Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman

I'm so on the fence about this one, it's not even funny. Do I love it? Do I hate it? I'm not sure. I do love the book design though, I'll start on a positive. Take a look at that cover. I dare you not to love it.

This is the story of the infamous villain Doctor Impossible as he plays out another scheme to control the Earth. Odd-numbered chapters are told from his perspective and are absolutely riveting, while even-numbered chapters are told by Fatale, a cyborg superhero on the team that's trying to track him down. Her chapters are flat and boring.

Literary novels like this are like watching train wrecks in SLOW MOTION. I have a feeling that it's not going to have a satisfying ending, just literary claptrap in which we all see how terrible the illness or social issue or dog dying is, but there's no resolution or hope or even much conflict, just exploring the issue. Things take forever to happen and all it is is long internal monologuing about the angst of it all. And yet, you can't look away.

Doctor Impossible was the reason I sat through the boredom. I lived for his chapters. He's the only sympathetic character in the book, and although I think that was the point, it didn't endear me to the other half of the story. Doctor Impossible was witty, intelligent, brave... "Savvy" is the word. He knows the story is going to play out exactly like it always has and nothing's going to change, but he keeps on trying, he never gives up.

All the heroes were boring, flat, and annoying, and it was like pulling teeth just to sit through their scenes. They tried to work up some mystique and suspense, but I just didn't care, with the possible exception of Blackwolf (a Captain Ersatz of Batman, so I had to like him) and Mister Mystic (who got just enough attention to make me want more, but not enough for me to know if I actually liked him.)

SPOILER ALERT:
The heroes don't do much but complain and fight amongst themselves, but somehow they still beat Doctor Impossible. It's just not fair.
END SPOILERS

Really, I just don't know. I was frustrated and enrapt for equal parts. If this sounds remotely like something you might potentially be interested in, read it, think about it, let me know what you decide. Most of the reviews I've read really haven't understood what the book was trying to say any more than I did, and some of them are just mistaken. It's not a parody of superhero literature by any means.

Anyway. Read it, read Hero, read Watchmen.

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The Reformed Vampire Support Group by Catherine Jinks

This is a fascinating, hilarious book. The vampires drink blood, but after that you can drop all the old vampire tropes. These vampires are really quite ill and nauseated most of the time, get their blood from guinea pigs, and only leave their homes to attend their weekly Support Group meetings. Our main character, Nina, has been a vampire for about thirty years since she was fifteen, and still lives with her (now 70-year-old) mother.

Now, throw in a vampire slayer who kills one of the group's members and starts a runaway train of plot weirdness! I hesitate to use the word "intricate" for the plot, but I'm not sure why. It's just sort of magnificently random, and the "barely holding together, and loving it" feel makes it a joy to read. The story is dark and gothic, but the style is hilarious. It's unique.

The characters were very much like real people -- always whining (funny and not annoying in this case), and having no idea how to go about reacting to a plot like this, but hiding a few gems in the ranks. It really felt like what might happen if a bunch of real people were attacked. And, like real people, the more you get to know them the more fun they are, and that applies to every single character.

What we have here is a case of everything going right, all the narrative devices coming together and working well. Making something that's new and great, but doesn't make a big deal out of itself. If there's one thing I hate it's a story that's trying too hard to be cool, and this is definitely not one of those.

Support Group just came out last April, but Catherine Jinks has written a lot more books than I expected so there's plenty to look into. There's a planned sequel, The Abused Werewolf Rescue Group, but no release date on that as of yet... I recommend Sucks to Be Me for fans of this.

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Boys That Bite by Mari Mancusi

When Sunny is mistaken for her goth twin sister and bitten by a vampire, will she be able to reverse the effects before prom? I didn't know, but by halfway through the book, I surprised myself by sort of caring.

This is one of those teen vampire books that's so common, mostly just teen girls complaining because they've been somehow wrangled into the vampire world while making as many pop culture references as possible. Nice beach reads, but kind of annoying in bulk. Which is why I was surprised that I kind of liked it.

There are a lot of quirky little things hidden away in the text that made the book stand out and be memorable. I liked the Slayers Inc., beer-drinking Druid, we-order-vamp-gear-online style of the thing, where people are people everywhere you go. The plot seemed pretty cut and dry and the reader is set up to see a particular outcome... Then the plot changes and you quickly formulate another set outcome... Then it changes again and you think "Oh... OH... Hm." There's an obvious lead-in to a sequel, Stake That, which looks like a rather brilliant plot move and might actually be better than Boys That Bite. (There's also a third book after that, I see.)

The one thing that bothered me was how terrible all the other characters were to Sunny. She's being turned into a vampire against her will, and it doesn't look like that great of a gig, and all anyone can talk about is how terrible it is for THEM. Whiny characters annoy me, but Sunny really is in the right, she's the injured party, and nobody cares. I would be having serious second thoughts about my relationship with people if they were that callous about ME.

It's not a must-read, but there were a lot of things to like and it doesn't take long to read. I suggest this book to casual vampire fans or to the "need something to read after Twilight" crowd.

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Suck it Up by Brian Meehl

Morning McCobb, a 16-year-old boy who likes superheroes, is the first vampire in history to come out on national television. Will the vampires' dreams of Worldwide Out Day be realized, or will Morning ruin it all by succombing to his lust for the blood of Portia Dredful, his publicist's daughter?

As it says on the cover several times, this is a vampire novel that's not quite like the rest of them. While it is a light read it's also a thoughtful story, one that should be read slowly, not in one big chunk. Things need to unfold at their own pace.

