Annabeth’s Dagger and Backpack

When and where Annabeth lost her dagger and backpack are inconsistent.

In The Mark of Athena it says on page 561:

But in The House of Hades on page 41 it says: 

She couldn’t have lost the backpack and dagger in Tartarus if she didn’t fall down into Tartarus with them. Imagine you had a paper in your hand, and you’re walking through a park. Then you put it on a bench for a second so you can do something that requires both hands, and when you turn back the paper is missing. You think “Oh a gust of wind probably blew it away.” and you continue walking. Then you run down a hill and accidentally fall down it. You pick yourself up, see your hands are empty, and think “Oh my paper is missing! It must have gotten lost when I fell down the hill!” 

The big key here is "probably", as in "I don't know, I'm just guessing."

Khione and Ogygia

How was Khione able to blast Leo Valdez to Ogygia when it happens completely by the Fates? 

Like Khione knew that she was bringing him there, like it says in The House of Hades on page 332: 

Could the Fates not make her send him away?

The Three Fates’ Mother

In The House of Hades on page 409 it says: 

But in Percy Jackson’s Greek Gods it says that Zeus and Themis (the Titan of divine law) birthed the Three Fates:

So which is it? And even if the myths differ, at least Rick Riordan could be consistent in his books!

Rick isn't exactly consistent even with what deities exist and how they interact.

The Labyrinth’s Reopening

The Labyrinth shouldn’t be reopened OR safe.  

In The House of Hades on page 544 it says:

And then on page 550:

So that would imply that technically for an immortal, she’s dead, so the Labyrinth should collapse like it did with Daedalus, right? So why in The Hidden Oracle on pages 121-122 does it says this:

How is the Labyrinth still around? And even if there was some explanation to it’s creation (like Pasiphaë was still alive for some bizarre reason) then how does it not have a dangerous feel to it? If Daedalus’s was crazy and he was a half-decent man then how would a Labyrinth connected to Pasiphaë’s life force be like?  Although it does say later in The Hidden Oracle on page 167:

Also:

Annabeth shares my concern.

Incapacitated is not the same as dead. Not an error.

Orion’s Slow Healing

In The Blood of Olympus on page 369 it says:

Then on page 370 it says:

All the other giants healed so quickly from wounds that a demigod inflicted without help from a god! How come Orion heals much slower? It’s not like there was a god on the Hunters’ side, though one can argue that they have the divine assistance of Artemis, in which case the Hunters should just deal with the giants instead of the Seven begging the gods to help them defeat the giants.

Maybe the hunters no longer qualify as demigods for stuff like this? Would also help explain why Thalia joined to avoid the forbidden prophecy.

The Orientation Film

In the Camp Half-Blood Confidential: Your Real Guide to the Demigod Training Camp on page 5 it says: 

The thing is, Chiron mentions the orientation film to Percy twice before! Once when he himself was a newbie:

And once when Nico goes to watch it on pages 59-60 in The Titan’s Curse:

So how come Percy forgot? Or what about all the other campers, for that matter? Did they all enter camp in such a dramatic fashion that the orientation film wasn’t “sufficient enough”?

They are constantly training, doing camp activities, and praying for a quest. It's not impossible they just plum forgot.

Greek Fire

In The Hidden Oracle on page 295 it says:

The problem is that I thought that Greek fire didn’t need to have a regular fire to start it. We see that there’s no need for one throughout the series, for example in The Mark of Athena by the Shrimpzilla monster, by Halcyon Green’s house in The Demigod Diaries, by Leo and the blemmyae in The Dark Prophecy, etc. So why is it different here?

A different problem: on page 296 it says:

But isn’t Greek fire green? Why is it red? We see that all the time too, usually when Greek fire is mentioned and used.

Maybe he just assumed it was Greek Fire? Or it was made wrong. The recipe isn't exactly common knowledge.

The Myrmekes

In The Demigod Files on page 39 it says:

So the Myrmekes are bloodred, right? But in The Hidden Oracle on page 227 for the second quote it says:

 And also here on page 263:

So which is it? Are Myrmekes red or black? And both are from the same ant hill at Camp Half-Blood so they can’t be two different species.

The fact species can have multiple different colors among individuals should be, ah, apparent.

Iapetus/Bob’s Hair Color

In The Demigod Files on page 124 it says:

But in all the other Percy Jackson books Iapetus/Bob has white hair! What happened there?

