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A bit hit and miss, but the concept of writing a more inclusive shared superhuman universe is a great one. I'll follow up some of these authors and see what their longer works are like.
This collection of heroic tales focuses on folks who aren't normally explored as superheroic characters.
I have to agree with the majority of the other reviewers: this is an uneven collection. But, from the worst (Tat Master) to the best(The Henchman), at least each story has something interesting to say (well, maybe not Tat Master, did I mention how bad that was?).The three that really stood out for me were Trickster, The Angel of Loneliness and The Henchman (the author of that last story also wrote Incognegro, an amazing and disturbing graphic novel). The book is worth picking up just for these s...
A series of dark, short stories about superheroes (often accidental heroes, or villains who were really heroes), most involving race relations. The writing was a bit uneven, but I liked most of the stories. It was a good accidental find at the library.
A couple really good stories and a few that just didn't appeal to me. The good ones were enough to make it a worthwhile read, tho.
The stories in this book all deal with the supposed 'uncommon' heroes of fiction - the ones that don't fall into any broad category already established by modern superhero tropes. None of the protagonists in this book would pal around with Superman or Wolverine, no sir. No figure-hugging spandex for these folks, nuh-uh! It is because these stories depart from the usual superhero norms that they are far more entertaining than what one gets reading the usual comic-book pablum that's out there.That...
I started reading this over a year ago, on a flight home for Christmas, and the thing about short story books is they're easy to put down and come back to a long time later. Overall I thought the collection was kind of uneven but it opens and closes very strong, two of my three favourites are the opening and closing stories - "Dream Knights" and "Housework" - and then in between I really liked "Henchman", among others. I really loved the premise of this collection, and I definitely recommend it....
I liked the ones about class struggle - "The Henchman" was my favorite, I think. Some of the stories in here are icky revenge fantasies and pulpy pulp pulp, but there were a few standouts.
Found in a 12-year-old notebook, a time when I was apparently writing reviews by hand first. My handwriting has not improved since then, but I don’t think it’s any worse, either.You can read the title a bunch of ways, but to quote the intro, “these ain’t your mama’s and daddy’s super heroes”. In some cases, I’d argue the “super”. In others, I’d argue the “hero”. A couple of stories are outright fantasy, but isn’t the Superhero genre really just specialized Fantasy, regardless of what science-y t...
There were some really great stories in here, and some that I didn't like that well. I did appreciate the concept of the collection, a re-centering of the "superhero" as the oppressed/disregarded/underdog. Yes to that. Mat Johnson's "Henchman" was hilarious, "The Picket" by Walter Mosley thought-provoking, and both "Dred" by Jerry A. Rodriguez and "The Whores of Onyx City" by Michael A. Gonzales gave me kick-ass women heroes with badass outfits, and I do LOVE those.
Everybody is reinventing superheroes these days. But if authors are going to tug on Superman's cape, they better have something interesting to say. The Darker Mask is a collection of superhero stories that emphasize racial and sexual diversity. That's cool. The heroes in this book are often confused by the extraordinary physical gifts they possess. And more often than not, they come from disadvantaged backgrounds and don't relate to Batman-like philanthropic gestures. They're just trying to pay
There are a few stories I liked, one I really wanted to keep going-- Sweeper-- some that I found pointless and overall, not worth buying, even though I did. If you had gone to the Capital Bookfest and heard the authors go on about it, you would have done the same thing I did. I mostly regret the lost $14 but some of the stories were worth like $8.
High quality adult short stories of the other side of being a superhero. Not all stories are great but most are. Well worth the time and in some ways (blaspheme alert) better at what it is trying to do than The Watchmen.
Got tired halfway through. It isn't necessarily the book's fault, I just tend to have much less patience for short story anthologies and collections than novels. Here are some of my thoughts on the stories I did read.Dream Knights by L.A. Banks: A secretary fights back in her lucid dreams against the shadow creatures that haunt her while she's awake. The reason the shadow creatures (called the Watchers, for no real reason) exist is cool. Everything else plays out like bland wish fulfillment. Two...
I've had bad luck of late with collections, but this one felt awkward and immature; a teenage amateur dressing up for his first night on patrol. Many of the writers tried to literally describe comic book action, but the problem is that comic books work only because they're illustrated. Making that literal made it feel adolescent rather than action packed. It was even more of a disappointment because the introduction talked up the content eloquently and really got me excited for what was inside.
Can't wait to get to this collection of superhero stories written by "genre" authors and compare it to Who Can Save Us Now?, written by "literary" ones.
