67 pages 2 hours read

Rick Riordan

The Lightning Thief

Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2005

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Chapters 7-9Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 7 Summary: “Dinner Goes up in Smoke”

Annabeth finishes Percy’s tour and takes him back to the cabins. Feeling overwhelmed from the toilet incident, Percy says he wants to go home. Annabeth tells him he is home and that Camp Half-Blood is the only safe place for kids like them: half-god kids. Annabeth is the daughter of Athena (goddess of wisdom and battle), and Percy’s not “determined” status means he doesn’t know who his god parent is. The only way he’ll find out is if his father claims him with a sign, and depending on who Percy’s father is, he may have to stay at Camp Half-Blood all the time (what Annabeth calls being a “year-rounder”). If his dad is a powerful god, it might be “too dangerous to leave” because Percy will attract monsters in the mortal world (95).

Percy asks Annabeth about the summer solstice deadline he overheard Chiron and Grover discussing. She guesses something was stolen, but she doesn’t know what. She thought Percy, as a newcomer, would have information and figured she could work with him so long as he wasn’t the son of Ares or Poseidon, two gods Athena has feuds with.

Later that night, Percy joins the rest of camp for dinner.