villains Archives - The Y Logs

Yzabel / June 2, 2018

Review: Please Don’t Tell My Parents You Believe Her

Please Don’t Tell My Parents You Believe Her by Richard Roberts

My rating: [rating=2]

Blurb:

Middle school supervillain Penny Akk has defeated every challenge thrown against her. She has bested heroes, villains, weirdos who can’t make up their minds, robots, aliens, friends, rivals, enemies, natural disasters, secret admirers, and her own shyness.

Now she has only one opponent left.

Her own super power.

…and the other Penny who stole it.

Review:

[I received a copy of this book from the publisher.]

The final instalment in this series, or at least for Penny’s arc. The story picks up right after the previous volume’s cliffhanger, with Penny having to contend with her family and friends not believing ‘the evil robot’. One can only imagine the pain and sadness this is for a kid. She didn’t spend time moping, which I definitely liked, and she kept acting and taking the matter into hands, finding people to help her, getting to know her other friends better (like Marcia and Cassie), and revealing both to the readers and to herself that she’s made of tough stuff… But when she started writing letters to her parents, pretending she was at ‘supervillain camp’, that’s when I knew where the hurt had gone.

Also, Gerty. That character was pretty fun.

While I enjoyed it as a light read, though, I must admit I was disappointed about several things, such as:

– The way Penny comes clear to her parents. That was so anticlimactic and infuriating, since this was, after all, quite a stake for Penny.

– Ray and Claire are even more out of the way than in the previous volume. Sure, Penny gets other sidekicks, and doesn’t have to do everything alone, but… That was really a let-down. I like the original Inscrutable Machine trio, and seeing it in that state was heart-breaking.

– Half of the book felt like a filler, which disappointed me even more that if not for that, there would’ve been room and time for meaningful character development.

– No one seemed to stop and consider the Machine’s role for more than a second. When it was obvious that it held the key to who the original Penny was.

– The ending was… predictable. It wraps things up nicely, however I can’t tell it held any surprise for me.

Overall, this is a series I’d still recommend, but I wish it had ended on the same quality as the first book.

Yzabel / April 1, 2016

Review: Please Don’t Tell My Parents I’ve Got Henchmen

Please Don’t Tell My Parents I’ve Got Henchmen by Richard Roberts

My rating: [rating=2]

Blurb:

What would middle school be like if half your classmates had super powers? It’s time for Penny Akk to find out. Her latest (failed) attempt to become a superhero has inspired the rest of the kids in her school to reveal their own powers.

Now, all of her relationships are changing. She has a not-at-all-secret admirer, who wants to be Penny’s partner almost as much as she wants to be Penny’s rival. The meanest girl in school has gained super powers and lost her mind. Can Penny help her find a better one? Can she help an aging supervillain connect with his daughter, and mend the broken hearts of two of the most powerful people in the world? And in all this, where will she find time for her own supervillainous fun, or even more dangerous, to start dating?

It’s going to be a long, strange semester.

Review:

[I received a copy of this book from the publisher, in exchange for an honest review.]

I have been following this series from its first volume, which I really liked, so I’ll admit to being slightly biased. I like the main characters, the world of superheroes and villains developed here—everybody knows they exist, with more or less admiration and acceptance of what they do, and with a subverted Masquerade trope (supers don’t hide per se, but there’s an unspoken rule about “not getting personal”, that is, not revealing people’s day-to-day identities).

And I’m feeling torn, because I liked this third volume, yet also found it kind of weak in terms of plot. Perhaps because it’s more focused on a part of Penny et al.’s life we hadn’t really seen yet, that is, growing up, and finding out that dividing one’s life between villainous activities, trying to become a hero, and just good old norma activities, is time-consuming and difficult.

In that regard, it was interesting. Other kids are making their coming out, refusing to hide their powers any longer, and a wind of acceptance is blowing over the school. The club activities, the new lair, those were both fun to read about, and also leading to more thoughtful considerations.

