When a friend recommended that I pick up a copy of George R.R. Martin's "A Game of Thrones," I let myself get thoroughly engrossed before I realized that it was part of an unfinished series.

There's something comforting about knowing that there's another book on the horizon to look forward to. There's also something frustrating about having to wait… and wait… and wait.

Imagine if I had the (im)patience of a 12-year-old boy.

It seems like my son has been waiting FOREVER for the final installment of Christopher Paolini's Inheritance Trilogy, which has taken five years to complete. You have to give Paolini a break — he was 15 when he wrote the first draft of “Eragon” — but his fans have been eagerly waiting for “Brisingr” since 2005. When you think about it, that’s a quarter of a 12-year-old’s life.

Now that the book’s release is a month away, I told my son we could preorder it from the bookstore to make sure he didn’t have to wait a minute longer than necessary to begin reading it.

Easier said than done, it turns out, but after confounding the bookstore cashier with our request, we had a chance to look over the other upcoming releases. One name jumped out at both of us:

Rick Riordan.

Rick Riordan is not a god, but he writes a series about the Olympian gods and their children, in particular, one Percy Jackson, whose story is not finished. Since there are thousands of kids (and their parents) waiting for the next Percy Jackson book, why did Riordian take time off to write "The 39 Clues"?

It could be because he’s brilliant.

One thing I really like about the Percy Jackson series is that it’s not just a good read, but it’s the type of series that sends kids looking for more reading materials so they can bone up on their Greek mythology.

I can only hope that Riodan’s new project inspires the same quest for knowledge about world history. The great thing about it is that it’s not just a book series. It’s going multimedia — no doubt to attract boys who are more reluctant to read than my son is.

From Riordan’s website:

The 39 Clues will feature ten action-packed books. The first, The Maze of Bones, is written by Rick Riordan, who also designed the story arc for the entire series. The 39 Clues experience also includes trading cards and a huge on-line game which will allow you to become a member of the Cahill family and compete for amazing prizes!

What a come-on, to both kids and their parents. Educational and fun? Judging from his other work, Riordan might be able to pull it off.

It looks like we’ll need to add that to our preorder list as well.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 19th, 2008 at 6:00 am and is filed under Family Tree. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.