There's a certain realism in the atmosphere that I found fascinating. Most vampire books feel hidden in the shadows, confined by the need to keep the vampires a secret from the humans in the book. Morning is thrown out into the world, and it feels like a coming out for all the vampires in all the stories. It made me look at everything in a new light.

The vampires themselves are also interesting and not the norm, there's more of an emphasis on shapeshifting than the common powers, and they have a singular origin story. The characters were all very grounded in the story for me, each with a coherent set of motivations and a firm sense of self, by which I mean I had a very distinct image of each one. They didn't bleed into each other or agree about things just because it was the author's opinion! While the romance is obvious, Portia is not your typical heroine, and I loved her power.

The plot was slow in some places, but that should be a cue to slow down and get in deep in those places. There's a great mix of internal conflict with Morning and Portia, and external conflict with Morning and Ikor, the vampire who's willing to kill Morning to keep vampires from coming out. Everything is resolved beautifully at the end, with just enough of a tease for me to hope we get a sequel AND hope we don't. All in all, a thoroughly satisfying book.

It sort of felt like taking the hero of The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl and putting him in Sucks to Be Me (links are to reviews.) I recommend Sucks to Be Me, or maybe Vladimir Tod.

Suck It Up

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Hero by Perry Moore

Thom Creed's father is a disgraced superhero. There's a lot Thom can't talk to his father about--like how he's developing superpowers, that the superhero League wants him to join them, and especially not that he's gay.

I read the whole book today. 428 pages, only breaking for food and the water closet. It was just that good. It's *sob* *pause* *gasp* over and over the whole way.

Thom is a totally relatable character that I loved to cheer on, especially speaking as a teenager. He makes mistakes, and he doesn't always have a very realistic image of himself, but he never gives up. He goes after what he wants, and he doesn't mind working for it. The other characters mostly made me want to tackle them and hug them to death, but even the characters I didn't like were fascinating. Most of the established heroes are thinly veiled versions of DC heroes--Uberman, Warrior Woman-- but they became archetypes to work from and ideas to explore, rather than the parodies I was worried about.

The plot was intricate, 428 pages is long for a YA novel, but it was easy to follow, one event flowing naturally into the next. Perry Moore slammed right to the heart of what superheroes mean, both the fantastic and the terrible but mostly the amazing.

I highly recommend this book to anyone. YA, otherwise, superhero fan, otherwise, GLBT, otherwise, whatever. I hear there's a TV series in the works and I can't wait... I'm sure I'll be mentioning this book in other reviews, but as yet I don't have anything I can recommend that wouldn't fall flat after reading this. Maybe go read the classic graphic novels.

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Weird Henry Berg by Sarah Sargent

It seems that this book is little-known enough to not have a picture. Amazon confirms that it's out of print... Snap it up while you can! It was originally published in 1980, but mine is a 1993 edition.

Henry Berg is a boy whose father was a dope fiend and is no longer around. He spends most of his time imagining himself as an animal, trying to get away from his mother's hounding about his schoolwork. His best friend is a lizard named Vincent, and he's determined to keep him despite his mother's objections and a little old lady's claims that Vincent is a dragon.

I was hoping it would suck, so I could get rid of it and make a little shelf space for another book, but instead it sucked me in from page one. Having been brought to tears by the amazing Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher, I thought this very similar story would just be a cheap imitation or something. Instead, I was brought to more tears.

It's basically a more realistic Jeremy Thatcher, a secret pet story with a dragon, but I didn't find myself comparing them while I was reading. Weird Henry Berg is hilarious, especially where the dragon Aelf is concerned, but it's also not afraid of hard themes. It's a story where things aren't always black and white, where more than one person is in the right, and things can be confusing. I found a fascinating theme of duality in the book, between the ancient and modern, light and dark, age and youth. It's a fantastic, exciting kids' story, with an underlayer of deep, thought-provoking material. I was very impressed.

This, Jeremy Thatcher, and The Monster Garden are three of a kind. I heartily recommend all three.

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Push starring Chris Evans and Dakota Fanning

Push is a sci-fi thriller that came out on DVD last week, starring Chris Evans and Dakota Fanning, 111 minutes, and rated PG-13 for "intense sequences of violence and action, brief strong language, smoking and a scene of teen drinking." It's a superhero movie that's not based on a comic book, and it's awesome!

I kind of envision Push as what a DC version of X-Men might be. Similar powers and stuff, but less political and more action-oriented. It follows the recent (awesome) trend of being a grittier, more realistic superhero movie. It's not as stylized and predictable as people usually envision superheroes. The heroes have some of the classic powers, like telekinesis, but there are also some new powers I'd never seen before.

While it isn't "stylized," it is very stylish. It doesn't take place in New York! It happens in Hong Kong, and to me it looks like the costuming and cinematography are influenced by that as well. Not enough to be confusing, just enough to be new and interesting. The plot has a lot of classic tropes thrown in, done very stylishly of course, and combined with the new powers and story it creates a great balance of expectations fulfilled and expectations turned around.

The characters are great. They're just so themselves, they might be "types" like the precocious kid or the evil government agent, but they're so like real people that it doesn't matter. I especially loved how all the "I wish that character had more scenes" throwaway characters came back for more scenes! I was especially impressed with Dakota Fanning's acting. I knew she was going to do "pottymouthed kid who's older than Fanning's stereotype," but I didn't think she was going to do it well or believably.

The only thing I will mention as a warning was that some story elements weren't clear, like who was working for who in some cases. Just make sure you're paying attention and it won't be a big deal.

There's not much else I can say without giving spoilers, so just go watch the movie. I recommend it especially to fans of X-Men or Jumper.

Buy Push