Category Archives: Science Fiction

BOOK REVIEW: Regarding Ducks and Universes by Neve Maslakovic

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Regarding Ducks and UniversesRegarding Ducks and Universes by Neve Maslakovic

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Amazon page

As one might guess from the title, this is a lighthearted–dare I say whimsical–science fiction novel set around parallel universes. The light tone works to discourage one from being too much of a stickler about logical consistency and scientific validity. Parallel universes can raise almost as many troubling questions as time travel; but when the tone is comedic, it’s easy to set the these concerns aside and take it as a simple plot device. This isn’t to suggest that Maslakovic neglects the issues altogether. She is, after all, an engineer by training. Having the universes split a relatively short time in the past is likely an attempt to deal with the fact that the two universes are extremely similar, but recognizably different (a cliché among sci-fi parallel universes.) But she does avoid getting bogged down in the minutiae of consistency. There may be some happenings that leave one a bit befuddled, given there is obviously different decisions and behaviors occurring in the alternative universes, so events in one universe shouldn’t be a predictor of events in the other.

The backdrop is that a technical writer and aspiring novelist, Felix Sayers, finds out that he has an “alter.” In Sayer’s world, there are two San Franciscos. He is from what’s considered the original Universe, A, and there’s an alternative Universe B that one can cross over to if one is willing to follow a number of rules–mostly set in place to prohibit interacting with one’s alter. Everyone born before the schism of the two universes has an alternative version of themselves in the alternate universe unless that person has passed away. Like identical twins, “alters” look alike, but because of chains of different decisions and experiences, they may lead considerably different lives. Felix thought he was alter-less, but when he finds out about a discrepancy in his birthdate, he realizes he does.

Felix decides to go to Universe B, to spy on and possibly interrogate his alter—in contravention of the rules. Specifically, Felix of A wants to know if Felix B is working on a novel, and, if so, if the alter is ahead of him. He doesn’t want his to be relegated to writing the novel by “the other Felix Sayers.”

As the story progresses, the novel crosses genres again, adding a mystery component. When Felix crosses over, he draws much more attention than he wants or expects. This includes several failed (and sometimes comedic) attempts on his life. Felix immediately suspects one person, but it wouldn’t be much of a mystery if the initial suspect turned out to be the villain. Actually, it’s not much of a murder mystery because there are few characters who we can believe would be credibly wicked.

However, there’s still the mysterious question of whether Felix engaged in an activity that resulted in the split. Of course, there’s a scientist who creates the conditions in which the schism can happen, but Felix nonetheless worries whether he “caused” the split through some inadvertent act as an infant. This may not be so much a critique as it is insight into what makes the lead likable, if hapless. Incidentally, this is where the duck comes in.

If you like light sci-fi, this is a good read. It’s not side-splitting like Douglas Adams, but it’s laid back and has a dry sense of humor.

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2014 Science Fiction Movies

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Here’s the 2014 slate of sci-fi films. I didn’t include superhero films (because I did a post on them yesterday) nor did I include those that might be best classified in other speculative fiction genres (e.g. horror, supernatural, or fantasy.)

WELCOME TO YESTERDAY; February 21st

If you don’t think teenagers are safe to drive cars, imagine the chaos they’d create in a time machine.

DIVERGENT; March 21st

This is based on one of the popular dystopian Young Adult (YA) novels of late. I’m not saying that it’s just like the Hunger Games trilogy or Maze Runner–both of which also have movies coming out in 2014–but it’s clearly the subgenre du jour. In this YA dystopia, people are divided into five classes by testing, but some are divergent–defying classification.

UNDER THE SKIN; April 4th (US, previously released elsewhere)

An alien seductress lures hitchhikers into her van with nefarious purpose (and maybe lollipops.) Moral: if Scarlett Johansson tries to pick you up in a serial killeresque van, think twice; and then get in because it’s Scarlett-freakin’ Johansson.

EARTH TO ECHO; April 25th

Kids discover an alien. It sounds a lot like ET.

THE SCRIBBLER; May 1st
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Supposedly based upon the graphic novel of the same name, which would make this about a girl with multiple personality disorder who partakes in an experimental treatment called the “Siamese Burn.”

GODZILLA; May 16th

The latest attempt to revive Godzilla–using CGI to make him bigger and uglier than previously imaginable.

EDGE OF TOMORROW; June 6th

Like Groundhog Day but with guns and explosions.

