The Kane Chronicles is a book series written by Rick Riordan, about two siblings, Carter and Sadie Kane, who find out that they're descendants of Ancient Egyptian magicians and also two lines of pharaohs. The siblings were raised apart most of their life after their mother died, Carter traveling the world with their father, famous Egyptologist Julius Kane, and Sadie living with their grandparents in England. They're brought together on Christmas Eve when their dad tries to "set things right." However, things go horribly wrong and the two are sent on a mission to save their father and stop Set, the Egyptian god of Chaos, from ruling the world. The series consists of The Red Pyramid, The Throne of Fire, and The Serpent's Shadow, released on May 1st, 2012.A graphic novel of The Red Pyramid has been announced for May, 2012. See here.
This series provides examples of:
Action Girl: Sadie, Zia, Neith, and Bast. To an extent, Tawaret.
All Myths Are True: In this case, Egyptian and a hint of Percy Jackson's Greek.
Back from the Dead: Carter and Sadie think their dad was trying to bring their mother back. That wasn't completely true.
Bast, as a gift from the gods, at the end.
Walt appears to do this, but he actually just hosted Anubis at the last minute.
Body and Host: When a magician is being possessed by a god they are known as "hosts" or "godlings". Can have shades of body snatching, as the god is sometimes able to forcibly take control of their host's body.
But Not Too Black: While both Carter and Sadie are biracial, Sadie is described as having lighter skin and hair. Most people don't realize they are family when they first meet them.
But Not Too Foreign: Sadie was born and raised in America until age 6, where she was moved to England to live with her grandparents.
Brother-Sister Team: Carter and Sadie. Having been separated for around six years prior to the beginning of the story, it takes them a little while to get into the hang of things, but they do.
Cannot Spit It Out: Walt never manages to explain just what he and Anubis have been discussing but that's mostly Sadie's fault.
Anubis: Couldn't get a word in edgewise?"
Card-Carrying Villain: In The Serpent's Shadow, Apophis leaves the Egyptian hieroglyph for chaos wherever he destroys a Nome.
The Cavalry: In the third book, the elderly and mostly senile gods from the House of Rest, along with Tawaret and the newly restored Bes charge a horde of demons to rescue the main heroes.
The Chessmaster: Apophis. How much? He doesn't even appear until the end of the book and he very nearly tricks Set-a god of Chaos-into blowing up the world for him.
Crossover Cosmology: Although the book only focuses on the Egyptian gods, Thoth mentions that he gets mistaken for the Greek god Hermes and having meet him and Amos mentions that Manhattan has its own gods, a reference to the Greek gods from Percy Jackson and the Olympians.
Monsters also bite it the same way. Turn into sand upon their death but now we know why it takes a bit to come back.
The Kane Chronicles also have something similar to PJO's Mist, causing monsters and supernatural items to be invisible or to appear as ordinary animals or objects.
Moses also makes an appearance in the history hallway.
At the beginning of The Throne Of Fire, Carter mentions that he's seen winged horses across the river in Manhattan.
Divine Assistance: Horis, Isis, Bast, Bes, and on occasion, other gods.
Divine Parentage: Carter and Sadie, obviously. The Blood of the Pharoahs.
Kind of. The gods prefer to take host from certain bloodlines with powerful magic that usually contain at least one pharaoh at some point in time or another. But it's unclear if the gods preferred them because they were pharaohs or if they ended up becoming pharaohs specifically because they could host the gods.
Physically, Apophis is a mile-long red snake whose presence melts people's senses, whatever that means. He can also possess people and at one point says he is everywhere.
Eye Scream / Facial Horror: What happened to Menshikov when he tried and failed to awaken Ra.
Expy: The series is very similar to Percy Jackson and the Olympians, another series by the same author. One who has read both can easily tell that the characters are alike (apart from the same universe and the same writing style).
You have a smart, but shy Carter as Annabeth. A Book Dumb (but not stupid) and sarcastic Sadie as Percy (except she is more outgoing). Anubis also is the god of the afterlife as Nico is the son of the god of death and both lived...for a very long time. The Zia Rashid/Zoe Nightshade comparison is so blindingly obvious many fans like to believe the latter was reborn as the former.
French Jerk: Desjardins. Although not so much when he execrates Apophis, thus sacrficing his life to to so.
Fighting a Shadow: Shabtis can be used to create "stand ins" for real magicians. The Zia after the museum incident is also one. The real one is hidden. In "Throne of Fire" she's saved from The Place of Red Sands.
You can also use shadows for more effective execration.
Historical Villain Upgrade: The real Setne was a highly respected religious/political figure in Ancient Egypt, with several myths written about him in which he is the hero.
Idiot Hero: Sadie isn't nearly as dumb as other examples, but she's almost as reckless.
I Know Your True Name: This is how the heroes manage to enslave Set. Also how Sadie manages to cure Carter of poisoning.
