp prevents monsters from crossing, but the weakened border allows the bull to pass.

“Annabeth shouted: ‘Tyson, help him!’

Somewhere near, toward the crest of the hill, Tyson wailed, ‘Can’t—get—through!’

‘I, Annabeth Chase, give you permission to enter camp!’

Thunder shook the hillside. Suddenly Tyson was there, barreling toward me, yelling: ‘Percy needs help!’ 

This quotation also comes from the fight in Chapter 4. Here, Tyson, a monster, is not able to enter camp. In contrast to the bulls who pass the border, if with difficulty, Tyson requires permission from Annabeth (a demigod). This implies a difference in strength between types of monsters. As creatures forged by a god (Hephaestus), the bulls may be stronger than a flesh-and-blood monster. It may also be that Tyson is a young monster and thus not yet as powerful as the bulls or a full-grown cyclops.

“Ever come home and found your room messed up? Like some helpful person (hi, Mom) has tried to ‘clean’ it, and suddenly you can’t find anything? And even if nothing is missing, you get that creepy feeling like somebody’s been looking through your private stuff and dusting everything with lemon furniture polish?

That’s kind of the way I felt seeing Camp Half Blood again.

On the surface, things didn’t look all that different. The Big House was still there with its blue gabled roof and its wraparound porch. The strawberry fields still baked in the sun. The same white-columned Greek buildings were scattered around the valley—the amphitheater, the combat arena, the dining pavilion overlooking Long Island Sound. And nestled between the woods and the creek were the same cabins—a crazy assortment of twelve buildings, each representing a different Olympian god.

But there was an air of danger now. You could tell something was wrong. Instead of playing volleyball in the sandpit, counselors and satyrs were stockpiling weapons in the tool shed. Dryads armed with bows and arrows talked nervously at the edge of the woods. The forest looked sickly, the grass in the meadow was pale yellow, and the fire marks on Half Blood Hill stood out like ugly scars.

Somebody had messed with my favorite place in the world, and I was not... well, a happy camper.”

This passage sets up the conflict affecting Camp Half Blood, showing how the land is damaged and the atmosphere is tense. It contrasts with Percy’s memories of camp and how the place was portrayed in The Lightning Thief. Rather than a glowing and healthy area under the watch of the gods, camp now looks sickly. In addition to the land itself appearing duller, creatures such as the dryads (tree nymphs) are affected as part of the land.

“‘Swear you will do your best to keep Percy from danger,’ he insisted. ‘Swear upon the River Styx.’

‘I—I swear it upon the River Styx,’ Annabeth said.

Thunder rumbled outside.”

In Greek mythology, the River Styx is the sacred river of oaths, named so because Styx (daughter of the titans) sided with Zeus in the war between titans and gods. Following the war, the gods swore on the River Styx because breaking such an oath came with terrible consequences. Here, Chiron requires Annabeth to make such an oath, demonstrating the importance of keeping Percy safe. This also shows how such oaths still have power. Though no mention is made of the punishment for breaking the oath, one could assume it would be dire.

“But there was no explaining it to him. He was in heaven. And me... as much as I liked the big guy, I couldn’t help feeling embarrassed. Ashamed. There, I said it.

My father, the all-powerful Poseidon, had gotten moony-eyed for some nature spirit, and Tyson had been the result. I mean, I’d read the myths about Cyclopes. I even remembered that they were often Poseidon’s children. But I’d never really processed that this made them my... family. Until I had Tyson living with me in the next bunk.

And then there were the comments from the other campers. Suddenly, I wasn’t Percy Jackson, the cool guy who’d retrieved Zeus’s lightning bolt last summer. Now I was Percy Jackson, the poor schmuck with the ugly monster for a brother.” 

These lines from Percy’s narration come right after Poseidon claims Tyson as his son, and they show Percy at the beginning of his character arc. At the end of The Lightning Thief, Percy returned to camp a hero and finally found his place among the campers, despite being a forbidden child of Poseidon. In Chapter 1 of The Sea of Monsters, he expected to return to camp and still be the cool kid whose parentage was accepted. Rather than this, he finds himself again on the outskirts, again shunned for something outside his control. This passage shows how situations may never be fully resolved, only appeased until they are revived.

“‘I am a monster.’

‘Don’t say that.’

‘It is okay. I will be a good monster. Then you will not have to be mad.’

I didn’t know what to say. I stared at the ceiling and felt like I was dying slowly, right along with Thalia’s tree.”

This conversation between Percy and Tyson shows how Percy’s frustration affects Tyson, as well as Tyson’s understanding of the situation. Here, Percy realizes his feelings don’t only affect him. His lack of acceptance makes Tyson feel as if he needs to behave a certain way to make Percy like him. Tyson’s claim that he will be a “good monster” shows the harm done by treating someone poorly based on who they are/what they look like. Through Percy’s opinion of him, Tyson believes there is something wrong with him and that the only way to make things right is to defy his nature.