Aging, sun bleaching, manual bleaching, magic, one of the descriptions being just a little off (they never say how gray, and light gray can look white)...

Tristan McLean’s Assistant

In The Lost Hero on page 115 of the e-book it says:

But in The House of Hades on page 556 of the e-book it says:

Why is Tristan McLean’s assistant’s name switched?

People can't have multiple dicks?

Whose Got the Eye?

In The Sea of Monsters on page 32 it says who has the eye:

But the next page (page 33) says this:

One can say that they changed eyes without mentioning it, which in itself is a little queer, but later on page 33 it says this:

Constantly moving parts could mean Anger just grabbed it again.

Or Wasp didn't know Anger had the eye.

Hera’s Hair

I guess this is sort of a continuation of Athena’s hair color, because now we have a change in Hera’s hair color.

In The Titan’s Curse on page 287 we have this:

The next time we see Hera is in The Battle of the Labyrinth on page 101:

And her hair stays consistently brown/black for the rest of the series.

The Lost Hero, for example:

And this, also from The Lost Hero:

Her face was both terrible and beautiful, and a golden crown glowed in her long black hair. 

And the official picture for Hera on Rick Riordan’s website is this:

This again brings us to the question of the change of hair color with the gods. With Hera, she goes from gray hair to brown/black. Why? 

Because black hair looks better.

She's a goddess. She could probably turn into a cat if she wanted to. After all, the forms they have aren't their real forms.

Grover’s Passing Out

Everyone knows the iconic scene with Percy fighting the Minotaur while Grover is passed out on the side saying, “Food.” But it looks like Rick himself forgot?

In The Battle of the Labyrinth on page 310 it says:

The only other time I’d seen Grover pass out was in New Mexico, when he’d felt the presence of Pan.

Percy actually saw Grover pass out three times. Once by the Minotaur, once by New Mexico, and once in the Labyrinth. One can argue that Percy forgot that his best friend was passed out, but in The Demigod Files by his interview, Percy stresses this detail as being one of the things that made fighting the Minotaur so scary.

Maybe Grover’s passing out by Thalia’s tree wasn’t really passing out? Maybe Percy meant passing out in a specific way? Maybe Percy was using deductive reasoning? 

Did he actually see it though? He kinda had a large bull man chasing him. I think he had other priorities. Or maybe that made Grover passing out not stick in memory. He DOES have something that is like ADHD, after all.

Who Rode the Golden Fleece?

If I didn’t decide to pick up Percy Jackson’s Greek Heroes after rereading the whole Percy Jackson and the Olympians series then I totally wouldn’t have seen this.

In The Sea of Monsters on pages 86-87, Annabeth is explaining the myth of the Golden Fleece to Percy:

When I first read the books, I didn’t think twice about this because I wasn’t a Greek mythology expert. Then I read Percy Jackson’s Greek Gods and Percy Jackson’s Greek Heroes, which gave me an epic crash course. Now, while rereading this scene, I vaguely remembered that Europa was seduced by Zeus as a bull, and then carried away to a far-off place that the Greeks named Europe. Still I didn’t think anything was wrong, because Europa could have bee both myths. Then I reread Percy Jackson’s Greek Heroes. On pages 778-779 of the e-book we have the story of Nephele’s children:

Is this a mistake or a conflict in myths? Since there are landmarks named after the people in the myths, it appears to be concrete. I decided to research the myth of the Golden Fleece, and it turns out that no one says that Europa and Cadmus rode the Golden Fleece. So Rick Riordan mistake? I should think so.

Couldn't they be different myths? After all, the ram had to know people could and would fall off.

Percy’s Ability to Talk to Sea Creatures and Horses

So this just occurred to me: some days Percy will talk to animals regularly and they’d talk back in his head. Other times he talks mentally to them and they back to him. This is usually identified by whether the text Percy is saying is italicized or not. Which brings my weird question: Does Percy realize when he speaks mentally or regularly? To me, there’s no consistency to when he speaks normally or when he speaks mentally. It just seems random.

This is in The Mark of Athena on page 224 of the e-book. It’s an example of Percy talking regularly to a horse (a.k.a. Blackjack):

This is when Percy speaks to the flesh-eating horses (page 149 of The Battle of the Labyrinth):

There are plenty of other examples to choose from, but I think these two are sufficient enough. If anyone has any theories as to why Percy does this, let me know!

