Ex-Heroes

Ex-Heroes by Peter Clines

Combining superheroes and zombies is an interesting concept that, at first, seems like it would be too much. For the most part, though, Ex-Heroes worked for me. You can tell the author really likes his characters and is highly invested in them. He did a good job of bringing everything together. In the end, I was left wishing there had been more.

There is so much background to this story that it takes a long time telling. I feel like the actual plot of Ex-Heroes doesn’t begin until almost two-thirds of the way through it. I liked reading some of the background, especially the heroes’ autobiographical chapters—that stuff was interesting, and helped shape my idea of who these heroes were as characters—but there was way too much of it. And most of it was fairly boring. It may have been better served in smaller doses. The actual story was really good, though, and it was short-changed by all the background. The heroes’ discovery of the zombie virus’ origin, for example, is a big deal issue that could have been given more attention. This novel could have used another 75-100 pages of the actual plot.

One of the things I liked most about Ex-Heroes is that the majority of people behaved like real people. I rarely found myself saying, “people don’t act like that.” Clines did a good job of expressing human nature throughout, and he did so without utilizing a lot of stereotypes and clichés.

I said “a lot”, not “none” because the bad guys were mostly nothing but stereotypes and clichés. All the people were something other than normal—bald, colored hair, tattoos, etc.—were with the bad guys. Even among the superheroes, all, except Zzzap, whose superhero form was something other than humanoid ended up with the bad guys. Very simplistic good vs. evil battle lines were drawn, and I didn’t like that too much. This story was capable of more than that.

Some of the characters, like St. George and Gorgon, were great. Others, not so much. Something bugged me about Danielle, but Stealth was, for me, the worst. In her autobiographical chapter, she came across as a Mary Sue supermodel doubling as, essentially, the smartest woman ever. Throughout the rest of the novel, she’s an odd combination of Dr. Spock from Star Trek and Vicki from Small Wonder. She is the one example of character who doesn’t feel real. Instead, Stealth comes across as the author’s lifelong sexual fantasy. She’s out of place in this story. But she’s the leader.

My biggest issue was that the author made me wonder about isms. I don't like it when authors write with expectation of receiving benefit of the doubt in regards to isms. The bad guys being a Latin gang wasn't suspicious by itself. But where were the Latinos on the good side? Asian women took a beating in the book. And then there's this question: what made the gang's sanctuary so bad? In the end, we learn about their involvement with zombies, but before that, there was no reason to view them as enemies except that they didn't follow the superheroes. The idea that people are bad just because they don't agree with you is a bad one. That rubbed me in a bad way.

Still, I mostly like Ex-Heroes. I wanted more out of it, but I’m not overly disappointed with what I got. I’ll definitely read the sequel.

C