Book Review: The Tyrant's Tomb (The Trials of Apollo, #4) by Rick Riordan

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BOOK review

Started on: 31 January 2021
Finished on: 19 February 2021

 

The Tyrant's Tomb (The Trials of Apollo, #4) by Rick Riordan

 

Title: The Tyrant's Tomb (The Trials of Apollo, #4)

Author: Rick Riordan
Publisher: Disney Hyperion

Pages: 440 pages / 439 pages (e-book)
Year of Publication: 2019
Price: Rp 185,000 (https://www.periplus.com/)

Rating: 5/5

*for those who haven't read the first book, this review may contain spoiler.

Review for The Hidden Oracle (The Trials of Apollo, #1) by Rick Riordan here.

Review for The Dark Prophecy (The Trials of Apollo, #2) by Rick Riordan here.

Review for The Burning Maze (The Trials of Apollo, #3) by Rick Riordan here.
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"This was how it ended, I thought bitterly. Not fighting threats from the outside, but fighting against the ugliest side of our own history."

On his path to restoring five ancient oracles and reclaiming his godly powers, Apollo has faced both triumphs and tragedies. Now his journey required him to visit Camp Jupiter in the San Fransisco Bay Area where the Roman demigods are preparing for a desperate last stand against the evil Triumvirate of Roman emperors. Old friends from Camp Jupiter desperately need Apollo's help to survive the attack. Unfortunately, the answer to their salvation lies in the forgotten tomb of a Roman ruler, who's able to control an army of undead.

"Even the Fates cannot foresee all the wonders the universe has in store for us."

"I understood heartache a little better now. Each person's grief has its own life span; it needs to follow its own path."

Finally, I have finished the fourth book in this series and I only have one book left to read! If the third book gave me a huge shock, this book gave me a mini heart attack because the story is getting more and more intense now. The war between the emperors and Camp Jupiter is truly a life-and-death situation. In The Tyrant's Tomb, Apollo is accompanied by several demigods from Camp Jupiter; some of them are characters that we've met in The Heroes of Olympus series such as: Hazel Levesque, Frank Zhang, and Reyna Ramírez-Arellano. Like all the other demigod characters, they each have special ability that will help Apollo on his quest. Hazel, being the daughter of Pluto (the Roman counterpart of Hades), is especially strong underground. Frank Zhang is a shapeshifter and he's able to change into any animal he wishes. While Reyna is extremely good with her weapons and she's also able to strengthen other people's power—which enabled Apollo to summon his godly power. All of these powerful demigod companions are definitely necessary since Apollo and Meg will be facing three enemies in this book: Tarquin (who controls an army of zombies) and two of the Triumvirate emperors: Commodus and Caligula.

So many things happened in this book right from the beginning; as Apollo and Meg are escorted to Camp Jupiter, they were attacked by Eurynomos—a spirit of rotting corpses. While they were escaping, Apollo was scratched in the belly and that caused him to slowly turn into a zombie. In the back of my mind, I know that Apollo will be able to survive it somehow, but somehow I still felt nervous about it from start to finish 😆. Throughout their journey, we also got to know more about Apollo's character and what he did in the past as a god. My jaw dropped when I read the story of Apollo's history with the Cumaean Sibyl, Apollo's bad relationship with the ravens which leads to him killing his pregnant girlfriend, and how he bullied a minor god in the past. Those stories made me realize that Apollo was not a pleasant being back in his godly days; but that makes his character arc a lot more interesting. Now that he's human, Apollo starts developing conscience and slowly become better through the experiences that he had with his companions. He might not be able to undo all the bad things that he's done, but Apollo is definitely trying to become a better person—which is commendable.

"That's kind of the point. You do something evil, you feel bad about it, you do better. That's a sign you might be developing a conscience."

"Still... I was struck by the way she said I used to be a God. She didn't seem to mean it as an insult. She said it almost like a concession—like she knew what a horrible deity I had been, but held out hope that I might be capable of being someone better, more helpful, maybe even worthy of forgiveness."

One of the funniest scenes in this book is the one that involved Apollo and Reyna. Apollo is constantly cautious around Reyna because something that Venus (the Roman counterpart of Aphrodite, the goddess of love) said to him. And when the two of them went on a quest together, Apollo suddenly blurted out some kind of ridiculous confession to Reyna that made her laugh out loud (I giggled and cringed so hard at this scene 🤣🤣; I'm embarrassed for you, Apollo). Not going to spoil the result of that confession, but it was a huge comic relief in the midst of all the action-packed scenes.

The last one that I'll mention in this review is the grand battle in Camp Jupiter. The first one is the battle between Commodus-Caligula and Apollo-Frank. It was a very epic two-on-two battle that Frank Zhang suggested so they could have a fair fight. Apollo went against Commodus who lost his eyesight after witnessing Apollo's divine form in The Dark Prophecy. Since Commodus relied on his hearing during the fight, Apollo took advantage of that. On the other hand, Frank fights against Caligula with a strategy in mind. However, his strategy is one that gave me a mini heart attack. Of course I'm not going to write how the story unfolds in this review, but just remember that Frank's life force is tied to a piece of wood; and his strategy involved that piece of wood. It was crazy but also very heroic at the same time 👏👏.

"Even if we somehow managed to defeat the Triumvirate, there was still that greatest Oracle, Delphi, under the control of my old nemesis Python. How I could defeat him in my present form as a sixteen-year-old weakling, I had no idea."

This book was intense! It was action-packed, one obstacle right after another, a lot of life-and-death situation; and I can't wait to see how the final book is going to unfold! The prophecy doesn't really give us much clue about what's going to happen in the next book, or who their companion will be on the next quest. Am really excited to tag along with Apollo and Meg as they embark on their last quest and come face to face with Nero and Apollo's old nemesis, Python. I'm hoping to see more of Apollo's godly power in action in the fifth and final book! 💪

by.stefaniesugia♥ .