![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
I just finished a very interesting book: Hench, by Natalie Zina Walshchots
I started re-reading Terry Pratchett's Discworld series in December as a distraction, but decided I needed a break. Hench was recommended to Russet a while back, and it sounded interesting. I was fortunate to be able to snag a copy in my ebook sales within the last week or so and read it.
The book follows perhaps about a year in the life of Anna, who at the beginning of the book is getting short-term jobs at a temp agency doing various jobs for supervillains. They're called Henches, doing things like filing, data entry, driving (bonus if you're a certified stunt driver), etc. Muscle roles are handled through a different agency and they are called Meat, and are paid more and get free medical - if you don't mind the medical care being provided by veterinarians and medical school dropouts and doctors who've lost their licenses.
Anna is excellent with spreadsheets and data analysis and lands a pretty good gig that looks like it might go long-term, maybe even permanent!, until a superhero casually back-hands her across a room and her leg gets multiple compound fractures. While she's recovering, she starts thinking about ways to add up the damage and lives lost that the "heroes" cause with such casual and callous disregard - and planning how to make them pay!
It was an excellent read, and I came very close to finishing it in a day. Had I only known that I had about four pages to go....
Anyway, interesting perspective on the hero/villain situation. The book contains a short story titled Meat, and a sequel to Hench is coming out later this year, titled Villain. I'm quite looking forward to it. I haven't pre-purchased it yet, but am thinking about it. The short story distorted the apparent page count of the main story, or I would have finished it in the same day that I started it.
I found it to be well-written and very engaging. She has an excellent style for illustrating area color of The Big East Coast City. Her descriptions of some of the violence, especially Anna's final revenge may be somewhat disturbing, but that's also the point of the book - it's intended to illustrate that full-power superhero/villain fights cause a lot of carnage, and bystanders are injured or killed in gruesome ways.
This is Natalie's first novel. She's previously written two books of poetry, one of which has won a prize. She's a Torontanian. I'd love to see some of her poetry, but those books are not available through the Apple Bookstore, I'll have to check other sources and see if I can get ahold of them.
The book follows perhaps about a year in the life of Anna, who at the beginning of the book is getting short-term jobs at a temp agency doing various jobs for supervillains. They're called Henches, doing things like filing, data entry, driving (bonus if you're a certified stunt driver), etc. Muscle roles are handled through a different agency and they are called Meat, and are paid more and get free medical - if you don't mind the medical care being provided by veterinarians and medical school dropouts and doctors who've lost their licenses.
Anna is excellent with spreadsheets and data analysis and lands a pretty good gig that looks like it might go long-term, maybe even permanent!, until a superhero casually back-hands her across a room and her leg gets multiple compound fractures. While she's recovering, she starts thinking about ways to add up the damage and lives lost that the "heroes" cause with such casual and callous disregard - and planning how to make them pay!
It was an excellent read, and I came very close to finishing it in a day. Had I only known that I had about four pages to go....
Anyway, interesting perspective on the hero/villain situation. The book contains a short story titled Meat, and a sequel to Hench is coming out later this year, titled Villain. I'm quite looking forward to it. I haven't pre-purchased it yet, but am thinking about it. The short story distorted the apparent page count of the main story, or I would have finished it in the same day that I started it.
I found it to be well-written and very engaging. She has an excellent style for illustrating area color of The Big East Coast City. Her descriptions of some of the violence, especially Anna's final revenge may be somewhat disturbing, but that's also the point of the book - it's intended to illustrate that full-power superhero/villain fights cause a lot of carnage, and bystanders are injured or killed in gruesome ways.
This is Natalie's first novel. She's previously written two books of poetry, one of which has won a prize. She's a Torontanian. I'd love to see some of her poetry, but those books are not available through the Apple Bookstore, I'll have to check other sources and see if I can get ahold of them.
no subject
HENCH 4 LYFE