I quite liked Marcia’s development, although I wish we had been given some more information about how exactly she turned out like that (“she has the scrolls” is a bit of a shortcut: how did she survive them?). Her powers are of a kind that I find fascinating, that is, would you stay sane if nothing could hurt you, or not for long? Or would you start experimenting, looking for the one thing that may do you harm? It made me think of Claire’s experiments at the beginning of the “Heroes” series, only in a more.. unhealthy way. But then, I much prefer this Marcia to theuppity girl from book 1.

Quite a few things that left me frustrated, though:

– This is really more a “slice of life” book, without any real plot apart from the loose “teenagers gathering and developing their powers”. As mentioned above, it allowed to delve deeper into our three wannabe-heroes (or wannabe-villains?) problems and potential choices for the future, and to reveal more about existing characters, like Bull and his family. On the other hand, there was no real main plot here, ideas would spring up and unfurl into short events that would then die down, and good plot devices were lost in the middle. What about the robot? (Having her around more would’ve been fun… and I think we could do with a new Vera by now.) What exactly happened to Barbara to make her another kind of unpredictable, but perhaps still as dangerous as her sister? Also, we’re having many secondary characters introduced (the club) and this is screen time may have been better used on the Inscrutable Machine (who didn’t do enough villainy to my liking—I want to see them dostuff back together more often!).

– Still no real insight as to Ray’s family, which makes his position hard to relate to: it seems his parents would hate him if they were to learn he’s a super, and so he both wants to stay and to leave… but that’s only what we’re told. We never get to see his family. We don’t know what they’re like. Regular people, from what I rememberfrom book 1… or not so much? Are they heroes or villains in disguise? Or maybe people who got badly hurt in the past by some hero or villain, and now they despise everything “super”? I really, really want to know, and I really hope there’s more to Ray’s folks than the little we’vebeen told so far. It can’t be so simple. And if it has to be “that bad”, then I want to see it, too.

– Are the Akks so blind as to their daughter’s activities? Or are they pretending not to know? Deluding themselves? By now, this is more than troublesome. Maybe Penny’s father might get away with this (scientist more focused on his own inventions, and all that), but it’s difficult to keep seeing the Audit as this calculating, probabilities- and statistics-wielding ex-hero, as this sort of human computer, when she’s so oblivious to what’s so obvious. The “bumbling blind adult” trope isn’t working.

Honestly, I don’t like giving less than 3 stars to this book. But…

Nevertheless, this novel raises some interesting questions and potential future arcs at the end, and I’d still want to see those in a next installment, if it meant more antics from the trio. Among other things: what is the Inscrutable Machine to do, to choose, considering that they seem to be really talented at villainous stuff (with the good deeds backfiring), yet still find themselves instinctively helping people as well as causing mayhem? And what is Spider up to?

Yzabel / June 26, 2015

Review: Havelock, Part One

Havelock by Jane D. Everly

My rating: [rating=4]

Blurb:

Eliana Havelock is a female with no past, whose determination to bring down a Karachi arms dealer catches the attention of the British Secret Intelligence Service. MI-6 is currently fractured due to political upheaval, with many of its covert programs dissolved or disbanded. When Eliana presents the opportunity to divert an international arms disaster, the head of MI-6 partners her with one of its best and brightest, the enigmatic, Connor Blackwell. But in a world of secrets and hidden agendas, who can Eliana trust? And what, or who, is Eliana really after?

Review:

[I received a copy from the publisher, in exchange for an honest review.]

I’ll have less to say here than I do when it comes to my regular reviews, since it’s the first part in a serial (6 chapters), and obviously no first episode can ever develop everything in terms of characters, plot and world building. However, those six chapters were definitely interesting.

The style is a little surprising, in that it mixes parts from Eliana’s point of view (1st person, present tense), and parts seen through other characters (3rd person, past tense). I’m not sure what the intent was—more and more novels do that, so I’m actually never really sure—but it didn’t bother me the way it did in other stories. It lent a certain immediacy to Eliana’s scenes, and since they were of the action-packed kind, it fitted. I liked her humorous way of describing situations, too.