THE PURGE 2; June 20th

Sequel to the movie about a dystopian future in which all laws are set aside for a short period once a year.

DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES; July 11th

This one takes place after the escape shown in the last PotA movie (w/ James Franco) and a pandemic and war that followed, but before humanity is completely enslaved by the damn, dirty apes.

JUPITER ASCENDING; July 25th

A nobody Earthling, played by Mila Kunis, turns out to be the most important woman in the Universe. Naturally, lots of people want her dead.

THE GIVER; August 15th
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Based on the popular YA novel. One person’s utopia is another person’s hell.

RESIDENT EVIL 6; September 12th
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Wow! They’ve made six of these? Way to milk it. Just kidding. I’m sure it will be novel and interesting.

MAZE RUNNER; September 19th
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Another YA dystopian adventure. Lord of the Flies meets Hunger Games?

INTERSTELLAR; November 7th

A huge Christopher Nolan film about interstellar travel.

MOCKINGJAY, Pt. I; November 21st
Mockingjay
The first part of the third book in this trilogy, because why make three movies based on three, thin YA novels when you can make four movies based on three, thin YA novels.

HOME; November 26th
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This film is supposedly based on the above book. It’s about an 11 year old who must survive on her own after her mother is abducted by aliens.

Other potential sci-fi releases of unknown date and quality:



THE ZERO THEOREM; no US release date set; the UK release is supposed to be in March

It’s about a man trying to solve a theorem, but with all sorts of craziness in the mix.



MAX STEEL; based on a line of toys (promising.)
SPACE STATION 76; that 70’s sci-fi movie.
GLIMMER; more teen time travel [shudders]

BOOK REVIEW: Memoirs Found in a Bathtub by Stanislaw Lem

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Memoirs Found in a BathtubMemoirs Found in a Bathtub by Stanisław Lem

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Amazon page

If you enjoyed Joseph Heller’s Catch 22, which is to say you like gallows humor that scoffs at the folly of thinking of “bureaucratic logic” as anything other than an oxymoron, then Stanislaw Lem’s Memoirs Found in a Bathtub will be right up your alley. The premise is that future archeologists are trying to decipher what happened to humanity from a dearth of remaining documentation. One of the best and most extensive of these records is the memoirs of a bureaucrat telling of his experience in a subterranean complex that reads a lot like a spoof on the Pentagon. The 31st century timeline in which a future generation tries to understand the intervening dark ages is only discussed in the prologue, the remainder is the first person account of this bureaucrat of ill-chosen profession.

The narrator tells us about his final assignment, one that was so secret that his superiors couldn’t even tell him what it was. When he finally does get some written guidance, it’s stolen. Throughout the story, the author is shifting through various departments of this complex trying to figure out what is going on and with little initial success. At first he’s trying to figure out what his mission is, but later he’s just trying to figure out what’s real and meaningful–and if those concepts retain any usefulness. Along the way, odd and spectacular events occur that leave him thinking he’s being framed. He doesn’t know if he’s in a test, in the middle of a conspiracy, or amid a collection of lunatics.

There are sections that read quite like a Monty Python sketch, and the absurdist humor is sometimes like that of Douglas Adams–though more sparing and dark. There’s a scene featuring an officer who tries to talk the narrator into confessing, and I could only picture said officer in my mind as Eric Idle. Among the absurdist elements is the explanation of office operations. We are told that command was unable to deal with accurately and swiftly circulating memos because of the volume, and so they took to a random system in which paperwork was indiscriminately circulated until it happened upon the correct desk. There’s an officer who begins to chew and swallow envelopes to prevent information from falling into the wrong hands. One of the best examples of absurdist humor is a conversation with a cryptologist who suggests that everything is a code and, ignoring messages that seem to be of military value and that are not coded, takes to using a machine to “decipher” random literature into nonsensical messages.

Nothing is as it seems in this book, and the humor derives from the narrator being the only individual who insists on the world making sense. If you’ve ever been in a position where you had to interact regularly with a bureaucracy, you’ll understand the value of laughing at such humor to avoid weeping. Much of the humor comes from the desire to keep things secret while trying to know everything there is. The narrator keeps finding not-so-subtle fly-shaped spy devices on his coffee saucer. There are blatant lies about behavior that takes place right before the narrator’s eyes. When he’s institutionalized, it turns out that the other inmates are not at all who they seem to be either.

