The Labors of Hercules Beal by Gary D. Schmidt
Hi my name is Kire. I love to read, play volleyball and play my viola.
The Labors of Hercules Beal is an interesting fiction novel that follows a 7th grade boy, Hercules Beal. Unfortunately, both his parents are dead which forces Hercules’s brother to take care of him. They also have to keep the family business afloat.
With his parents dead, his brother ends up putting him in a new school where he is assigned a project about the 12 labors of Hercules. This is a year-long project where Hercules has to apply the 12 labors to things in his own life. He does this through facing all sorts of challenges. One of the challenges he overcomes while doing this project is dealing with a group of feral cats with the help of his friends. This challenge represents the Nemean Lion in Hercules’ school project.
At the beginning of the book, Hercules hates his school project and has no idea how to apply the labors to his own life but at the end of the book, the labors actually help him learn a lot about his life and help him with things like dealing with the grief from losing his parents and juggling school while helping his brother run the family business.
Overall, I really enjoyed reading The Labors of Hercules Beal although it did start a bit slow. I would recommend it to anyone who’s looking for a book that makes you want to keep reading. It would also be an interesting book for anyone who is into Greek mythology. All in all, I found The Labors of Hercules Beal to be a fun and interesting book.
