I Sally Jackson.

I ❤️ Sally Jackson.

Also I haven’t posted anything in a while but that’s because I’m working on a giant post about a Camp Jupiter Map. That’s all, we love Mrs. Jackson.

I’m sobbing

We’ve finally finished the lightning thief in my English class, now we’re watching the first movie to compare with it; wherein I also get to see the Peter Johnson movie for the first time, we were given like papers to compare with the book and movie while we watched the movie; I was seated over in the back in the class, and I was working very hard to write down my thoughts… which turned into a very biased hypercritical (I think?) note taking session on things I didn’t like about the movies. I apologize for not putting a transcript down for the pictures below, but it was a long period of just yelling into my paper and silently apologizing to my braincells that had to be subjected to the movie, I mention in the photos what I consider bad writing (and several times I think I scribble out show don’t tell) and to note that I’m not a like writing genius that knows movies, but they kind of just… word vomit things at the viewer in like a 5 minute speed round that is like fact after fact and I was sitting there still thinking about the Mrs. Dodds scene, and they make the gods very involved? If that’s the right sentiment, if you get what I mean,

Old books And Ye olde Camp Jupiter

NOTE!! The actual stuff about PJO is about 5 paragraphs in; so if you want to slip my bad rambling about two very old epics, I have it headed)

I’ve been reading the Iliad (just finished it, still try to spell it with two L’s 😎) and I’m working on the first books of the Odyssey (with Telemachus doing his thing) and I’ll say; first it was an actual joy, a riot, a rollercoaster, to read the Iliad. There has been very few books where I’ve laughed as much in character dialogue interactions (that sounds so funky but I genuinely did giggle about it) and it was just so silly goofy and fun, and I have it annotated so I can start talking about certain things

And I’ve just started the Odyssey; which it certainly does feel like a sequel (that sounds mean, but it feels the same way that reading daughter of the moon goddess and then heart of the sun warrior; amazing books by the way, go pick them up)

And it’s really fun to consume some version of the original stories and Epics and comparing it to media created with it (I say that like I’ll talk about more than just PJO and the literary choices Rick made on how to interpret and use the gods and stuff. I still am getting around to reading TSOA but it scares me man)

But, I really don’t know what I’m trying to get at

Just that the books are fun and it is generally super fun and interesting to read and even though the first few books of the Odyssey are feeling a bit like a Jason or Piper chapter; I’m pushing through to read Odysseus and his journey; and so I can eventually get to the Aeneid and annoy my friends even more with fun things about Rome and giggle in my classes;

Where the Pjo starts)

Along with that! I’d want to talk more about pre-modern CHB and CJ; seeing as my history class is going through the slog that is colonial history currently and I need someway to stimulate my brain other than writing facts about Mainz Gladius while people are talking about the Salem Witch Trials (my class is feral and gross and they have a big lack of nuance and maturity to think and process the events without being absolute idiots- that sounds mean but they’re annoying and I need to vent)

But I’d like to say there are things we know basically about sides that Greeks and Romans sided on; and because I apparently allergic to discussing Greek demigods at the moment, I’m listing Rome :3

We know that in PJO Roman demigods and the Roman side tends to want to side with rising empires almost inherently; or just rising… things. *cough, cough, the Confederacy, cough, cough*. But aside from that; we can base the ideas that,

1) we can probably confirm that there was a drop in Greco-Roman demigod participation in wars out of the Americas after it (the pantheon and the majority of the demigod groups) moved; though we can probably confirm until after North America became a Economic powerhouse that if following Riordanverse canon; that the Gods moved to New York (if we want to push it, they probably were in Massachusetts in the late 1600s the earliest in America; though I’d say they hadn’t moved until America started like doing good in like what post WII? I think-?)