Marked To Die: Julius knew he would be possessed by Osiris, and eventually end up "dead" as the host for the Lord of the Dead. Walt's family is also cursed to die young and using magic speeds up the process.
Narrative Profanity Filter: "The following is a transcript of a digital recording... Background noises such as scuffling, hitting, and cursing by the two speakers have not been transcribed."
In Throne of Fire, characters "spewing lots of very creative curses" almost becomes a running gag.
Nice Job Breaking It Carter: In the end, Apophis being destroyed also causes the gods to retreat, because of some sort of Yin-Yang system.
]], and two villainous examples in Menshikov and Face of Horror.
Noodle Incident: Carter and Sadie's actions while recording are often briefly described as such.
Also, the "Spatula Incident," a past fight between Carter and Sadie's father and their maternal grandparents.
And the time that their Julius punched his father-in-law in the face.
No Such Thing As Wizard Jesus: Averted in another important religious figure- it is made very clear that Moses was actually a magician. On top of that, a comment from Bes in The Throne of Fire suggests that one of his miracles, the parting of the Red Sea, was something any magician from Ancient Egypt could've done.
Although gods are manifestly real, All Myths Are True, and Moses was apparently a badass enough wizard that he's the only outsider ever to best the House of Life, so it certainly be said to work anyway.
Additionally, it is implied that "other magic" is just how the Egyptians describe the power of foreign gods.
Official Couple: Julius and Ruby, Carter and Zia, Sadie and Walt/Anubis, and Bes and Tawaret.
Oh My Gods!: Averted as Sadie frequently says "Oh my God," and "God," throughout the book, but played straight with Bast and others more familiar with Ancient Egypt.
Power Trio: Carter and Sadie along with Bast, Zia, Amos...
Red Herring: Set tricks Carter and Sadie into thinking that Desjardins is his host. It's really Amos.
Red Oni, Blue Oni/Sibling Yin-Yang: It can actually go either way. Normally, Sadie, being more brash in contrast to reserved and bookish Carter, clearly seems to be the red. However, Carter shows more of the impulsiveness seen in the "red" when in combat partially due to being the host of the warrior god Horus.
Sadly Mythtaken: In all fairness, most of the liberties taken with the myths were probably to make the whole thing less...incestuous, but there is one mistake: Ammit the Devourer should be female.
This is actually lampshaded in The Serpent's Shadow.
Sealed Evil in a Can: When Julius attempted to summon Osiris, he released him along with his four siblings, one of which was Set.
Sequel Hook: "Should further recordings fall into my hands, I will relay the information."
Word Of God states that they are in the same universe, and that the events of The Red Pyramid happen almost directly after the events of The Last Olympian.
Though Rick Riordan needs to pay more attention to his timelines and explosions. The Williamsburg Bridge is destroyed in The Last Olympian, but Our Heroes drive over it in The Red Pyramid. Possibly The Red Pyramid and Throne of Fire take place the winter and spring before the battle of Manhattan and The Serpent's Shadow the fall after.
No, because the Gaia's Vengeance is with a goddess, not a god. The Greek/Roman gods and the Egyptian gods seem to be totally different people.
The Heroes of Olympus shows that gods can have different aspects in other cultures, and that Mist keeps them apart as far as mortals are concerned. The Egyptian gods are probably extremely powerful monsters from the perspectives of the Greeks, but Nut, Geb, and their forced separation are almost exactly like the separation of Gaia and Ouranos. Apothis is rising, managed to manipulate even Set, and is trying to eat the world: why should he only be affecting one set of gods?
The Nut/Geb and Gaia/Ouranos separation isn't all that the same. Gaia gave her son (Kronos) a weapon so he could kill Ouranos. I don't see that happening with Nut and Geb. Gaia's Vengeance is because she hates the fact that the gods killed her children the titans. Other than that I agree, Apothis is probably the whole reason behind everything.
Drew and Lacy, daughters of Aphrodite, go to the same school as Sadie and the other magicians of Brooklyn House. Sadie comments that Lacy mentioned their 'summer camp' that they attended. She also mentions investigating reports of magic activity on Long Island.
Shout Out: To Percy Jackson, of course. "Manhattan has other problems. Other gods. It's best we stay separate."
There's also the incident where they meet Thoth, who complains about how he used to get confused with Hermes.
Carter also sees a winged horse that he thought was an illusion because of the magic security system. This Troper doesn't think so.
During a fight with some water demons in the Nile, Carter wishes to himself that he had the powers of a sea god.
Also to Doctor Who as one of Sadie's shabti was a thermos with googly eyes that yelled Exterminate! She was raised in England. Plus she mentions Jelly Babys later on.
And the other other work that involves cows with lasers is Gunnerkrigg Court.
Not sure if this is a proper shout-out, but Anubis wears Arcade Fire and The Dead Weather t-shirts.
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