Jet and Iridium went through superhero training school together as teenagers. Then things change and they become archenemies; Jet the hero and Iridium the villain. However there is much more going on in this book then a simple superhero story. The book goes back and forth between Jet and Iri's time at the academy and the present. The story touches on many issues from homosexuality to human experimentation, however it still moves along at a pace fast enough for the most impatient reader. ( )

Jet and Iridium went through superhero training school together as teenagers. Then things change and they become archenemies; Jet the hero and Iridium the villain. However there is much more going on in this book then a simple superhero story. The book goes back and forth between Jet and Iri's time at the academy and the present. The story touches on many issues from homosexuality to human experimentation, however it still moves along at a pace fast enough for the most impatient reader. ( )

Jet and Iridium went through superhero training school together as teenagers. Then things change and they become archenemies; Jet the hero and Iridium the villain. However there is much more going on in this book then a simple superhero story. The book goes back and forth between Jet and Iri's time at the academy and the present. The story touches on many issues from homosexuality to human experimentation, however it still moves along at a pace fast enough for the most impatient reader. ( )

Jet and Iridium went through superhero training school together as teenagers. Then things change and they become archenemies; Jet the hero and Iridium the villain. However there is much more going on in this book then a simple superhero story. The book goes back and forth between Jet and Iri's time at the academy and the present. The story touches on many issues from homosexuality to human experimentation, however it still moves along at a pace fast enough for the most impatient reader. ( )

This is a superhero book. Capes, flying, justice, supervillains - the whole shebang. But if what you're looking for is an action-packed story where heroes shoot lasers out of their eyes and save the city for a grateful populace, I don't think this is the book for you. This particular story is more about the complexities of friendship, and about power and control. The main characters are Jet, a shadow power whose father went insane and who fears the same fate, and Iridium, a light power whose father rebelled and went "rabid," and who has followed in his footsteps. Jet and Iridium were friends and partners in superhero school, but now Jet is the perfect corporate hero while Iridium is an outlaw and enemy to the Squadron of superheroes.

The worldbuilding here is pretty solid. It takes place about a hundred years in the future, and the world has become something of a craphole. There's a ton of crime and poverty, and most superhero activities involve protecting society from the crimes of renegade "extrahumans." They don't do much to stop everyday crime, so the streets are violent and dangerous, and poverty is pretty much everywhere. Heroes have corporate sponsors, and spend a lot of their time doing advertisements and posing for press releases. Regular people range from fanatical devotees of their favorite heroes, to violent members of the Everyman society, which wants to take the whole system down and eliminate everyone with a superpower. And behind everything is a corrupt system that is ripe for collapse.

I don't want to go too much into details about the story, because that's a big part of the journey here. Who can be trusted? Who's evil? Which side is the right one? (You'll think you know, but the last quarter of the book held some surprises. At least for me.) It was a slow starter for me, but I really enjoyed the epic finale. There's a sequel, and I think I need to find out what happened. Good payoff. ( )