If Stanislaw Lem is not an author familiar to you (he’s a Polish writer who died in 2006), this is a good work to cut your teeth on. It’s not one of his most well-known pieces, but it’s humorous and easier to follow than Solaris. Fans of Kurt Vonnegut and Robert Heinlein are also likely to enjoy this book. I recommend it.

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2014 Superhero Movies

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Here’s an overview of the upcoming year’s superhero movies.

 



I, FRANKENSTEIN; January 24th

Frankenstein’s monster may not the usual superhero, but it’s based on a graphic novel and the demon-battling premise seems heroic enough.



ROBOCOP; February 12th

This is also one you might not think of this as a superhero movie, I include it because there was a Marvel comic based on the movie and if Iron Man is a superhero…



CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER; April 4th

The second Captain America installment and the third of the five Marvel Phase II films. After taking on some high level conspiracies, Captain America finds himself battling his old sidekick’s villainous alter ego, i.e. The Winter Soldier.



AMAZING SPIDERMAN 2; May 2nd

The sequel finds Spiderman facing Electro and–to a lesser degree–Rhino.



X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST; May 23rd

As the confusing title implies, this is a time travel story in which events in the past must be changed to avert a grim future. Wolverine is sent back to affect this change.



TRANSFORMERS 4: AGE OF EXTINCTION; June 27th
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OK, this is more a toy movie than a superhero movie, but cars that turn into robots seem super in my book. That’s not to say there isn’t a better than average chance the movie will stink.



GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY; August 1st
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It’s still early. There’s no trailer out as of this posting.



TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES; August 8th
No trailer or images out, and little is known except this is about as ridiculous a premise for a movie as is imaginable.



BIG HERO 6; November 7th
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This is an animated Marvel project. A robotics prodigy and his creation team up with amateur crime-fighters to put an end to a nefarious plot.

BOOK REVIEW: Inventing Iron Man by E. Paul Zehr

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Inventing Iron Man: The Possibility of a Human MachineInventing Iron Man: The Possibility of a Human Machine by E. Paul Zehr

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Amazon page

As the title suggests, this book examines whether Iron Man could exist in the real world. As with Michio Kaku’s book Physics of the Impossible, answering the question involves defining the various meanings of “impossible.”

One way to parse the question is, “Is Iron Man possible today given the existing state of technology?” In and of itself, this question is of limited interest because the answer is, “no.” There’s certainly a demand, and so if Iron Man could exist given current technology, he probably would. That’s not to say it isn’t interesting to learn about what technologies are holding us back and where the cutting edge of relevant technologies lies—both of which are addressed by the book.

Still, a more interesting inquiry is, “Will Iron Man ever be reality given the physical laws that we know to govern the universe?” While more intriguing, it’s also a harder question to definitively answer. It’s impossible to foresee all the technological developments that might come along to answer the seemingly insurmountable challenges (e.g. Tony Stark’s inevitable Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI).) The book deals with the critical question of what challenges would have to be overcome for Iron Man to be reality.

As Zehr suggests, the appeal of Iron Man is that he’s considered to be among superheroes for the common man. Like Batman, the sufficiently bright and diligent nerd may fantasize that, “That could be me.” You or I can’t be Superman or Wolverine, but given enough money, smarts, and training we could be Batman, or—even better—pilot the Iron Man suit. Put in this light, the book may seem like just another frivolous attempt to capitalize on the popularity of superheroes to sell books. However, there’s actually a great deal of food for thought packed in the book. Like others, I read the book because its title is Inventing Iron Man and not Neuro-motor control of a self-propelled armor system or some other suitably scholarly title.

Dr. Zehr has the bona fides to delve into this topic. He is a Professor who investigates questions of how the nervous system controls movement. That subject may not constitute the sum total of critical concerns, but it’s one of the most important challenges. For Iron Man to move the way he does in the movies and comic books, Tony Stark’s impulses to move have to be transmitted seamlessly to the servo-motors that move the suit. From dodging Col. Rhodes’ (i.e. War Machine’s) punches to ducking RPGs, Stark can’t be quick enough if he has to manually steer the device. Then, of course, there’s the issue of feedback. Any neophyte meditator who’s had his or her foot fall sound asleep will know how difficult it is to walk surefootedly when one can’t feel anything through one’s foot.