“‘One night, when this boy’s mother wasn’t watching, he sneaked out of their cave and stole some cattle that belonged to Apollo.’

‘Did he get blasted to tiny pieces?’ I asked.

‘Hmm... no. Actually, everything turned out quite well. To make up for his theft, the boy gave Apollo an instrument he’d invented—a lyre. Apollo was so enchanted with the music that he forgot all about being angry.’

‘So what’s the moral?’

‘The moral?’ Hermes asked. ‘Goodness, you act like it’s a fable. It’s a true story. Does truth have a moral?’”

Here, Percy speaks with Hermes before setting off to find the Golden Fleece. Hermes tells this story to illustrate how Percy breaking the rules to do something right may result in reward, rather than punishment. These lines also call into question the difference between reality and fiction. Presumably, all fictional stories have roots in reality. Hermes asks if truth needs a moral, a question that is not answered. It also opens the question of when truth becomes fiction and if fictional stories that are based on truth have morals.

“Tyson caught his breath. ‘Fish ponies!’

He was right. As the creatures pulled themselves onto the sand, I saw that they were only horses in the front; their back halves were silvery fish bodies, with glistening scales and rainbow tail fins.

‘Hippocampi!’ Annabeth said. ‘They’re beautiful.’”

Hippocampi (plural of hippocampus) are half-horse, half-fish creatures that are made from sea foam, according to Greek myth. As the god of the sea and of horses, Poseidon sends the creatures to help Percy and his friends, and as Poseidon’s children, Percy and Tyson develop special relationships with the creatures.

“Tyson closed his eye like he was concentrating hard. Then his voice changed, becoming a husky approximation of Luke’s. ‘—the prophecy ourselves. The fools won’t know which way to turn.’

Before I could react, Tyson’s voice changed again, becoming deeper and gruffer, like the other guy we’d heard talking to Luke outside the cafeteria.”

Here, Tyson demonstrates an ability to listen in on conversations at a distance and mimic voices, a capability Riordan seemed to create for the cyclops race in his story world. There is no mention of how Tyson is able to do this, which means the ability could be specific to cyclopes or an ability given by Poseidon. If the latter, it is not a skill Percy shares, showing how different offspring may have different aptitudes. This scene also foreshadows the story Annabeth tells later about the cyclops who captured and tricked her, Thalia, and Luke with mimicking voices.

“That shouldn’t have bothered me. I mean, I knew Thalia and Luke had taken care of Annabeth when she was little. I knew the three of them had been runaways together, hiding from monsters, surviving on their own before Grover found them and tried to get them to Half Blood Hill. But whenever Annabeth talked about the time she’d spent with them, I kind of felt... I don’t know. Uncomfortable?

No. That’s not the word.

The word was jealous.”

These lines from Percy’s thoughts come after Percy, Annabeth, and Tyson escape Luke’s ship and Annabeth leads the group to a hideout built by her, Luke, and Thalia while they were on the run. Though Annabeth explained her history with Thalia and Luke in The Lightning Thief and a bit more in The Sea of Monsters, this is the first time Percy sees physical evidence from that part of Annabeth’s life. Though he understands it wasn’t a good time, he yearns for that kind of relationship with his friends—the kind where he and the group can rely on one another for anything. Emotions are tricky for anyone but can be especially so for someone struggling with their sense of belonging. Percy is jealous of a bad situation, something he shouldn’t feel jealous about, but it’s the closeness Annabeth experienced with friends, rather than the danger, he’s jealous of.

“‘Haven’t you ever wondered how franchise stores pop up so fast?’ she asked. ‘One day there’s nothing and then the next day—boom, there’s a new burger place or a coffee shop or whatever? First a single store, then two, then four—exact replicas spreading across the country?’

‘Um, no. Never thought about it.’

‘Percy, some of the chains multiply so fast because all their locations are magically linked to the life force of a monster. Some children of Hermes figured out how to do it back in the 1950s.’”

Annabeth’s explanation here shows how Riordan modernizes the Greek world and integrates it into modern life. This passage comes after the group sees a chain store in the middle of nowhere, a place Tyson can enter safely because chain stores are linked to monsters. By making this connection between chains and monsters, Riordan places a negative connotation on chain stores and restaurants. Annabeth’s link to the 1950s harkens to the decade when such giant chain companies as McDonald’s and Burger King were founded.

“‘I don’t want excuses, little girl!’ he growled.

‘Y-yes, father,’ Clarisse mumbled.

‘You don’t want to see me mad, do you?’

