A slow-burner, this book creeps on you! An interesting take on the superhero theme by writing from the perspective of a young powerless teenage boy - but he has his own strengths!

Loved this book - I had not been sure about whether or not I wanted to read it but once I started I was quickly hooked.

This is the story of David growing up, on the cusp of adulthood. He is trying to get to grips with the death of his father, his relationships with his mother and friends. He is also grappling with the concept of ‘girls’.

He shares secrets with Holly and has to face his greatest secret - his failure to save his father.

A grown up read but well worth grappling with.

This book was rather slow. The main character is a teenage boy, a fact you are not able to forget since so much of the book is him fantasizing about two different girls. He also has visions of himself as a superhero trying to save his dad from his death. Mental illness plays a role in this book and I was happy with how the mother addressed it at the end. She admits anger but also anger at herself for being angry since she knows that mental illness was to blame.

To an outsider, sixteen year old David looks and behaves much like any other guy his age - prefers his own company and hanging out in his bedroom to almost anything else. Maybe he's a little less social than others, but he's been through a rough time since his dad died in a car accident, so for a while friends and family have been prepared to cut him some slack. Now though, when they feel he ought to be getting his act together and putting the past behind him, David seems to be getting increasingly unsocial, obsessed with his dad's old super-hero comics and getting decidedly secretive. What his friends don't know is that David has superpowers himself. His super-hearing allows him to eavesdrop on conversations, being invisible means no one notices him (particularly girls) and his ability to fly lets him swoop over the town to help prevent accidents - or so he would like to think. He has another secret too, one that he's equally anxious to hide - that he's using a bird-watching scope to spy on his slightly older, attractive, bikini-clad neighbour, Holly. In doing so he stumbles on a very personal secret she'd like to keep hidden too. When he confronts her, the two form an unlikely bond, with Holly offering practical advice on the mysterious subject of girls and sex, while David tries his best to help her, but puts almost every foot wrong.


This is a story of being that awkward age between child and adult, of learning to accept that we can't always change things to be how we would like, and of first experiments with the opposite sex.
To be honest, especially perhaps from an adult's point of view, David isn't instantly likeable. He's too self-absorbed, too quick to lie to his mum and drag his best friend into the deception too, zooming in on his sunbathing female neighbour isn't polite, and as for imagining he has super-powers? isn't that a bit childish? But give him chance and he begins to grow on you. even when his behaviour is definitely cringe-worthy. It's easy of course to read a story and tell the hero he's making a mess of things, pulling all the wrong moves and making himself look foolish, arrogant and seriously un-cool, but that's how life is, particularly teenage life - full of mistakes we wish we'd avoided, and chances we've missed out on. The author could have created a teen hero who was, well, just that, a hero, the perfect guy in every respect, but David with all his flaws is far nearer to a real teenager, someone that readers can empathise with, and maybe it will give female readers an insight into that most mysterious of places, a teenage boy's mind.

Easy to read and an interesting premise, but had to stop reading as soon as there was a half naked woman and a teenage boy watching her through a telescope. It's just not something I'm comfortable with.

This was really not the book for me. There's a certain kind of book that's written about selfish teenage boys who only think about sex all the time. I know that according to a lot of people and the media that this is accurate to teenage boys, but I really just don't believe it. Some of the selfishness can be accounted for by the depression, but mostly I didn't believe it.

The superpower element was interesting and it was a good way to show David processing events, but the artwork wasn't to my taste at all and again, so much of it was centred around sex and David watching Holly through the scope that it really put me off.

I also felt that there was barely any personality written for the girls at all. Holly was beginning to develop a bit towards the end, but other than sunbathing and a crush on Robert Downey Jr, she really didn't have much of a life outside of helping David through his grief. Ellen had even less going for her. She was just there for David to lust after.

In all. I just didn't like this book. If it hadn't been for review, I probably wouldn't have bothered finishing it.

Text of abbreviated WordPress blog review
Edited to add Link to full post:



(Synopsis) ........

Review:

Well firstly, Thank you Mr Priestley! I finally finished reading Superpowerless at 5:17am. Luckily I wasn't working that morning, otherwise i might have just cried at a 7am alarm....
"I think about sex all the time. All the time. Well, sex and death and comics." or so 16 year old David admits to the older, and certainly more streetwise Holly; his neighbour, and the object of his teenage fantasies. Strange circumstances make them friends as David comes to terms with his grief and feelings of helplessness at being unable to 'save' his father, his loneliness after withdrawing from friendships, his infatuation for Holly, and his uncertainty over girls, sex and relationships. Holly struggles with her own demons regarding selfworth, and failed and unhealthy relationships.
Obsessed with the comic books left behind by his father, David attempts to rationalise his feelings by constructing a superpowered alterego.
Torn between his loneliness and his belief that with the mantle of superhero comes a necessity to be alone and unknown, he spends his days watching the neighbourhood through his dad's old telescope and imagining how it would feel to fly unseen and unhindered by the constraints of 'normal life'.
Through his own loneliness, grief and uncertainty; he finds it increasingly difficult to reach out and connect with those around him.

Thoughts:

Whilst unlike my usual choice of reading material, I very much enjoyed this book (probably made obvious by the aforementioned 5:17am fiasco!) and wouldn't hesitate to recommend it to anyone who enjoys YA fiction. I particularly think it would resonate with teenagers struggling with their own perceptions of not fitting in, and/or those trying to come to terms with prior loss.

(About The Author)....


I rate this a 4/5 stars read