[Iron Man 3 spoiler commentary in this paragraph.] One of the most damning challenges for making Iron Man a reality is the high probability of severe concussions. Let’s say you make the suit out of a material that is virtually indestructible? This may be possible. However, the pilot’s mushy brain is still sloshing around inside that impenetrable armor. One can remotely pilot the suit in order to negate this (as has been done in the comic books and the third movie), but—at that point—is it still Iron Man? I know from a writer’s perspective it’s a lot harder to maintain tension if there’s nothing human on the line. In the third movie about 30 autonomously piloted suits get wiped out and the viewer doesn’t care—the only source of tension is that Tony Stark is without armor half the time.

Some of the most interesting discussions are about where the current state of the art lies with respect to: a.) direct mind control over mechanical systems; b.) a “flying suit”; and c.) robotic movement enhancers. Zehr conducts interviews with those engineers and technologists involved in such technologies, and finds out where we are presently. Letter “a” above seems to be the least developed of the three technologies, but they are all active lines of research.

I enjoyed this book and found it interesting. I think anyone who is interested in the state of technology and its limits will find it a nice pop-sci introduction to the subject. The use of superheroes as a pedagogic device may be overdone, but it continues to work because we are fascinated by the edge of possibility, and that’s what superheroes represent.

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BOOK REVIEW: Alien Sex Ed. Ellen Datlow

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Alien Sex: 19 Tales by the Masters of Science Fiction and Dark FantasyAlien Sex: 19 Tales by the Masters of Science Fiction and Dark Fantasy by Ellen Datlow

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Amazon page

Alien Sex is an anthology of 19 works of short fiction that revolve around sex, attempted sex, or sex-like behavior with non-human entities. While the title leads one to believe the book is specifically about sex with aliens from outer space, that’s not the case in all these stories. There are also stories where the object of affection is a lesser primate, an incubus, a new species, and a biologically-modeled robot. As one would expect with life forms from other worlds, the “sexual” act is not always what we would recognize as sex. (e.g. One planet’s whoopee might be another’s mundane act.) As a last warning about what the book is not, it’s not—on the whole—a collection of sci-fi erotica. A number of the stories probably wouldn’t be arousing to the freakiest of super-freak, and I can only assume weren’t meant to be.

While there’s a unifying theme, the works included cover a lot of ground in terms of style and format. It’s not even true to say it’s 19 short stories because there’s one poem and one chapter that reads more like an essay (i.e. lacks a narrative structure.) Some of the works are written in the language, tone, and style of erotica, but others aren’t. A few of them read like thinly veiled commentary on problems in the author’s own love life—i.e. cheating spouses, feeling a lack of attentiveness, or porn addiction. (Each work has a brief author commentary at the end, and a couple of the authors suggest that what was going on in their own life or those close to them shaped the idea.)

While the appeal of the works varied significantly, overall this was a fun and intriguing read. The works included are as follows:

1.) Her Furry Face by Leigh Kennedy
A primate handler who is in a waning marriage falls for one of his super-intelligent orangutan students.

2.) War Bride by Rick Wilbur
The world is going to end tomorrow unless you’ve been taken as a pet by one of the aliens.

3.) How’s the Night Life on Cissalda by Harlan Ellison
A man sent to investigate an alien race becomes inextricably sexually entangled with one of the aliens. Eventually, he’s forcibly separated from the alien—of a race that are apparently thin-skinned—and lives to see the descent of mankind.

4.) The Jamesburg Incubus by Scott Baker
A teacher in a Catholic school finds that he can make out-of-body nocturnal visits to some of his more attractive female students.

5.) Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex by Larry Niven
This reads more like an essay than a short story. The work delves into the physics of why sex with Superman would be fatal for Lois Lane.

6.) The First Time by K.W. Jeter
This is a variation on the old coming of age story in which a young man is taken to a brothel for his first sexual encounter. It’s just that this encounter is of the 3rd kind.

7.) The Jungle Rot Kid on the Nod by Philip José Farmer
The premise behind the story is what if William S. Burroughs (author of Naked Lunch) had written the Tarzan stories instead of Edgar Rice Burroughs. In essence, it’s a risqué take on Tarzan.

8.) Husbands by Lisa Tuttle
After the extinction of husbands, a woman develops a new species to serve the companion role.

