Read: Two Books About Supervillains

If I could have chosen one week out of the year so far to fall victim to illness, I couldn't have picked a worse week than this one. Other than that time I was on the run from a serial killer. But it did give me some time to finish unrenewable library books.

If your weekly Internet browsing includes sites that feature book reviews, you've probably heard about Soon I Will Be Invincible. The author is Austin Grossman, and it's no wonder the book has attracted media attention. He's worked on some high-profile story-oriented video games, and 20 odd years after Watchmen, "literary" takes on superheroes are in. It's hip to try as hard as you can to like them. Of course, a movie is in planning stages.

People give Tim Burton a lot of shit for "not getting" Batman. But I have a feeling 20 years from now comic fans and movie critics are going to agree. With Batman Returns in particular (and a lot of help from Danny Elfman), he did something no one's really done during our current comic-book movie boom. He took someone else's characters, with years of canon, and ran with the concept. That's what great comic books are about, as Alan Moore and Frank Miller proved so long ago. "I have six months to tell my Batman story, and it's the dream of every 12-year-old boy. Fuck it, I want penguins with rocket launchers. And Prince."

Given the chance to create his own alternate DC universe, Austin Grossman does nothing unusual. Soon I Will Be Invincible is at best two novellas (one from the point of a super villain, another from a reluctant hero) slapped together. Which might be acceptable if it wasn't pretending to be a novel. But despite his statements to the contrary, it reads like a video game. Reading the book is like pressing the right mouse button to click through cut-scenes. If you're reading this blog, you've been there before.

Catherine Jinks' approach to supervillains is lower-profile, but more intriguing. If you've ever wondered what Harry Potter would be like from the point of Slytherin, this is the book for you. The narrative drags in the middle and the ending is a bit pat, but the author isn't afraid to address some of the more unpleasant aspects of teenage life. Evil Genius has a real feel-bad emotional aspect that JK Rowling's series lacks. It's over the top, but more believable. The only real flaw in the current hardcover addition is that stupid cardboard last page. You have been warned.