True confession: Aunty Em’s Garden Gnome Emporium is my favorite monster retail experience of all time. Probably because I didn’t have to actually experience it myself. But also because Aunty Em turns out to be Aunty “M.” That’s short for Medusa, who may be the original experiencer of the bad hair day.
Actually, considering she has to go around with snakes on her head where her hair’s supposed to be, I think we could just go with bad hair life.
Good rule to follow, in case it should happen to come up: Never piss off Athena, goddess of wisdom, Annabeth’s mom. That’s how Medusa ended up as old snakehead, and now she’s plenty pissed off. So pissed that one look at her hairdo is all it takes to turn you to stone. If you look at a reflection of her, you’re good to go. But if you look at her, well, head on. . . .
That’s who all the garden gnomes in the emporium are—creatures of one sort or another who looked Aunty Em right in her beady, bloodshot eyes. Grover even thinks he spots one that looks a lot like his Uncle Ferdinand. It turns out he’s right. Only it doesn’t just look a lot like his Uncle Ferdinand. It is his Uncle Ferdinand.
Grover gets extra points, by the way, for urging his companions not to set foot in Aunty Em’s Garden Gnome Emporium. He’s certain he smells monsters, and it turns out he’s absolutely right. Unfortunately, Percy and Annabeth overrule him. Not necessarily because they’ve developed a sudden interest in acquiring yard art for Camp Half-Blood, but because they smell burgers and they’re hungry.
Let’s just re-cap the overall scenario, shall we?
Percy, Grover, and Annabeth have just begun their quest. They know there’s danger all around them. In fact, they’ve just escaped from an attack by all three of the Furies in the back of a bus, which is no mean feat, I can tell you. So I suppose I should cut Percy and Annabeth some slack, because it does make a certain amount of sense that all that Fury-fighting would have made them hungry.
But instead of heading for a nice safe McDonald’s, where you can always use the bathroom even if you don’t buy a Happy Meal, what does our hero do instead? He leads his friends straight to the back of a warehouse filled with extremely odd yet lifelike statuary. Why? Because the proprietor, whose face is completely hidden from sight by a veil (did I forget to mention that?), says there’s a free snackbar.
Huh?
Surely the thing somebody ought to be smelling right about now is a rat. Strangely enough, nobody, with the possible exception of Grover, does. This is monster retail at its best and brightest: side-tracking the hero and his companions, then putting their lives at risk. The fact that they all eventually escape is fine and dandy. It’s also cause for alarm. Because it’s right here, with the trip to Aunty Em’s Garden Gnome Emporium, that a pattern starts to form.
When the going gets tough, the heroes go shopping. But somehow they never notice until it’s way too close to too late that the only thing the monsters really have for sale is trouble.
Here’s another case in point: chapter seventeen of The Lightning Thief. That’s when our gang pays a visit to Crusty’s Waterbed Palace.
Percy’s quest to retrieve Zeus’ lightning bolt has taken him and his companions from the east coast to Los Angeles by this time. No sooner do they set foot in the city, however, than they’re set on by a pack of thugs. And it is while trying to escape from them that our trio decides to pay an impromptu visit to the Waterbed Palace.
So far, so good. But wait! There’s more. Because once inside the Waterbed Palace, something strange happens. Well, more than one thing, if the full truth must be told. But the specific strange thing I’m getting at is this: Percy and his companions stick around.
Our hero and his friends have made it all the way across the country and they’re still not much closer to finding Zeus’ lightning bolt than they were when they set out. Time is definitely doing that thing where it runs out. So what do Percy, Grover, and Annabeth do?
You got it. They shop.
Unlike the side trip to Aunty Em’s, where he was pretty certain he could smell trouble coming, this time Grover’s the one who lets the trio down. He develops a sudden, potentially fatal attraction to the waterbeds. Almost before the trio knows what’s happening, Grover’s tied to one of the beds, with Annabeth not far behind. Both are in definite danger of being stretched to one size fits all.