‘No, father.’

‘No, father,’ Ares mimicked. ‘You’re pathetic. I should’ve let one of my sons take this quest.’

‘I’ll succeed!’ Clarisse promised, her voice trembling. ‘I’ll make you proud.’

‘You’d better,’ he warned. ‘You asked me for this quest, girl.’”

Percy overhears this conversation between Clarisse and her father, Ares (god of war), right before the group reaches the Sea of Monsters. Ares treats Clarisse poorly, implying she isn’t as good as any of his sons. He puts pressure on Clarisse he might not put on a male child. Ares is sexist and a bully, which implies a connection between war/violence and closed-minded thinking. Despite this, Clarisse wants to make him proud, showing to what lengths a child will go to impress a parent, even when that parent may not be worth impressing.

“I couldn’t get over how badly I’d messed up on Circe’s Island. If it hadn’t been for Annabeth, I’d still be a rodent, hiding in a hutch with a bunch of cute furry pirates. I thought about what Circe had said: See, Percy? You’ve unlocked your true self!

I still felt changed. Not just because I had a sudden desire to eat lettuce. I felt jumpy, like the instinct to be a scared little animal was now a part of me. Or maybe it had always been there. That’s what really worried me.”

Percy has these thoughts after escaping from Circe’s island. Up until now, Percy viewed himself as a brave demigod who could face any foe and survive, if not win. His experience as a guinea pig introduces him to the idea that fear lives within him, whether he wants it or not. This passage also shows how people don’t always match who they are on the inside with their outward appearance. Percy still looks the same, but there is a part of him that resembles a scared rodent.

“I glared at the misty island. I wanted to uncap my sword, but there was nothing to fight. How do you fight a song?”

These lines come while Annabeth listens to the Siren’s song. Percy watches her agony and wishes he could help her. Most of the enemies Percy has faced since discovering his demigod nature have been monsters with a physical form that he could strike and send back to Tartarus. He can’t fight the Siren song this way, which leaves him feeling helpless. Percy doesn’t yet understand that there are different ways to fight a battle.

“‘I mean, the West represents a lot of the best things mankind ever did—that’s why the fire is still burning. That’s why Olympus is still around. But sometimes you just see the bad stuff, you know? And you start thinking the way Luke does’: ‘If I could tear this all down, I would do it better.’” 

Annabeth says this to Percy after hearing the Siren song and seeing her heart’s greatest desires—to have her family back together and to remake the world better. She acknowledges that the gods and western civilization aren’t all bad while also suggesting there are a lot of things wrong with both. She gives weight to Luke’s view of the world and his drive to burn the world and start from scratch. But while Luke’s view has merit, it is too destructive if taken to an extreme, which shows how extremes are not the answer.

“‘Then you’re lucky. Hubris isn’t your fatal flaw.’

‘What is?’

‘I don’t know, Percy, but every hero has one. If you don’t find it and learn to control it... well, they don’t call it ‘fatal’ for nothing.’” 

After hearing the Siren song, Annabeth identifies her fatal flaw as hubris—the belief she can do everything better than anyone else. In this passage, she introduces the idea that all heroes have a fatal flaw, which she suggests is a flaw that, if left unchecked, can lead to a demigod’s demise. Percy doesn’t learn his fatal flaw by the end of the book, and this passage foreshadows that he likely will later in the series.

“‘You serve mortals!’ Polyphemus shouted. ‘Thieving humans!’

Polyphemus threw his first boulder. Tyson swatted it aside with his fist.

‘Not a traitor,’ Tyson said. ‘And you are not my kind.’”

One of the major themes of The Sea of Monsters is the idea that all members of a given group are not the same. This snippet of conversation between Polyphemus and Tyson shows how each cyclops has a different view of humans. Polyphemus believes himself above humans while Tyson considers Percy and the others not only friends, but his “kind.” Tyson rejects Polyphemus as his “kind,” showing how similarities in species or genetic makeup don’t define who a person is or what group they belong to.

“‘The Fleece should be used to heal! It belongs to the children of the gods!’

‘I am a child of the gods!’ Polyphemus swiped at me, but I sidestepped. ‘Father Poseidon, curse this thief!’ He was blinking hard now, like he could barely see, and I realized he was targeting by the sound of my voice.

‘Poseidon won’t curse me,’ I said, backing up as the Cyclops grabbed air. ‘I’m his son, too. He won’t play favorites.’”

