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It's a big day for middle-reader fantasies on Omni, with Heidi's interview with Immortal Nicholas Flamel author Michael Scott and now some highlights from Percy Jackson mastermind Rick Riordan's visit last week to the Amazon offices. (As it happens, today also marks the day when my nine-year-old son, who recently devoured the three books--so far--of the Nicholas Flamel series, dove into The Lightning Thief, the first Percy Jackson book, inspired in part by our friend Riley, whose devotion to the series you'll see below. The initial dosage appears to have taken: by the time I came downstairs this morning, Peter, the early riser in our household, had already read 140 pages and was authoritatively lecturing his younger brother on the various internal dramas of the Greek gods.)
Authors (and musicians) sometimes stop by the Amazon offices for events we call "Fishbowls" (the source for the name of our short-lived Bill Maher series from a few summers ago--gee, with a tagline like "eliminating the separation between the artist discovery experience and the follow-up purchase opportunity" how could it not have worked?), so-called because that's the feeling an artist presumably gets when gaped at by a conference room full of Amazon employees. But only this time did I finally get my act together and take out my beloved little Flip camera to record the proceedings for you. Expect to see more of these in the future, but here, for our belated YouTube debut (what, is it 2006 already?), are some clips from Riordan's excellent talk, attended by many very knowledgeable Riordan fans, all of whom played hooky from school to be there.
Already inhaled The Last Olympian, the fifth and final Percy Jackson book, and hoping for more? If you've already read the book (and the new prophecy contained within), you won't be surprised to hear there are more Olympian stories coming (although Percy himself might take a back seat to other characters). But what you might not know is that Riordan has another series planned, this one based on the equally kid-popular mythology of ancient Egypt. Watch him explain further:
If you've seen Riordan in person, you know what an excellent speaker and storyteller he is (with skills honed by years on the battlefield of the middle-school classroom). But nevertheless, when you have your favorite author standing in front of you but you also just got his newest book AND YOU'RE ONLY TWO-THIRDS OF THE WAY THROUGH!!!, what do you do? Watch, or read? You won't be surprised to see how Riley, the eight-year-old sitting next to me, responded to that dilemma. (By the way, keep your eye out in the clip for the book his dad next to him, my former Amazon colleague Lang Cook, is holding: it's an early galley copy of his first book, Fat of the Land, a gonzo guide to foraging (based on his blog by the same name) that's coming out this fall.)
See a couple more clips after the jump, including Riordan's answer to an audience question (I'm not sure if the kid who asked has parents on the Kindle team) about whether Percy's on the Kindle yet (he is), and one of my favorite of his stories, about the real person behind an evil math teacher from The Lightning Thief:
--Tom
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