Unless Percy thinks on his feet pretty darned fast, not only will he fail in his quest, but he and the others are going to be extremely uncomfortable—though admittedly more likely to be picked first for basketball.
Fortunately, by the time chapter seventeen has rolled around, thinking on his feet is a thing at which Perseus Jackson is learning to excel.
He turns the tables on waterbed salesman Crusty, short for Procrustes, a.k.a. the Stretcher, a real kill ’em with kindness guy. Percy does this by convincing Crusty that those waterbeds look pretty good, so good that Crusty himself ought to try one on for size. The moment Crusty does this, Percy’s in the clear. He dispatches the monster, rescues his friends.
The shopping trip is over. The quest is on.
But I’ve still got a question, and my guess is you do too: Why in Western Civilization didn’t Percy walk in then walk right back out the Waterbed Palace door? As soon as the thugs had departed, of course. Fast as our hero thinks on his feet when the time comes, why does it take the time so long to arrive? Why didn’t Percy spot that there was something weird going on right off the bat?
I mean, come on.
A guy that Percy himself describes as looking like a raptor in a leisure suit tries to sell three individuals clearly not old enough to have their own credit cards some waterbeds? Get real. Do you have any idea how expensive those things are? And I’m talking before the shipping and handling costs. No salesman is that desperate. No real one, anyhow.
It’s Aunty Em’s Garden Gnome Emporium all over again, when you get right down to it. Our friends end up walking right into a trap. But the thing that lures them into the trap in the first place is a front. Specifically, a store front.
So just what is it about monsters and retail? Why would monsters even pick retail in the first place? Why go to all the effort of trying to lure Percy and his friends in to shop, when it would be so much easier to simply jump out from behind the nearest available cover and wipe them out? Percy and his pals only add up to three, after all.
At least they do in The Lightning Thief. Our hero does get some reinforcements as his adventure moves along. Even so, monsters come in an infinite variety of shapes and sizes, not to mention numbers. Surely all they’d have to do would be to keep on coming. Sooner or later, and probably sooner, Percy and his pals are bound to get tired.
And here’s another question for you: If the monsters are going to go to all the trouble of setting up the opportunity for retail, how come they never seem to be selling anything a young demigod might actually want? Like some super new weapon, the ability to shop for your heart’s desire, or to travel through time.
It took me a while, but I think I’ve come up with an explanation.
The fact that the monsters aren’t selling anything our hero and his companions really, truly want is part of the point. I’m talking about the author’s point, now. And Percy not being able to spot the danger monster retail poses, at least not immediately, is the other part. Because the truth (which I put forward knowing full well that I run the risk of pissing off any monster within earshot) is actually quite radical.
All those retail monsters Percy encounters are actually doing him a favor, whether they mean to or not.
And just what is that favor, you’d like to know? They’re teaching Percy about caveat emptor.
You know what that is, of course.
It’s Latin for “let the buyer beware.” And if that doesn’t apply to Percy and pals I don’t know what does. Essentially what it means for them, or for any demigod and his or her quest companions, is that they need to keep their eyes open. I’m not just talking about when it comes to monster retail o
pportunities. I’m talking all the time.
Because when you get right down to it, almost everybody Percy meets, good or bad, has the potential to be hiding something. Half the time, it’s who they really are. The other half, it’s what they really want. And that’s not even counting the Mist, which can enable citizens of the realm of gods and monsters to screen themselves from mortal eyes entirely, or at the very least change their forms.
Not that a character has to use the Mist to hide what they really are, of course. The most important character in the series who looks like one thing but turns out to be another is one who never uses the Mist at all. He doesn’t even change shape. Not really. He simply hides his true colors until the time is right to reveal himself.
You know who I’m talking about, don’t you? It’s Luke, of course.
Luke, who starts out being the person Percy looks up to as a friend, then metamorphoses into an archenemy determined to bring down the gods at all costs. And he does all this without changing so much as a hair on his head.
By now, I’ll bet you’re beginning to see my point.