*A note that is for my Re-imagining, I am seriously considering not moving Pantheons from their native lands; since that leaves a kind of bad taste in my mouth and it makes the Gods and Olympus almost… too accessible for demigods; in the most likely case I’ll pull the Greek Pantheon back onto Olympus in Greece (and I will probably make a point that American demigods can and usually when they need to get to Olympus on their own, can access Olympus through the Olympic mountain range in Washington; I am in Washington, and therefore biased, along with that being the OLYMPIC mountain ranges, I mean, it’s RIGHT THERE guys; how could I not capitalize.) and I might possible move CJ over to being in Italy (though I like the Idea of having CJ just being right there in the Bay Area; before reading tLO and just hearing about them, I thought they were located in Italy, and this all depends on what I do once I start storyboarding Re-imagined) anyway, back on topic,

2) that I’d assume for the most part, as we see that New Rome likes setting Camps up 1) in the west, and 2) near rivers (and we can probably infer it would be somewhat closer to the Equator, or a warmer area). That I think the most likely place that in the Colonial Americas, Romans settled could be,

(This is all using names from Colonial times of Colonies)

A) in British Honduras (Belize); along the Belize river. As we know that Romans supported the British during the revolutionary war, it follows my criteria of being in a warmer climate, and near a river; though it isn’t exactly west, though in proportion to where the early Greek settlers would be, it certainly works, but it puts them far from the revolutionary and just USA so probably not; it’s the middle choice.

B) in New Spain (specifically the portion of California); along the Sacramento River. As Spain was a rising empire at some moment, it is along a river, warm climate, and certainly west. The fact that the Romans would have to be in American territory to still fight in the civil war; so this would be one of my more outlandish concepts.

C) in North Carolina (or just Carolina depending on the time) along the Cape Fear river. This puts them along a river, warm climate, not west but it would be in the direct opposite (as I’d put Greek demigods hiding out amongst the northern colonies or the middle colonies even) and it puts them both in a heavily loyalist (or a colony that supported being part of the British empire) colony; where it would be fitting for them to fight on the side of the Brits, AND a colony that would be in the Confederacy; meaning that they would be in prime position for both wars; I am quite proud of this, and if I needed to put a direct town as example for an area for Romans; I’d say Fayetteville, I’d put the legions settlement across from Fayetteville- in that strip of land between the main Cape Fear river and the river breaking off called south river I think. I am very proud of this one

But yeah! This post originally was going to be about the Iliad and the Odyssey; but I got side-tracked so there are some of my Colonial New Rome ideas, uh, I hope people see the sort of effort I put in for figuring out geological locations for ideas of Camp Jupiter; I might make a post of just a timeline for where Camp has been located through the years- it’s a fun little thought experiment, id also say pre- really big colonialism of the Americas, that the Romans temporarily were first with Spain (I didn’t chose Portugal despite the fact that during that time they had the whole seafaring empire thing, but the Greeks would totally be supporting them) then the Romans go with the British Empire, briefly go down to the confederacy, then stick with America.

R O M E

I just was scrolling through tumblr and saw some Octavian fanart talking about traditional augury robes and my blood pressure spiked and my heart rate accelerated, my pupils dialated and I experienced true happiness-

I’m going to take this as an excuse to go research and draw my dude in his toga

Talking about Piper McLean?!?!

We all know that Piper is repeatedly characterized that she is a vegetarian because of a meat factory thing- idk I haven’t read the books in a few months and I don’t want to go look at specifics,

But, I’m saying this as someone that currently at least; doesn’t like piper’s character too much, I find her boring, minorly annoying. Her personality gets a little same-ey and reading her chapters is boring- incredibly boring.

Okay finally the point; what if Piper’s clear empathy and compassion for animals extend to monsters? Am I saying make Piper a pacifist? No, at least not really. But making her much more averse and against killing monsters, that sounds interesting. The only other character that we get that has some sort of overall attachment to monsters is Octavian. And I think Piper getting this facet of character to her sounds interesting

But I don’t really talk about CHB kids; so this is new, and I will do more with them.

I’m working on the legion system for Camp Jupiter and rankings and size and all that fun stuff- it’s a lot and it’s super fun and silly-

Bryce Lawerence

Okay! Okay, I’m actually writing this. I spent my time walking to school about how much HoO doesn’t really use this character that I think would be great, but let’s start,

(P.S VARUS WILL GET HIS OWN POST)

Bryce Lawerence

If anyone needs the reminder; Bryce Lawerence is a character from BoO that tracks Nico, Reyna, and Coach Hedge down. He’s the one that like Nico turns into a ghost and drags to the underworld.

