Leo Valdez
Encyclopedia
Leo Valdez is a fictional character
Fictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
in Rick Riordan
Rick Riordan
Richard Russell "Rick" Riordan, Jr. is an American author best known for writing the Percy Jackson & the Olympians series. He also wrote the Tres Navarre mystery series for adults and helped to edit Demigods and Monsters, a collection of essays on the topic of his Percy Jackson series...
's The Heroes of Olympus
The Heroes of Olympus
The Heroes of Olympus is a fantasy book series written by Rick Riordan and based on Greek and Roman mythology. It is the sequel series to the Percy Jackson & the Olympians pentalogy....
series of novels. He first appears as one of the three protagonists in The Lost Hero
The Lost Hero
The Lost Hero is a 2010 fantasy-adventure novel written by Rick Riordan and is based on Greek and Roman mythology. It is the first book in the series The Heroes of Olympus, the next series about Camp Half-Blood. It was preceded by the Percy Jackson & the Olympians series, which focused solely on...
where he is a fifteen year-old demigod
Demigod
The term "demigod" , meaning "half-god", is commonly used to describe mythological figures whose one parent was a god and whose other parent was human; as such, demigods are human-god hybrids...
of indeterminate parentage who attends the Wilderness School, a boarding school
Boarding school
A boarding school is a school where some or all pupils study and live during the school year with their fellow students and possibly teachers and/or administrators. The word 'boarding' is used in the sense of "bed and board," i.e., lodging and meals...
for "bad kids".
After an attack by a group of storm spirits Leo learns that he and his friends, Jason Grace
Jason Grace
Jason Grace is a fictional character and the protagonist in Rick Riordan's The Heroes of Olympus book series, the sequel to the Percy Jackson & the Olympians series. He first appears in The Lost Hero, the first novel of the series, as a 15 or 16-year-old boy suffering from amnesia...
and Piper McLean
Piper McLean
Piper McLean is a fictional character and the deuteragonist in Rick Riordan's The Heroes of Olympus book series, the sequel to the Percy Jackson & the Olympians series. She first appears in The Lost Hero, the first novel of the series, as a fifteen year-old undetermined demigod who attends the...
, are demigods. The three of them are then escorted to Camp Half-Blood, a sanctuary for Greek demigods, where Hephaestus
Hephaestus
Hephaestus was a Greek god whose Roman equivalent was Vulcan. He is the son of Zeus and Hera, the King and Queen of the Gods - or else, according to some accounts, of Hera alone. He was the god of technology, blacksmiths, craftsmen, artisans, sculptors, metals, metallurgy, fire and volcanoes...
claims him as his son.
Background
In the novels Leo is the demigod son of HephaestusHephaestus
Hephaestus was a Greek god whose Roman equivalent was Vulcan. He is the son of Zeus and Hera, the King and Queen of the Gods - or else, according to some accounts, of Hera alone. He was the god of technology, blacksmiths, craftsmen, artisans, sculptors, metals, metallurgy, fire and volcanoes...
, the Roman equivalent of Vulcan
Vulcan (mythology)
Vulcan , aka Mulciber, is the god of beneficial and hindering fire, including the fire of volcanoes in ancient Roman religion and Roman Neopaganism. Vulcan is usually depicted with a thunderbolt. He is known as Sethlans in Etruscan mythology...
, and Esperanza Valdez, who worked at a machine shop. He grew up in North Houston with Tia Callida as his baby-sitter, whom he later discovers to be Hera
Hera
Hera was the wife and one of three sisters of Zeus in the Olympian pantheon of Greek mythology and religion. Her chief function was as the goddess of women and marriage. Her counterpart in the religion of ancient Rome was Juno. The cow and the peacock were sacred to her...
in human form.
The novel The Lost Hero explains how Tia Callida tried to "kill" Leo many times: The myth of Demeter and Persephone is reflected when she lets Leo take a nap inside a blazing fire at the age of two; When he was three, she let him play with knives; When he was four she gave Leo a stick and encouraged him to poke a rattlesnake but, not wanting to harm the snake, he let it get away.
When Leo was eight he encountered a sleeping woman dressed in earthen robes, who he will later learn to be Gaia
Gaia (mythology)
Gaia was the primordial Earth-goddess in ancient Greek religion. Gaia was the great mother of all: the heavenly gods and Titans were descended from her union with Uranus , the sea-gods from her union with Pontus , the Giants from her mating with Tartarus and mortal creatures were sprung or born...
, or "mother earth". She locked his mother inside the machine shop while Leo was in the break room. After Gaia goes right through a table, Leo realizes that she will go right through him as well and kill his mother. In desperation, he erupts into flames, killing his mother. Leo's relatives would not take him in after his mother's death and he was sent to several foster homes which he always ran away from.
After Leo is claimed by Hephaestus at Camp Half-Blood, he discovers that he is the only living son of the god who can manipulate fire
Fire
Fire is the rapid oxidation of a material in the chemical process of combustion, releasing heat, light, and various reaction products. Slower oxidative processes like rusting or digestion are not included by this definition....
, a power which many demigods claim is dangerous and catastrophic. The last son of Hephaestus to have power over fire was Thomas Faynor, who was responsible for starting the Great Fire of London
Great Fire of London
The Great Fire of London was a major conflagration that swept through the central parts of the English city of London, from Sunday, 2 September to Wednesday, 5 September 1666. The fire gutted the medieval City of London inside the old Roman City Wall...
in 1666.