9.) When the Fathers Go by Bruce McAllister
A husband confesses to his wife that while she was in stasis waiting for him to come back from interplanetary travel, he sired a child with an alien. Furthermore, the child is coming to live with them. But wait there’s more…

10.) Dancing Chickens by Edward Bryant
This story reads more like an overly elaborate joke than a short story. It begins with the question, “What do aliens want?” and ends with a pun punch line. That being said, the lead is an unappealing but intriguing character.

11.) Roadside Rescue by Pat Cadigan
A stranded motorist is made an indecent proposal by a chauffeur on behalf of his alien employer.

12.) Omnisexual by Geoff Ryman
This is about an intergalactic brothel, but it’s the story in the collection that reads most like literary fiction—meant in both the best and worst possible ways.

13.) All My Darling Daughters by Connie Willis
While there are several really good works in this anthology, I’d have to rank this as my favorite—if only by a narrow victory. A sassy, sexually-liberated co-ed has her sex life torn asunder when all the young men come back from break with little, furry creatures in their possession and no interest in the female student body. Besides a neat concept for a story (though it may be implying that men are overwhelmingly rapey), the author does a great job of character development making the lead character both interesting and likable, while juxtaposing her with her apparently goodie two-shoes roommate.

14.) Arousal by Richard Christian Matheson
A woman who cheats on her husband with a stranger is cursed with permanent post-coital euphoria that swamps all interest in her family and life in general.

15.) Scales by Lewis Shiner
A woman’s husband is having an affair with what she thinks is a student assistant, but who turns out to be a soul-sucking seductress from the netherworld.

16.) Saving the World at the New Moon Hotel by Roberta Lannes
A woman waiting for her spouse to meet her at a bar to apologize for his infidelities decides to get a little herself. The man she hooks up with turns out not to be a man at all.

17.) And I Awoke and Found Me Here on the Cold Hill’s Side James Tiptree, Jr.
An experienced man offers advice to a newbie to get away before he ends up seduced by the aliens. This story talks about sex, but is about something much broader.

18.) Picture Planes Michaela Roessner
This one is a poem about alien sex, rather than a story. It stands alone as the only non-prose entry.

19.) Love and Sex Among the Invertebrates Pat Murphy
In a post-apocalyptic world, a dying scientist–who no longer believes in science–creates robots capable of engaging in the act. The creatures she makes are based on a range of real animals which are written about interspersed with the story-line.

I’d recommend this book for those who enjoy science fiction. One need not be into erotica to enjoy the stories and, the more one is seeking erotica, the less appeal the book may have. It’s a collection of big name writers in science-fiction, and the anthology’s diversity makes it particularly interesting.

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BOOK REVIEW: Dawn by Octavia Butler

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Dawn (Xenogenesis, #1)Dawn by Octavia E. Butler

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Amazon page

Dawn is the story of a woman, Lilith, who awakens in the custody of aliens. This is no run-of-the-mill alien abduction. Lilith is one of a small number of human survivors of nuclear holocaust. The aliens are akin to a merchant ship that comes upon the survivor-baring life rafts of a sunken cruise ship—or at least they appear to be. They offer rescue, the hope of survival, and a promise to allow human survivors to rebuild their society in a low-radiation area of Earth when they are sufficiently trained in the necessary survival skills.

However, for Lilith the situation is not akin to shipwreck rescue because there’s a stark in-group / out-group conflict to get over. And it features the most challenging and terrifying out-group imaginable—an intelligent alien race. Lilith instinctively fears and distrusts the aliens. She discovers that she’s been awakened and put back in stasis on more than one occasion. While Lilith’s fear turns out to be unfounded, her distrust proves sound. The aliens genuinely want to help the humans and mean them no harm, but they do have their own plans and see a means to benefit from their interaction with humanity. While the aliens don’t lie, they do withhold information, only gradually doling it out as they see fit. As Lilith’s fear subsides and her trust–at least in a limited sense–grows, this restricted information is a constant source of tension between Lilith and her alien handlers.

While Lilith is initially terrified and completely incapable of interacting with the aliens, she does by gradual turns accept the truth of the situation and begins to interact with the aliens, trying to discover their end-game. Her (relatively) calm and open-minded nature was—in part–why she was chosen. She’s to be a liaison between other newly awakened human survivors and the aliens. She and the humans she has already awakened will be the only beings that the newly awakened humans will see until they are deemed ready by the aliens. Of course, this makes Lilith distrusted among her fellow humans. Most of them are frozen in a Cold War mindset and think they are under the control of the Russians, refusing to believe the “nonsense” about aliens.

