Set in 2001, a book about five uni students that suddenly develop super powers of a fairly archetypal nature, except they have no energy projector. Flying, super strength, speed, telepathy, invisibility.

Written as it is about a few around 20 year olds trying to deal, the major problem it has it is is fairly flat, at least for the first 3/4 or so, anyway. So, is it trying to be realistic about what it might be like, or is it supposed to be a more four color approach? Appears to be stuck in the middle.

It certainly fails the first part - pretty much documented evidence of more than human activity in a city provokes zero interest from corporate, spook, major law enforcement, criminals, or others? Certainly the existence of an actual telepath might keep a lot of those people away from casual contact - but the All-Stars themselves wonder about this little themselves. They aren't morons, you are shown that - but pretty braindead given their situation. Not like this is happening in backwoods Kentucky or anything. Everyone who finds out has little problem believing, either, with no freakouts.

Them pretty much instantly deciding to fight crime on the back of some amateur martial arts training and some nifty seamstress work does lend more to the four colour interpretation, perhaps, where security and politics issues don't come to Keystone City unless the plot requires it. The Dial-H-For Heroness of the first part, them going along with nary a scratch, just the occasional hangover leans this way, too.

They do of course make mistakes - and things get worse as this is set in 2001, when some planes are crashed into major New York real estate. Revelations about the past as things get problematic.

However, points for giving a shot to a serious approach, as opposed to heavyhanded satire. The latter being significantly harder to do than the former.

A bit under 3.5 perhaps

http://notfreesf.blogspot.com/2009/09... ( )

Superpowers was nominated for a Nebula, and deservedly so, though it didn’t win. It’s a "realistic" take on superheroes, focusing on the personal. In the story, having super abilities isn’t a boon. The five main characters were all richly conceived. I disagree with some reviewers who took issue with the number and quality of secondary characters. I thought they added quite a bit to the story. Unlike a lot of superhero fiction, the conflict is primarily that of self-doubt and that doubt is not caused by facing a nemesis. It’s also a pretty quick read.

(Full review at my blog) ( )

Five college juniors in Madison, WI throw a party, drink beer and pass out. When they wake up, they don’t have hangovers, they have the superpowers of the book’s title: super strength, speed, invisibility, telepathy and flight. The book wonders what would happen to real kids in the real world if suddenly blessed–or is it cursed?–with superpowers.

Superheros is an older teen novel, featuring college protagonists struggling with real-life issues, in addition to their new problems. It’s also an introduction to superhero culture, perhaps best for fans of shows like Heroes or Smallville who haven’t yet become comic-book readers. ( )

On May 19, 2001 five students at University of Wisconsin- Madison have a party to celebrate the end of the school year. They wake up with superpowers. Jack has speed, Charlie has telepathy, Caroline can fly, Harriet turns invisible, Mary Beth is super strong. For a couple of days they think it‘s just them, then they try to decide what to do with their powers. Caroline doesn‘t want to be a superhero, she just wants to fly, but her friends convince her otherwise.

“It was nice having heroes for a while… But in the end I gues we have to get by without heroes. Even the best of them is as human as the rest of us, and the only thing you can count on with humans is that they’ll let you down eventually. You, for instance. You’ll forget this story eventually, and it’ll be like it didn’t happen.” ( )

http://books.moonsoar.com/archives/20... ( )