Middleworld

I teach at a dual immersion English-Spanish school, and many of my students absolutely love Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson and the Olympians series. When I saw that Jon & Pamela Voelkel had written a book called Middleworld similar to Percy Jackson set in the Mayan jungle, I was very excited. The front cover image made me think of the journeys and adventures the book would contain, wondering what was in store for me.

Throughout the book, the narration is intermixed with beautiful, detailed sketches. Max takes an unexpected journey to San Xavier (a fictional country based on present day Belize) in search of his parents who went there on an archeological dig and then disappeared. He is portrayed as a stereotypical teen at the start of the book - very self centered and obsessed with video games. However, once in San Xavier he finds himself thrown into the challenges that make him feel like he is living a real life video game. After meeting Lola by chance one evening, his life changes as they get swept up into a quest of good versus evil. Max realizes that the Mayan culture is not ancient history afterall.

There is a brief author's note in the beginning explaining that all of the characters are made up except for one, Friar Diego de Landa. As I was reading I realized that I would have loved to brush up on my Mayan history so that I could separate out more of the fact versus fiction in the book. I can see my students loving this adventurous book. They are fascinated with pre-columbian cultures, so the mixture of content and the Percy Jackson style book is sure to catch their attention. Reading the book might also make them want to read more about history, especially the Mayans and Belize. They can start out by looking at the fairly extensive glossary at the back of the book.

While this book had a satisfying conclusion, there were plenty of loose ends to leave readers wishing that that the second book was already out!

Many of the teachers in my YA lit course have been thrilled with the Percy Jackson series, thinking their students will also love them. I will be telling them about this series at our last class meeting, as I am sure that they would love to hear of similar books.

*Copy courtesy of the publisher