The Lost Hero
Leo makes his first appearance in the novel The Lost HeroThe Lost Hero
The Lost Hero is a 2010 fantasy-adventure novel written by Rick Riordan and is based on Greek and Roman mythology. It is the first book in the series The Heroes of Olympus, the next series about Camp Half-Blood. It was preceded by the Percy Jackson & the Olympians series, which focused solely on...
(2010) as a student at the Wilderness School, a boarding school for "bad kids". He and his friends Jason Grace
Jason Grace
Jason Grace is a fictional character and the protagonist in Rick Riordan's The Heroes of Olympus book series, the sequel to the Percy Jackson & the Olympians series. He first appears in The Lost Hero, the first novel of the series, as a 15 or 16-year-old boy suffering from amnesia...
and Piper McLean
Piper McLean
Piper McLean is a fictional character and the deuteragonist in Rick Riordan's The Heroes of Olympus book series, the sequel to the Percy Jackson & the Olympians series. She first appears in The Lost Hero, the first novel of the series, as a fifteen year-old undetermined demigod who attends the...
are on the school bus for a field trip to the Grand Canyon
Grand Canyon
The Grand Canyon is a steep-sided canyon carved by the Colorado River in the United States in the state of Arizona. It is largely contained within the Grand Canyon National Park, the 15th national park in the United States...
. Leo believes Jason to be his best friend, but later discovers that this was a fake memory manipulated by the Mist.
After getting attacked by a group of storm spirits, Leo, Jason, and Piper are escorted to Camp Half-Blood, where Leo is claimed as the son of the Greek god Hephaestus. He embarks on a quest to save Hera with Jason and Piper after Rachel Elizabeth Dare, the current Oracle of Delphi, gives Jason a prophecy that advises him to choose Leo and Piper as his companions.
The Son of Neptune
He is briefly seen towards the end of The Son of NeptuneThe Son of Neptune
The Son of Neptune is the second book in the Heroes of Olympus series written by Rick Riordan. It was released on October 4, 2011.-Development:...
(2011) when he sends video message to Percy on a piece of parchment. He is then revealed to look just like Sammy Valdez, Hazel's boyfriend from 70 years earlier, hinting he may be related to Sammy.
.
Physical appearance
In the novel Leo is described as looking like a "LatinoLatino
The demonyms Latino and Latina , are defined in English language dictionaries as:* "a person of Latin-American descent."* "A Latin American."* "A person of Hispanic, especially Latin-American, descent, often one living in the United States."...
Santa's elf" with curly black hair, dark brown eyes, pointy ears, a cheerful babyish face, and a mischievous smile. He is described as being of normal height with a slim build.
Personality
The novel describes Valdez as appearing to be impatient, often seen fiddling with mechanical bits and pieces when he is nervous or bored, quickly constructing various objects and disassembling them just as fast. Leo is normally seen as a cheerful person, who enjoys playing pranks on others and provides comic reliefComic relief
Comic relief is the inclusion of a humorous character, scene or witty dialogue in an otherwise serious work, often to relieve tension.-Definition:...
during serious moments in the book. Despite his normally happy appearance, Leo is emotionally scarred by the loss of his mother. Leo resents Hephasteus for ignoring him. He is shown as an extremely quick thinker who is good at math, and one of the most intelligent students at Camp Half-Blood. It is also stated that he falls in love with every girl he meets, as long as she is totally out of his league. That includes Thalia Grace (Jason's older sister) whom he endlessly tries to impress. 'Dirt Woman' as Leo calls her, is always trying to mess up his life. She made Leo lose control with his fire abilities, causing the death of his mother. Leo ran away six times, possibly because he wants to forget about his mother's death and keep moving farther and farther away from the machine shop where she died. Leo briefly dreamed of having his mother back (possibly as the result of supporting or blackmailing Gaea), but dismissed the idea as "'Frankenstein thinking'". Leo jokingly refers to himself as "'Commander Tool Belt'".
Powers and abilities
Like most demigods in Riordan's novels, Leo is diagnosed with ADHD but, unlike the rest, he does not suffer from dyslexiaDyslexia
Dyslexia is a very broad term defining a learning disability that impairs a person's fluency or comprehension accuracy in being able to read, and which can manifest itself as a difficulty with phonological awareness, phonological decoding, orthographic coding, auditory short-term memory, or rapid...
. As the son of Hephaestus, the god of flames and blacksmiths, Leo has a gift for repairing and building almost anything. Other than Charles Beckendorf, who first appeared, and died, in the Percy Jackson series, he is the only camper at Camp Half-Blood who is able to control Festus, a life-size bronze automaton
Automaton
An automaton is a self-operating machine. The word is sometimes used to describe a robot, more specifically an autonomous robot. An alternative spelling, now obsolete, is automation.-Etymology:...
dragon. He is able to control any kind of mechanical device without previous knowledge of the subject, such as flying a helicopter. Leo is also the only living son of Hephaestus
Hephaestus
Hephaestus was a Greek god whose Roman equivalent was Vulcan. He is the son of Zeus and Hera, the King and Queen of the Gods - or else, according to some accounts, of Hera alone. He was the god of technology, blacksmiths, craftsmen, artisans, sculptors, metals, metallurgy, fire and volcanoes...
who is able to control and manipulate fire. When Leo exhibits extreme feelings, his body temperature rises, which can ultimately cause him to become encased in a ball of fire. This almost caused him to fall to his death when he melted the bridge to Aeolus' palace.