Bryce is canonically a legacy of Orcus with very potent powers- or like, he is very explicitly shown to be able to use many (not something that we see with many other Romans in HoO that aren’t the POVs)

We are told that he comes from a very high up family from New Rome (the only reason Reyna says he wasn’t executed was because his parents like paid off the senate or jury or whatever-)

And Bryce is shown to be sadistic, we are told that he tortured cats, caused chaos in the forum and supposedly killed his Centurion- despite the… dubious representation on possible mental disorders/ illnesses that could be placed on him. Rick wanted to imply that he was ‘psycho killer’ despite the stereotypes used to portray him as such.

Anyway Bryce is one of my favorite characters to emerge from HoO, which is a shame because literally like 3 other people care about him and everyone else only talks about him when in relation to Nico. But I personally think that -like many of the other members of Camp Jupiter/Romans- there was a big ball just dropped on how potentially interesting he may be! And I have concepts/headcanons/ whatever that I want to share on him :]

But Bryce Lawerence, i have to concepts for him. Personally I like the concept that (in my Re-imagining) he is the legionnaire that caused Gwen’s almost death. Though everyone decides to assume it was Octavian because apparently the POVs just want to hate him- I think it would be more interesting if it’s Bryce. Maybe before this give one of the POVs some interaction with him, or a passing thought/comment that ‘you don’t wanna hang around him Percy’ or whatever. Because that could lead to good setup to make Bryce a re-occurring problem/threat or at least give the readers a ‘OH THAT GUY!’ moment when he shows up in BoO. If we align it with how Id want a Camp Jupiter POV; like actually in CJ, love Hazel, Frank, Reyna, and not really Jason but kinda Jason but an actual character in Camp Jupiter that could give a show into what’s going on there, whether that be camera behavior OR to have actual Character; expand and help the overall characterization of CJ and it’s legionnaires, while possibly making Bryce more of a threat (Idk if that whole thing made sense)

Quick sort of related to the whole ‘when does Bryce murder his centurion’ If I remember it correctly; the book (BoO) seems to imply that it was Reyna having to deal with the trial all by herself because Jason was gone- I don’t know if I’m Misremembering but that places the fact that Bryce has (in the canon timeline) around like what, eight months to murder his centurion, get tried, and exiled before SoN? Unless we assume that he was still there while Percy was at CJ and he simply wasn’t mentioned- if so that would feel a little like a missed opportunity, and puts a remarkably short time to when he’d have to get exiled between MoA and HoH, when Reyna implies that he’s been gone for a looong time.

Which of course leads to the second concept and the probably more Canon idea. Bryce killed his centurion sometime during the second Titanomachy (Second Titan war? I don’t know what terminology we’re using at this point in time) but; this is a good way to both make it believable that the Jury, senate, whatever, would let him off with an Exile for the murder of a officer or whatever. BUT it also maps onto the implication Reyna has that its been a long time since she’s seen Bryce. Along with that what I was talking about at the beginning of this bullet point; I think they say that his Centurion was murdered during the war games but I’m not 100% on that info- but he could’ve easily had planned this to murder them during the Siege on Mt.Tam, or whatever battles there was on the Roman side. It means they’d have to rely on much more circumstantial evidence (that we’re told was already the heap of their information for the canon trial) and it could easily be taken in tandem with his family influencing his sentencing to be a exiling(?) and I think the idea makes more sense- and if we place the trial happening during TLH, it still has Reyna as the only Praetor to like do the thing.

I like giving Bryce traits like being overprotective, awkward, he attaches to people quickly, a hot-head, etc, etc. I just like giving him character traits that help give him depth- or something of the sort, in what I’m imagining it would add more of a sense of worry and dread when Bruce is friendly and seems genuinely okay, a little weird and awkward, but okay. And then a colder calculating, sadistic side. He always is sadistic I’m not saying this is like a ‘oh he snaps’ type of moment, but more of a- there are occasions when the facade slips, or times when he just does. I add poor impulse control onto lists of things that I characterize him with- either that’s out of the blue buying a new sword, or full force slamming someone into the wall.

I also consider the Lawerence family to be currently on their third generation of Demigods- or legacies? God-related. And Bryce has a younger sister. It’s not very relevant because I haven’t expanded on the concept a lot but he has a little sister that’s like 6 and they have a surprisingly good relationship.

Okay I currently feel like a sickly Victorian child on my last legs- so I’m going to wrap this post up quick, let’s hope I work of the Varus one.