Starter Villain by John Scalzi (2023)

 

Villain (n)  A professional disrupter, not necessarily evil. Services are available by subscription.

I am frequently drawn to a book by its cover and more often than not, the inside cover confirms I want to read it. Villian Starter was one such book. Who wouldn’t want to read about super intelligent cat spies who can talk and dolphins threatening to go on strike? 

Charlie Fitzer's life is going nowhere fast. The former business reporter turned substitute teacher is divorced and living in his deceased father’s house which his siblings want to sell out from under him. All Charlie wants to do is buy the downtown pub and live a quiet life with his cat. Everything changes when his billionaire uncle Jake, last seen when Charlie was five years old, dies and leaves his supervillain business (complete with island volcano lair) to Charlie. Unfortunately, Charlie also inherits uncle Jake's enemies who now want to kill him.

After his house is blown up, Charlie moves to the volcano lair and is guided in his new life by Mathilda Morrison, his uncle’s right-hand woman, now his. It's up to Charlie to win the war his uncle started against the other supervillains. But first he must attend the mysterious Lombardy Convocation, a consortium of all supervillains. And there are also labor negotiations with the Cetacean Association of the Americas, Chapter One.

The book is very well written and hard to put down. The whole thing is absurd but it’s a vastly entertaining read. I highly recommend it.

4.3 stars on Goodreads, 4.6 on Amazon

Blind Spots by Thomas Mullen (2023)

 

Seven years before the story begins, the entire world was hit with a fast moving virus (“The Blinding”), resulting in complete blindness for the entire population. Millions of people died that first year due to panic and the resulting drug overdoses, suicides, rioting, and fires. The following year, Eye Tech, now the most powerful corporation in the world, introduced a cranial implant called a vidder which downloads visual information directly into the brain on what the eyes should be seeing. Blind Spots is the story of what happens when someone learns to hack the technology and can change what the wearer sees.

Homicide detective Mark Owens has been on the force since before The Blinding. When a scientist is murdered and the only witness insists the killer was blacked out of her vision, Owens doesn’t believe her―until he experiences the phenomena himself. No one believes him either until they witness the same thing right before they die. Suspects range from the tech billionaire who designed the vidder to anti-modernity cultists. Owens must investigate them all knowing he can’t trust his own eyes. Parallel to the murder plotline is the internal affairs investigation into the suicide of Owens’s wife Jeanie.

The reader can’t help but draw parallels to today’s world- the COVID pandemic, those that get vaccine and those that won’t or can’t afford it, search engine type results, complete with pop-ups, fake news, and corporations that hold the real power. I found Blind Spots a fascinating read.

3.89 stars on Goodreads, 4.1 on Amazon