Though there’s still a lot of mystery surrounding the characters, again, there’s much room for more development in later episodes. So far, nothing’s revealed about Eliana, but she clearly demonstrates resourcefulness and abilities to fight and get out of dire straits. Other characters are also close to tropes clearly reminiscent of typical spy narratives, à la James Bond, yet everything here seems to work in a reversed way. The dashing spy/action type is a woman. The big boss is also a woman (and got there through years of service in which she played an active role, even getting severaly wounded, not because she was a paper-pusher). The potential mark-to-be-seduced is a guy. The villain is… villainish, yet his ruthlessness and his plan make him enjoyable, not ridiculous. And the story’s overall plot looks promising (not to mention a few hints dropped here and there).

A bit stereotypical, sure, but of the kind that was very entertaining. I’ll gladly read the next installment.

Yzabel / March 13, 2014

Review: Please Don’t Tell My Parents I’m A Supervillain

Please Don’t Tell My Parents I’m a Supervillain by Richard Roberts

My rating: [rating=4]

Summary:

Penelope Akk wants to be a superhero. She’s got superhero parents. She’s got the ultimate mad science power, filling her life with crazy gadgets even she doesn’t understand. She has two super-powered best friends. In middle school, the line between good and evil looks clear.

In real life, nothing is that clear. All it takes is one hero’s sidekick picking a fight, and Penny and her friends are labeled supervillains. In the process, Penny learns a hard lesson about villainy: She’s good at it.

Criminal masterminds, heroes in power armor, bottles of dragon blood, alien war drones, shapeshifters and ghosts, no matter what the super powered world throws at her, Penny and her friends come out on top. They have to. If she can keep winning, maybe she can clear her name before her mom and dad find out.

Review:

(I got a copy of this book through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

I found this book to be a very entertaining and refreshing read, focused on the characters’ adventures, and likely something I’d have thoroughly enjoyed in middle school—well, I did enjoy it now, after all. In my opinion, it definitely reaches its aim of providing younger readers with likeable characters, all with their specific traits. Penny, the mad scientist, whose power works in spurts of genius, and whose voice throughout the story I quickly grew fond of. Claire, cute but also resourceful, especially when it comes to using connections to the team’s advantage. Ray, who simply was, well, classy, and whose take on circumstances was definitely contagious. At the same time, I could tell they were kids, reacting like kids getting powers, and wanting to have fun with those before it was time to get all serious and act like grown-ups.

Paradoxically, the fact they were kids made the community’s reaction to their presence somewhat more believable: with heroes and villains alike used to fighting each other with magic and “adult” powers, throwing in kid-like actions in the middle can be unsettling, and difficult to predict. The Inscrutable Machine did exactly that. As for the heroes/villain community itself, your mileage may vary on the “believability scale”. Personally, I found it mostly made sense in its own way: with both sides having super powers, at some point you have to reach some kind of agreement to avoid really wreaking havoc with no one the winner at the end. (That, and the alien invasion in the past, which seemed to have forced them to cooperate.)

Another likeable side of the story was how it really focused on its premise, a.k.a. teenagers accidentally labelled as supervillains, then deciding to play the part until they could “see the errors of their ways and become heroes”. I’ve read too many books that start off with something interesting like that, then veer off toward teenage drama/love stories, with those not being the reason why I picked them in the first place. There is a touch of romantic interest here, but it’s subtle, and played in a somewhat comical way, so it agreed with me in the end.

The few qualms I had about this novel were mostly related to the adults’ reactions. While some of them were understandable (Brian being too focused on his own science, too much of an air-head when it comes to relationships; the Minx as a playful, secret-loving woman who found fun in what her kid was going through; Lucyfar, who openly plays on her ambiguity as a villain who occasionally does good, so she’s left alone…), I thought the Audit, on the other hand, was too oblivious to what was happening. It would’ve worked if she had had a different personality, but I wondered why she, among all the others, didn’t catch that something was going the wrong way? Perhaps this could have been played a little differently. I also wondered about Ray’s family: he seemed frightened of their reaction, and so I wish we had had more of a glimpse into that, more explanations. (Unless this book’s meant to have a sequel, in which case this question might get an answer later, but I don’t know about that yet.)

I’d give this story a 3.5 stars, because of those problems that kept nagging at me. However, I’m still rounding it to a 4. I had fun, plain and simple; I think younger readers would have fun, too; and so I think this has to factor in.