Dreadnought (Nemesis, book 1) by April Daniels

[james_davis_nicoll]

Dreadnought (Nemesis, book 1) by April Daniels

Comments

[jessie_c]

I wish that it could be said that the transphobia in the book was exaggerated for the sake of drama, but it really isn't.

[james_davis_nicoll]

It gets worse in the sequel.

[(Anonymous)]

I hope it wasn't cribbed from the author's personal experience. Maybe a forlorn hope.

[kithrup]

When is book 2 coming out?

[james_davis_nicoll]

July.

[autopope]

Have read (and contributed a blurb for) the sequel. It solidly lives up to high explectations based on the first one.

[heron61]

I enjoyed it, and found it superior to Marion Harmon's Wearing the Cape (which it clearly has similarities to, and which I found too dull to finish, unlike this novel), but it was also odd, in that the vast majority of the superhero plot was predictable and unimpressive beach read/airplane read fluff, which the sections relating to the character's family and trans issues in general were, deeper, better written, and notably more complex.

It looks like superhero novels are on their way to becoming their own subgenre, and this is definitely a readable example, but I'd definitely like some better world-building and plotting.

[(Anonymous)]

That part of Danny's voice rang true for me.

I've taught high school for a generation now, and what Danny worried/obsessed about in the book is the kind of things that adolescents worry/obsess about. Likewise taking the world for granted (in this case, superheroes).

[neowolf2]

Wait, is that the same Doctor Impossible from Austin Grossman's Soon I Will Be Invincible?

Anyway, I keep buying books you review positively. This will be another one.

[james_davis_nicoll]

No, different Doctor Impossible.

[autopope]

One of these days I shall have to write a spoof superhero fic featuring Doctor Transcardinal, who iterated through several handles like "Doctor Impossible" and got terminally pissed off by other supes usurping his name, so he finally settled on an infinite one.

His lair is, of course, modelled on Hilbert's Hotel.

[neowolf2]

Doctor Ineffable? Doctor Inaccessible?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_large_cardinal_properties

[eub]

Doctor Super Almost Huge.

[scott_sanford]

Secret identities are a genre convention - but I have to admit that a whole body transformation with gender flip is a pretty good way to get people looking in the wrong direction. No doubt a teenager could manage to mess up that deflection very quickly.

[dsrtao]

It's not a reversible transform, in this case -- the superpower kernel looks around its new host and reworks it to fit the host's unconscious ideal form.

Which is great and wonderful and very very inconvenient for Danny, who would be much happier if it was either a costume-change or didn't happen until she gains legal majority. Of such things are plots devised, though.

Superhero names

[(Anonymous)]

Are superhero names in the story explained at all? This is Dreadnought because she got the complete mojo of the previous Dreadnought, who presumably was living the dream or hir own until the fatal encounter. Like Major Carol Danvers who was irradiated by Captain Mar-Vell's Psyche-Magnitron and eight years later became Ms. Marvel (and then Captain Marvel). So, "Dreadnought" basically means "fearless" with an overtone of a large battleship.

And "Doctor Impossible" sounds a lot like "Mister Fantastic" to me. Or maybe "Mister Immortal". Both flexible in their own way.

"Utopia" though implies a better society but possibly with strict rules, and, as the title of another novel portraying such a society, literally means "nowhere". So is Utopia an idealist? Maybe the kind of idealist who needs a lot of other people's money or a significant population reduction as part of their plan?

Robert Carnegie

Re: Superhero names

[james_davis_nicoll]

As is so often true, names are significant. Utopia would argue she wants the greatest good for the greatest number of people.

Re: Superhero names

[beamjockey]

Would Utilitaria have been a better name?

[magedragonfire]

It’s possible Danny has not noticed the pocket disparity between men’s and women’s clothes because superhero costumes for all genders generally don’t have pockets. Being skin-tight spandex or body armor and not much in between.

The solution to this problem is, of course: always more pouches.

[james_davis_nicoll]

Pouches come up in passing in the sequel :)

[roseembolism]

If you consider 1/200 a potentially civilization-crashing proportion of superhumans, you might want to consider My Hero academia, where 80% of the human race is gifted with super-abilities at some level. The superheroes have their work cut out for them.

[neowolf2]

Read and enjoyed. Looking forward to the sequel.