Almost nobody in Percy’s world is what they originally appear to be, including, as it turns out, Percy himself. And if he’s going to survive in this world he’s suddenly discovered he’s a very important part of, he’s going to have to use more than his wits. He’s going to have to use his eyes. What’s the best way of learning to do that?
You got it. By discovering how often you just can’t trust them.
That’s what monster retail is really all about. It’s about learning to see the difference between truth and illusion. Developing the ability to see what’s really there and what is not. And as Percy’s experience at Aunty Em’s Garden Gnome Emporium goes to show, there’s no such thing as a real bargain when you indulge in monster retail, not to mention no such thing as a free lunch.
But the thing that really makes the theory work for me is the way that Percy himself begins to catch on. He even says as much, sort of, right before he makes the stupendous mistake of stepping through the front doors of the Lotus Hotel and Casino. Why does he do this, apart from the fact that it seems like a good idea at the time?
He does it because even he admits he’s learned to be suspicious. Learned to be prepared for the fact that almost anything he encounters could be either a monster or a god. But the doorman in front of the Lotus is clearly human, clearly normal. Now that Percy knows how important it is to look for stuff like this, he’s able to spot it right off.
Not only that, the doorman is a sympathetic human, and his sympathy strikes just the right note to encourage Percy to walk through the casino doors. This turns out to be about the worst mistake he could have made, and comes perilously close to derailing the entire quest.
This is seriously sneaky stuff. Why? Because the Lotus turns the tables on Percy. His decision to enter the Hotel and Casino in the first place rests on the fact that he’s learning his lesson, learning not to trust his eyes. But who’s been teaching him this? The monsters, that’s who. With a little help from the people Percy actually trusts thrown in on the side.
When you look at it this way, it doesn’t seem so far-fetched to suggest that all those retail monsters are actually doing Percy a favor. You might even be able to claim that, in a roundabout sort of way, all those monsters are really on Percy’s side.
Boy are they surprised.
Still not convinced that monster retail is actually a positive thing? Let’s take a look at The Sea of Monsters, The Titan’s Curse, and The Battle of the Labyrinth for a moment. Those are Percy Jackson and the Olympians books two, three, and four. Not very many retail opportunities here, you say? (With the exception of Monster Donut in The Sea of Monsters, my second favorite monster retail opportunity of all time, in case you’re counting.)
Aha! I reply. That’s just my point. By the time The Sea of Monsters, The Titan’s Curse, and The Battle of the Labyrinth roll around, Percy’s beginning to get the point. He’s learned the lesson all those shopping opportunities were trying to teach: Keep your eyes off the merchandise and on the quest-related prize.
The fact that Percy’s learned to do this makes him much more dangerous, of course. Which is also why the fighting stakes get higher as the series goes along. The monsters have learned their lesson as well. No more trying to sidetrack the hero. Luring Percy off the track just isn’t going to cut it anymore. Just keep coming at him head-on until you take the sucker out.
Fortunately, they haven’t managed this so far. But it seems clear they’re not going to give up. And who’s spearheading the efforts to get rid of our hero? Who is his gone-over-to-the-dark-side counterpart? That’s right. It’s Luke, the threat Percy almost didn’t recognize in time.
This is quite a clever sleight of hand on the author’s part, if you stop to think about it. Because it puts the heart of an enemy—a monster, if you will—behind the face of a friend. This makes all Percy’s encounters with Luke (and Annabeth’s too, come to think of it) dangerous not just physically, but emotionally as well.
When you fight a friend who’s turned into an enemy, you risk destruction not just of who you are in the present, but who you’ve been in the past. Why? Because you have to battle both your adversary, and your own remorse for having been fooled in the first place, for not having known that he was a bad guy in time.
It’s enough to make a hero nostalgic for the days of freaky garden statuary and killer waterbeds. Surely facing a monster that can turn you into stone is easier than staring into the face of someone you used to trust and then raising your sword. Because when you do that, there’s always the chance your own feelings can be turned into a weapon to be used against you.
Let’s face it. Monsters who wear the faces of friends play serious hardball.