This conversation between Percy and Polyphemus shows a few things. First, it represents how people (monsters included) fall back on old solutions to solve problems. In the “Odyssey,” Polyphemus called on Poseidon to curse Odysseus, which Poseidon did. Here, Polyphemus does the same thing, which has no result since Percy is also Poseidon’s son. Second, these lines symbolize how people are more alike than they are different. Percy and Polyphemus may be different physically (human versus cyclops), but both are sons of Poseidon and fighting to better their own situations. Polyphemus claims he is also a child of the gods. Percy ignores this because camp needs the Fleece, and in doing so, Percy, perhaps unintentionally, implies that demigod children of the gods are more important and have more righteous causes than monster children. Taken together, these lines show that people are more alike than different and that personal wants/needs, rather than happenstance of birth, cause divisions among groups.

“‘You shall sail the iron ship with warriors of bone,

You shall find what you seek and make it your own,

But despair for your life entombed within stone,

And fail without friends, to fly home alone.’”

These are the lines of Clarisse’s prophesy. In The Lightning Thief, Percy received a quest prophesy, which ended up coming to pass in ways he didn’t expect or see coming. Clarisse’s prophesy is similar. It seems to say she cannot succeed unless accompanied by other demigods, which she takes to mean she won’t receive glory for the quest. When Percy deciphers the final line and sends Clarisse on ahead to camp by airplane, he shows how tricky prophesies can be and how they may have multiple meanings.

“Backbiter was a foot longer than my own sword. Its blade glinted with an evil gray-and-gold light where the human steel had been melded with celestial bronze. I could almost feel the blade fighting against itself, like two opposing magnets bound together. I didn’t know how the blade had been made, but I sensed a tragedy. Someone had died in the process.”

Backbiter is Luke’s sword and represents dichotomy. It is forged of both regular steel and celestial bronze, making it effective against both mortals and monsters. Percy senses a tragedy went into its making. While the details of the sword’s creation are never revealed, it represents how the wielder is torn. Luke wants to destroy the gods, even while part of him yearns to be accepted and acknowledged, especially by his father, Hermes.

“He pulled an arrow from his quiver and turned the razor-sharp tip so it glinted in the firelight. ‘Celestial bronze, Percy. An immortal weapon. What would happen if you shot this at a human?’

‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘It would pass right through.’

‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘Humans don’t exist on the same level as the immortals. They can’t even be hurt by our weapons. But you, Percy—you are part god, part human. You live in both worlds. You can be harmed by both, and you can affect both. That’s what makes heroes so special. You carry the hopes of humanity into the realm of the eternal. Monsters never die. They are reborn from the chaos and barbarism that is always bubbling underneath civilization, the very stuff that makes Kronos stronger. They must be defeated again and again, kept at bay. Heroes embody that struggle. You fight the battles humanity must win, every generation, in order to stay human. Do you understand?’”

This conversation takes place between Percy and Chiron after the centaurs rescue Percy and his friends from Luke’s ship. Chiron uses celestial bronze to demonstrate the differences between mortals and the Greek world and, though he doesn’t say it, likens Percy to Backbiter—being forged of both worlds. Chiron also builds Riordan’s story world for the reader, delivering information about how monsters are formed and reformed, which allows them to continue spreading the discontent felt by humans. As a demigod, Percy battles both the monsters and what they represent, which harkens back to how he couldn’t fight the Siren song with a sword. Percy can stab the monsters and temporarily destroy them, but the fight for humanity is one he can’t wield a traditional weapon against.

“Nobody gave Annabeth or me a second look. It was as if we’d never left. In a way, I guess that was the best thank-you anyone could give us, because if they admitted we’d snuck out of camp to do the quest, they’d have to expel us. And really, I didn’t want any more attention. It felt good to be just one of the campers for once.” 

This passage of Percy’s thoughts once he arrives back at camp completes his character arc. At the beginning of the book, Percy looked forward to returning to camp, where he was a hero, and when Poseidon claimed Tyson, Percy hated that the other campers only paid attention to him in order to make fun of him. Percy wanted the same glory he received at the end of The Lightning Thief. Here, Percy fades into the background of the celebration, letting Clarisse take her well-deserved success. Percy learned he doesn’t always have to save the day to be acknowledged.

“‘Percy, the hardest part about being a god is that you must often act indirectly, especially when it comes to your own children. If we were to intervene every time our children had a problem... well, that would only create more problems and more resentment.’ […] ‘Families are messy. Immortal families are eternally messy. Sometimes the best we can do is to remind each other that we’re related, for better or worse... and try to keep the maiming and killing to a minimum.’”

Hermes offers Percy these words of wisdom after Percy tells the god he couldn’t convince Luke to change. To Percy’s surprise, Hermes isn’t upset, which shows a difference between how mortal and immortal beings view the decisions of minds and hearts. These lines also offer some insight into how the gods work. They can only indirectly influence events, offering wisdom or aid here and there. Hermes and Poseidon both help Percy throughout The Sea of Monsters—Hermes’s help being more obvious.