Percy Jackson is back for more adventures, thrills, monsters, and snark. 
 What's different this time is puberty. 
 In The Titan's Curse Percy is 14 and just starting to get nervous when speaking to girls. However, I don't buy that because most of his friends are girls and he can talk to them all the time. The nervousness comes from realizing he now has romantic feelings toward women, Annabeth in particular. Personally, I think it's adorable to see Percy get his first crushes and start the whole "awkward around girls" phase of this adolescence. I highly doubt the series will become entirely invested just in Percy's love life so I'm not concerned that the storylines will take a turn for the worst. It will just have some extra awkward hilarious moments which I'm sure will be littered with laugh out loud moments. 
 I'm continually surprised that I enjoy this series so much. It's just so darn fun and clever! Combine that with incredibly likeable characters (Percy) and a vast world of mythology to pull from and you have a receipt for a great series. I always enjoy learning about all the different monsters that exist and all the different Gods and their personalities. However, considering this is a middle grade novel, a lot of the mythologies are toned down to PG rated. 
 We meet some new faces in this third installment of the series. We get to meet Apollo, some new half-bloods named Bianca and Nico, and Artemis along with of her band of immortal maiden hunters. These are all great new additions to the cast. I don't want to spoil the story so I will just put all my incoherent fan freak outs in a (view spoiler)[ Annabeth is taken prisoner for basically the whole story so she's not really in it. It was strange to see Percy on his own without Annabeth. They've always been a team so this story had a bit of a different vibe to it. Bianca and Nico are apparently Hades' kids!!!!! So many demi-gods! Thalia joins Artemis as one of her maiden huntresses to remove herself from the prophecy! Maybe Grover found Pan?! Annabeth's adorably nerdy dad! So many new characters and shakeups! (hide spoiler)]. I adore Percy as our narrator. He's just so kind hearted and funny and likeable! This is a major selling point for me if you couldn't tell... 
 This is definitely the half way point in the series. I feel like The Titan's Curse is the beginning of the end game for Percy Jackson. We can finally see all the major players and the threads pulling them together. I'm super excited to find out what's going to happen next. On to The Battle of the Labyrinth!