In short, Percy Jackson continues to face pretty big odds. My personal guess is they’ll just keep getting bigger as the series goes along. Things are just getting good. Why stop now? Only Rick Riordan knows what will happen next, of course. But whatever it is, I think we can all be certain of at least one thing: No matter where the next adventure in his destiny leads, Perseus Jackson will not be taking along any Ancient Greek gift cards.
Cameron Dokey has more than thirty young people’s titles to her credit, including Wild Orchid, Belle, Before Midnight, Sunlight and Shadow, Beauty Sleep, Golden, and The Storyteller’s Daughter, all for the Once Upon a Time series. She’s also proud of the romantic comedy How Not to Spend Your Senior Year.
Cam’s interest in Greek mythology made it a particular joy for her to write about Percy Jackson and the Olympians. When she’s not writing, Cameron may be found working in her Seattle, Washington, garden. She has four cats named for characters in Shakespeare. None of them have ever been chased by bears.
Stealing Fire From the Gods
The Appeal of Percy Jackson
Paul Collins
Growing up is dangerous. Being yourself is dangerous.
In the classic Australian film, Strictly Ballroom, the chief character, Scott, wants to dance his own steps and wants to do it his way. And all Hades breaks loose!
Scott’s attempts at becoming an individual, at becoming himself, are seen as a crime, an act of rebellion, against the social “group” of which he is a member because Scott is not fitting in; he’s not conforming.
Well, neither is Percy Jackson.
Percy is dyslexic, has Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), and is always getting into trouble. In most school systems, and society at large, that pretty much makes Percy a loser, the kid least likely to succeed, the kind of kid who’ll never amount to anything and isn’t worth the effort anyway. Ever heard that one before?
Rick Riordan, author of the Percy Jackson series, turns these so-called flaws on their heads.
Like many kids in his position—labeled a misfit, looked down upon, shoved to the side lines—Percy feels shut out, left behind, and is beginning to feel frustrated and anxious about it. He can’t work out
why some of the teachers always pick on him, why things always go wrong even when he tries his hardest to do the right thing.
Of course, once you’ve been stuck with a label—like dyslexic, disruptive, troublemaker—it’s pretty hard to change things back, because you’re dealing with people’s perceptions. They don’t see “you” anymore, they just see the label.
In its own way, The Lightning Thief is a classic “Rags to Riches” plot, a type of story we’ve heard over and over again since early childhood: The Ugly Duckling, Cinderella, Aladdin, King Arthur, Star Wars, David Copperfield, Jane Eyre, Harry Potter, Rocky, the biblical Joseph and his brothers, and many, many more. They are all essentially stories about growing up, about coming into the power and responsibility of adulthood, and about the dark forces that try to stop them. They begin, usually, with a child or youthful hero/heroine who is often an orphan or part orphan (like Aladdin, Percy has “lost” a father) and who has been marginalized, forced to live in the shadows like Cinderella: neglected, scorned, undervalued, overlooked, and mistreated.
This story is found in every culture and every time, including that of the North American Indians prior to the arrival of the Europeans and as far back as ninth-century China (and there is no reason to think that was its first occurrence).
So why is this particular plot so important to us? What is it really about?
Well, I’ll tell you. It’s about rebellion.
It’s about people growing up and becoming themselves. Just as Scott tries to do in Strictly Ballroom, just as Harry Potter tries and every person who has ever lived has tried. Just as a fair few of the heroes and heroines of Greek myths have tried.
And this is no accident.
The gods of Olympus—all-powerful, simultaneously good and bad, unpredictable, oddly human in their flaws—are stand-ins not only for the establishment (school, society, church) but also for those other godlike beings: parents.
Rick Riordan has rightly seen this and created a story about the children of the gods, who are in precisely the same power relationship to their very-much-alive-and-kicking gods as children in our world are to their parents. And this, I think, is one of the secrets to the success of the series: It mimics the experience of everyone growing up—and of every person’s troublesome need to become him- or herself.