The heart of this novel is about Lilith being unwillingly cast as both Uncle Tom and Judas Goat to her fellow survivors. She has powers, albeit limited, granted to her by the aliens, and these only make her more suspect. These include the ability to awaken humans from stasis and to reconfigure the area in which they live, but it also includes rapid healing and enhanced physical capacities. These are given her so she can hold her own against the hostile newly awakened. The aliens know there will be physically violent individuals because they experienced it firsthand. In fact, they are hoping that using Lilith as an intermediary will ease this proclivity. However, it does nothing of the kind, and instead makes Lilith and those who are close to her targets for the rest.

This book is sci-fi because it’s futuristic, speculates about alien life, and proposes a world in which amazing technological advances have been made. However, if there was a genre called psych-fi (psychological fiction), it might be more apropos. The heart of this story is about fear and trust, and how people treat in-group and out-group people and those seen as crossing over. It also addresses the issue of the dissolution of in-group characteristics and the innate fear that creates. What if humanity does not survive, but rather some race that is in large part human, but also inhuman?

Warning to the squeamish, there’s a recurring theme of attempted rape in the book. In the first case, this is visceral and believable. However, there’s a straining of credulity when people later are coming straight out of stasis and succumbing to their most base prurient urges. Sex is a powerful driver, but in such a situation it would seem that more immediate survival drivers would dominate. In other words, it has to be the rare horn-dog who wakes up from a 300 year stasis aboard an alien vessel, and the first thing he thinks of is getting his freak on.

I enjoyed this book and found it quite thought-provoking. The concept hooked me from the start. Butler’s use of language can be beautiful, but she doesn’t go overboard with elaborate language that distracts or bogs down the story.

This book could be enjoyed not only by fans of science fiction, but by those who like a good story in general and, in particular, those who like to think about what makes people tick.

It should be mentioned that this is the first book of a trilogy. The other books are Adulthood Rites and Imago, respectively. The entire trilogy, often called the Xenogenesis trilogy, can be purchased in one volume entitled Lilith’s Brood.

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POEM: Human Farm of Underachieving Aliens

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IMG_2485

What if the world that we know

is just a two-bit reality show

or some high-def video game?

Wouldn’t it be terrible lame,

if we were the toys of an alien race

of underachievers from deep outer space?

What if our planet currently resided

on a beat-up, old card-table–lopsided,

in the basement of a strung-out dude

who sat around in a cloud in the nude?

What if all of the wonder and foreboding

is just the result of some skillful encoding?

BOOK REVIEW: Justice League Vol. 1: Origin by Geoff Johns

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Justice League, Vol. 1: OriginJustice League, Vol. 1: Origin by Geoff Johns

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Amazon Page

Amazon had the Kindle edition of this graphic novel on sale recently. With all the talk of a Justice League movie, and whether it can ever get off the ground, my curiosity in these characters was piqued.

This volume was released in August of 2011 as the leading edge of a reboot of the entire DC comics line called “the New 52.” This is the origin story for the Justice League as a team, though all but one of the individual characters–Cyborg–is an existing hero at the time the story begins. The other characters, i.e. Batman, Green Lantern, Superman, Flash, Wonder Woman and Aquaman are familiar to the world but are not well liked. (and are introduced into the story arc in that order.)The volume consists of Issues #1 – 6 of the Justice League [New 52] reboot.

In the beginning, there’s only one dyad among this group who knows each other personally, the Green Lantern and the Flash–we don’t really know how they know each other. Most of the other characters are aware of each other’s existence (or myth), but have never met. Of course, Cyborg doesn’t exist at the beginning of the story, and his individual origin story is woven in throughout the book as a subplot so that he can be introduced into the arc at the climax. The characters are assumed to each operate in his (or her) own domains, i.e. Gotham City, Metropolis, Coast City, Central City, etc.

As the story opens, Batman is chasing down a stocky, non-human creature on the roof tops of Gotham in order to try to figure out what the nefarious character is up to. Green Lantern is inexplicably introduced into the middle of this chase scene. Batman and Green Lantern viscerally despise each other from the get go. This isn’t surprising as Green Lantern is an arrogant ass throughout the entire story. Perhaps the highlight of the book (which is sad as it happens so early) is when Lantern is busy mocking Batman, and the Dark Knight steals his ring–the source of his power–right off his finger.

