By the gods, I know this voice
"If he were an invader, I would pluck out his eyes. But he's my brother."
Plato's description of Atlantis dismissed one theory that the mysterious continent was once found in the Mediterranean Sea. The hubris of Atlanteans led to their demise, he said. But what about the sinking of the continent?
Peter Lerangis's "The Seven Wonders" series didn't receive much fanfare as Rick Riordan's "Percy Jackson and the Olympians" and "The Heroes of Olympus", the sequel. The premise was hard to pass up, though. The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World would reveal details of what happened to Atlantis, but only the Great Pyramid of Giza remained intact. The first four books of "The Seven Wonders" described how four descendants of the mighty Atlanteans discovered the rest. The Colossus of Rhodes was buried in one of the isles in the Aegean Sea. A time portal was found in the Euphrates. The spirit of Artemisia roamed the ruins of the mausoleum at Halicarnassus. And the statue of Zeus was located in an obscure restaurant far from Athens.
Lerangis published a novella between novels, which provided readers more information about the fascinating history of Atlantis. "The Promise", which came out on February 9, confirmed what Plato suspected all along.
Is the world turning upside down?
King Sh'anar ruled Atlantis, but it was Queen Qalani, his wife, who knew what made the kingdom prosperous and peaceful through the centuries. A ridge could be found in the middle of the continent, where vapor swirled around it. The queen believed it had powers, its source coming from the depths of the island. It may be the voice of a powerful deity. (It could be Poseidon, the god of the sea and earthquakes.) She was fearful of remote kingdoms (like Greece and Phoenicia) invading Atlantis someday, so she decided to isolate the powers and place them into seven spheres called the Loculi. Even the wisest mind could commit a mistake.
The couple had two sons, namely Kalai and Massarym. Readers would be reminded of Edward and Albert, the sons of King George V of England. The subject of succession drove a wedge between the two, and only Kalai sensed what would happen if the wrong person took possession of the Loculi. Those who recalled Plato's writings would wonder if Lerangis had knowledge of other documents pertaining to the lost continent. Maybe. They knew the outcome, but they wanted more. This was the allure of Atlantis.
The final chapter of "The Curse of the King", the fourth book in the series, described the gradual rise of Atlantis from the depths of the ocean. This would be a product of imagination, but those who cling to the belief that there was once a kingdom like Atlantis were crazy. They could be romantic as well. The civilizations predating Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Greece would be lost, but the tales (here and there) filtered through the centuries. It became a yarn for teenage readers. The succeeding civilizations didn't take heed of the hard lessons from Atlantis, though.
"Let me check. I will return in -"
