Heroine Complex by Sarah Kuhn

Heroine Complex by Sarah Kuhn

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Hate leaving a review box empty. So… (sorry about the names, my digital book is dead at the moment, so I cannot get all of the names correct).

The book stars Evie Tanaka who is 26, half Japanese, and the assistant to a superhero named Aveda Jupiter (aka Annie – Chinese). Mentioning the Asian backgrounds is important because that’s how the two became friends – being the only two Asian children in their kindergarten and having the ‘white students’ pick on them and make fun of them (especially since both had parents who would send along ‘strange’ food stuffs with their kids.

Evie was, apparently, traumatized by the early bullying to the point that she can’t stand the idea of standing out, having the light on her, etc. Annie (Aveda), on the other hand, made it her life goal to have the light on herself, while also backing up and helping Evie. The two grew up together, occasionally having a few others join their very small ‘gang’, like Simon (who Evie kind of sees as a sibling, though she occasionally allows herself to examine him to see if she feels any kind of lust towards him, but she just can’t seem to get there, no lust for her). Somewhere along the way, while growing up, they picked up on this film (or is it more?) from Asia (Hong Kong maybe) called The Heroic Trio starring three female superhero types. One: Asian people to look up to and are heroes; two: female Asian people . . . etc. etc. So, naturally, they absorbed that into their lives to the point that Annie decided to attempt to become some kind of superhero.

https://youtu.be/pXfNg6NN3C4



Somewhere around both of their 18th birthday the demons invaded. And promptly fell over dead. Proceeding the invasion was an earthquake and a rip in . . . um . . . the dimension? Something. They fell over dead ‘for reasons’ that I won’t go into here. But those were the ‘human shaped demons’ – after that failed invasion, occasionally more ‘portals’ would open and the demon equivalent of puppies would attack – imprinting on anything they see once they get through the portal (like, the book opens with Aveda fighting ‘cupcake demons’ in a cupcake shop while Evie darts around attempting to film the action).

The important reason why I made a big point about this first invasion, though, is the part wherein some of the people nearish to the first portal opening ended up with superpowers. Like the guy who . . . can marginally change the temperature in the room. Or the woman who is kind of like a human GPS . . . for automobiles (she can track autos and only autos). Or the woman who has very weak . . . um . . I forgot name but the very weak ability to make things ‘come to her’ (using mind, getting something to wiggle pop up and fly to her; mostly she can get them to wiggle) – that’s the ‘superpower’ that the superhero in San Francisco has – though the people who follow her and are her fans do not actually know that. Since it really is a weak-ass power. One of them did end up with a major high level superpower, though, but . . . more later.

Right, so, after that cupcake attack Aveda returned to HQ (their base, which they call ‘HQ’, presumably meaning Headquarters though I do not know if HQ is ever anything other than HQ in the book) and angrily beat up some punching bags. Aveda is kind of high maintenance, rage-y, and a self centered bitch. While beating up punching bags she apparently twisted her ankle. Badly. She has to be off her feet for 6 to 8 weeks. But San Francisco needs their superhero!!!! Or something. So the assistant has to put on Aveda’s costume and go out and about.

Fails immediately. More in having the ‘simple’ event she was just supposed to show up at have a portal of demons appear. Menace her. And require her to . . . . explode them with her fire ball power. Yeah, see, Evie is the one who ended up with the actual super duper high level superpower. But she’s repressed it as much as she can. Because . . . (I can say, but spoilers, let’s just say she fears to become a monster and leave it at that). So how’d Evie pretend to be Aveda? Sure both are descendants of people from Asia but . . . one is half-Japanese, other is Chinese, and . . . well, the most they really have in common is being roughly the same height (I think if I recall correctly). So . . . relying on people being unable to tell two Asian people apart? Well, no, this is where Simon comes in – he also got a power when the human-shaped demons fell over dead roughly 8 years ago – he’s something of a wizard/magic user. And has the ability to give someone a charm which will allow them to look like something else – temporarily.

So – while Aveda continues to recuperate, Evie continues to pretend to be Aveda, continues trying to be mother figure to her younger sister Bea (who is something like 16/17), and continue to repress her emotions and sex drive (until she doesn’t . . . and the book becomes a humping book). Meanwhile, to round out the cast, there’s Nate, the super muscular geek who basically lives in the basement and pokes at alien/demon stuff and creates spreadsheets. And also Maisy and Shnasty (okay, I might have their names wrong – something like that, Maisy being a gossip blogger and the S one being her sidekick). Oh, and then there’s the lesbian player – um . . . Lucy? I think her name was Lucy. She’s the weapons/bodyguard/trainer person. And she likes humping every woman who her eye falls onto. So, she’s the token background LGBT character in the book.

And . . um. Okay, so I was reluctant to read this book because that whole ‘I’ll self-sacrifice for your glory oh glorious one’ type assistant/super important person dynamic is one I want nothing (or very little) to do with. But I got myself to try this one because of the superhero thingie. And I am glad I did because this actually was quite fun. Even if there was all that heterosexual sex going on, still fun book.

Can’t wait for books 2 and 3.

Rating: 4.50

April 11 2017



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