The Green Lantern and Batman witness the inhuman creature planting a piece of alien-looking technology (later revealed to be a “mother box”), and Green Lantern’s ring confirms it to be otherworldly. The pair decide to pay a visit to the Earth’s resident alien, a.k.a. Superman. Green Lantern immediately runs afoul of Superman, arrogantly thinking he can subdue the Man of Steel, and has to call his old friend the Flash. The quartet finally stop fighting and begrudgingly agree to put their heads together.

After seeing a piece of the Cyborg origin story, we are introduced to Wonder Woman. She is probably the character that we get the greatest sense of. (Besides Lantern, who is unlikable throughout.] The Amazonian seems more alien than Superman. She’s never had ice cream but loves it, but not quite as much as a good fight. She’s not emotional about fighting, neither fearful nor angry, but is at her most happy when fighting. She’s the character most out of touch with the world she is occupies. She joins up with the four in the chase for the winged, alien monsters, forming a quintet and instilling some gender equity.

The Cyborg origin story comes to a head when Silas Stone, a brilliant defense industry scientist, turns his dying son, Victor, into the Cyborg, thinking it the only way to save the young man after he suffered severe burns from a mother box explosion. The former star football player is now a kind of Frankenstein’s monster, part himself and part autonomous machine. There’s a cacophony in his head as he can now pick up various radio signals.

It’s shortly thereafter that Aquaman is introduced. Considerable artistic effort was put into manning up Aguaman, who always seemed the weak link in this team. The group happens to be standing around near the water when Aquaman and his fish minions chase some of the evil army to the surface

The enemy is Darkseid, a juggernaut warlord from another world (or a parallel universe), whose army of evil minions have been the ones that the newly formed League have been fighting both individually and as a group. When Cyborg goes running away from his father–and his creator as a machine-man, he runs into the six superheroes, and the team of seven is fully assembled. Darkseid’s power is so great that he relatively easily captures and subdues Superman.

Batman goes to rescue Superman as the rest of the team regroups. The Dark Knight’s tactic is letting one of the evil, winged, juggernaut minions capture him–as they have been capturing others.

I won’t spoil the ending, but will say that it was pretty weak, and a large part of the reason I gave this work such a low rating.

A two star rating may seem a little harsh. The dialogue in this work is better than most comic books. There’s relatively less “As you know, Bob,…” style exposition. There is some, as when Green Lantern feels the need to explain to Batman about how there are other Green Lanterns and this is his space sector. However, there are also clever uses of action to present background, as when Lantern begins to admit that he’s a show-off and it turns out he’s brushing up against Wonder Woman’s truth lasso. (This is a much better way to do it than Wonder Woman saying, “And now my lasso is around you and you’ll have to tell the truth, for whosoever the lasso touches cannot bear false witness.” Which would be the typical comic book way of revealing the lasso’s power.)

There are two problems with this work that are too serious to overlook. First is the deus ex machina ending. The authors make a bold choice as to who will save the day, perhaps to create surprise and perhaps to highlight the character. But the whole resolution strains credulity. Second, there is no good explanation for why these characters keep piling into each other (except for the Xenophobic thought processes of Batman and the Green Lantern that Superman must know about anything alien.) These evil minions are supposedly everywhere, and yet the individual superheroes keep running into each other–and continuing to stay together despite the fact that most of them clearly don’t like the others. I think the author takes this “we hate each other, but are begrudgingly working together” trope a little too far. It feels as if this Wizard of Oz cast hadn’t come together by commonly following the yellow brick road, but rather that seven separate and randomly moving tornadoes picked up one each and just happened to stack them in a neat pile.

Besides Green Lantern being arrogant and unlikable and Wonder Woman being endearingly alien, we get very little sense of individual characters. Batman and the Flash are the voices of reason of two differing type, but Superman and Aquaman are just muscle.

I have a black and white Kindle, but the art looked good to me–but that’s not my forte. I applaud the artists for getting rid of Superman’s red tighty-whities and making Aquaman look more manly. At the end there’s some alternative artwork and info on costume development for those who geek out on such things.

If there’s any hope for a Justice League movie, it’s not to be found in this story line. If you’re a DC fan, you’ve already read this–like it or not. If you’re wondering whether to become a DC fan, I wouldn’t start here.