Convenience? Here he might have used telepathy to not alert other horses and/or scare the horse he was cleaning the stable of with a sudden sound.

I recall another time was when he was underwater. Can he speak under water? Can he breathe underwater? We know he can hold his breath for a long time, but I don't recall him breathing water in.

Hades and the Winter Solstice

Hey, guys!

I’m rereading The Titan’s Curse and I was up to the Olympian Council convening when I realized …  where was Hades? Isn’t the only time he’s allowed on the Olympian Council when it’s the Winter Solstice?

2. His wife just came back. He's probably very, VERY busy.

Just because he's allowed there doesn't mean he HAS to be there.

Tbf Hazel may have stopped aging. Y'kno, the whole being dead thing?

Latin and Greek Mythology

Ok so I’m relatively new here so I’m not sure if this has been covered yet but:

In The Lighting Thief, while at Yancy Academy, Percy takes a Latin course, taught by Chiron (Mr. Brunner). He remarks a few times that he performs alright in this class, and that it’s an enjoyable class because of his collection of Roman armor. But while they’re at the Metropolitan Museum, Mr. Brunner asks Percy to name a Greek myth, and says that he covered it in class.

Which means then, that Percy took a Latin class… and was taught Greek mythology. Not to mention, how would Chiron have gotten his hands on the armor and weaponry to keep in his classroom anyway?

It’s a tiny inconsistency but it’s quite funny to me… what kind of Latin class teaches Greek myths?

@rickriordanmistakes comment: I’ve never taken a Latin course so I don’t know if it’s true, but maybe it’s combined with a Greek mythology course since they’re similar? Because Percy mentions that Mr. Brunner/Chiron would challenge them to write down every Greek and Roman person who lived and their mother and the god they worshipped, and he also read The Cambridge Guide to Greek Mythology to study for the final. Also, “There was no way I was going to remember the difference between Chiron and Charon, or Polydictes and Polydeuces. And conjugating those Latin verbs? Forget it.” (Page 18 of The Lightning Thief) The quote makes it sound like they were learning both side by side. Anyone have any thoughts?

It's also possible he teaches Greek outside of the curriculum. A lot of ESE classes, including classes not strictly ESE but allowed to be like one, are very flexible, if they even have a syllabus or curriculum to follow. Or he does it for fun and gets away with it by mixing Greek and Roman.

I've actually been in both situations. My ESE classes were all over the place. We even played games a decent amount of times. Then there was my US History teacher, who mixed in trivia that only technically qualified as US History, like how Jesus would have been unable to bleed out because of where and how the nails were placed in his wrists, so when movies like the Exorcist have the possessed bleed from their wrist, it's either a mistake, or because there's no physical nail to stop the bleeding/the demon does it for dramatic effect.

I liked him. He was cool. He made learning fun.

Annabeth's Hair Color

In The Lightning Thief, on page 103 her hair color is honey blonde:

and in The Sword of Summer on page 6 and it says this about Frederick Chase:

And on page 7….

But honey blonde is usually darker than sandy hair, so how can she have honey blonde hair and still be lighter than her dad’s sandy hair?

@rickriordanmistakes comment: You’re right! And to add to this, on page 245 of The Titan’s Curse it talks about Frederick Chase’s appearance:

Is it possible that her hair grew lighter as she got older? Do we know of any description of her hair that comes later in the books? The Lost Hero and The Mark of Athena just describe her as having blond hair.

Thanks for sharing!

Oh! I know this one!

Hair bleaches as it's exposed to the sun. You know, like at a camp?

This is actually the reason Lisa, Bart, and Maggie all have "blond" hair. (It's implied Marge's hair are unnatural or a mutation of her sister's hair; Bart is said to have had reddish hair, like Patty Bouvier)

The Gray Sisters

It’s been a while!

This is another myth error, but in The Sea of Monsters on page 33 the Gray Sisters mentioned helping the original Jason:

But the Gray Sisters helped Perseus, not Jason. From the research that I’ve done, I didn’t find any conflicting myths, nor did I find any mention of the Gray Sisters in Jason’s story.

Thoughts?

Isn't Perseus an Argonaut? I could see them helping both of them at once.