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BOOK REVIEW: Seven Spiritual Laws of Superheroes by Deepak Chopra

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The Seven Spiritual Laws of Superheroes: Harnessing Our Power to Change the WorldThe Seven Spiritual Laws of Superheroes: Harnessing Our Power to Change the World by Deepak Chopra

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

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This is Deepak Chopra’s attempt to capitalize on society’s fascination with superheroes. By “capitalize” I’m not necessarily saying to “make money off of,” but perhaps to “use to his advantage in conveying his lessons.” [I’ll leave it to the reader to make judgments about the former.] There are books on the physics of superheroes, the philosophy of superheroes, and the mythology of superheroes, so why shouldn’t there be a book on the spiritual life of superheroes?

The book uses both the superheroes of mythology—i.e. Indian, Greek, Judeo-Christian, Muslim, and others—as well as the superheroes of comic books. While Chopra’s knowledge of the former is considerable, he enlists the co-authorship of his son Gotham (not named after Bruce Wayne’s hometown) to offer insight into the latter.

This book is also intended to capitalize (again, take that as you see fit) upon Chopra’s best-selling book, The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success, but without rehashing the same laws. The Seven Spiritual Laws of Superheroes format is as straightforward as its title. There are seven chapters, each corresponding to one of Chopra’s laws. Said laws address balance, transformation, power, love, creativity, intention, and transcendence.

As I read the book, there was something that rubbed me the wrong way about the writing. It wasn’t that I had major disagreement with Chopra’s ideas, but rather the way he was stating them. At first I thought this was the use of gratuitous assertion. He often began chapters with detailed statements about what superheroes are, do, believe, and understand without much—if any–substantiation of these claims. However, as I got into the first chapter I noticed that he would put one section in each chapter that discussed an example in-depth, offering at least anecdotal support for his claims.

This still left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth. It was because he used general statements like “superheroes know…” and “superheroes understand…,” and then provided a solitary example that fit his statement well, but leaving a vast cast of heroes that didn’t. It seemed a low form of inductive reasoning. In other words, he was attributing an enlightened way of thinking and acting to characters like Hulk and Wolverine.

Chopra and his supporters might make the claim that saying, “The Hulk understands X [insert any of the laws here]” doesn’t necessarily mean he understands them as an intellectual exercise, but rather that he shows this understanding through his behavior. Let me give a story that may make my meaning clearer.

An economist is giving a lecture on consumer behavior. Someone in the audience says, “Professor, how could consumers possibly behave in the way you suggest? Your theory requires complex Lagrangian optimization mathematics, which very few of them understand?”

The Professor replies, “Most of them don’t understand Newton’s work either, but they obey the Law of Gravity without fail.”

I thought about Chopra’s statements from this perspective, but concluded that his point was probably something entirely different. As an author of self-help books about the mind, when Chopra says “Superheroes understand X,” he’s not saying “Each and every superhero understands X,” but instead he’s saying, “If you want to be a superhero, you need to understand X.”

Accepting that that’s what Chopra meant, only one more qualm with the book remained. Laws can be clearly stated (OK, perhaps not tax law, but laws of physics—which seem to be more the kind of law he seeks to emulate), but Chopra’s discussion of his “laws” is vague and ill-defined. Each chapter begins with a large-font italics statement. I don’t know if this is supposed to be “the law” or not. It usually begins with a definition (some vaguely stated) and then statements that superheroes comport themselves in accordance with said definition. Maybe the unstated laws are supposed to be, “Superheroes live a life of balance,” and so on for the other chapters. As one trained as an economist, I’m well-aware of the wide-spread overuse of the term “law,” and maybe the ill-defined nature of Chopra’s laws is a recognition of this.

This book is written for Chopra’s usual audience of seekers of enlightenment. I don’t know that it’ll do well with hard-core science fiction or comic fans, and I don’t know that the Venn intersect of “spiritual self-help readers” and “comic book fans” is as big as Chopra would like. (But, I could be wrong.) Some of Chopra’s ideas about the potential spiritual ramifications of “quantum entanglement” are quite popular with sci-fi fans, but I’m not sure that that offers this book a clear audience. (It might. Chopra is a trained physician, and has some scientific bona fides—unlike many who share shelf space with him and who exist in a spiritual plane entirely unrelated to the world as we know it.)

All this being said, there are some thought-provoking ideas in this book, and the superhero and mythological examples help entertain and—in doing so—become the spoon of sugar that makes the medicine go down. Another testimonial is that I read most of this book in a single sitting, and I tend to jump from a chapter in one book to another book unless something really holds my interest.

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