The Darker Mask: Heroes from the Shadows
Summer has brought us countless movies about angst-ridden superheroes, so why not anthologies about them, too? On the heels of WHO CAN SAVE US NOW? comes THE DARKER MASK: HEROES FROM THE SHADOWS (also available simultaneously in paperback). Like WHO, MASK is less interested in costumed derring-do than real-life characters. True to its title, it also paints many a picture in a palette colored bleak.
Although some well-known authors contribute to the project — among them, Walter Mosley, Tananarive Due, L.A. Banks and Peter Spiegelman — some of its brighter spots come from lesser-known and unknown talents. Naomi Hirahara’s “Tat Master” refers to a quiet woman who’s run away from something in Japan, but unfortunately has followed her to America.
In Ann Nocenti’s “Switchback,” a young woman has the power to enter others’ bodies temporarily to get them to do her bidding. Meanwhile, an unpopular girl in high school learns she can dream the future, in Alexandra Sokoloff’s “The Edge of Seventeen,” and that others share her dream, which is classified as a nightmare. If these stories sound like something out of TV’s HEROES, your assumption is pretty valid.
Many tales are absolutely depressing, like Michael A. Gonzales’ “The Whores of Onyx City,” where the future looks anything but bright — a postapocalyptic scenario of disease and drugs, of sex and segregation. A few offer levity, like “Henchman,” in which Mat Johnson discusses the fringe benefits of being a villain’s hired muscle, and Lorenzo Carcaterra ventures into quasi-E.C. territory in “The Strega’s Last Dance.”
And yet many don’t seem like they fit DARKER MASK’s theme. Without singling out any offenders, I read several and couldn’t figure out why they were included, even stretching the definition of “hero” to normal folks doing something extraordinary and selfless. And to draw another comparison to WHO, the whole is a mixed bag, and one that could use a little more punch. —Rod Lott
“It seemed pointless to administer an antibiotic, as everyone hiding in that indentation of rock can smell the pus seeping from the wounded woman’s vagina.”
OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF WALTER MOSLEY:
• THE WAVE by Walter Mosley
OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF ALEXANDRA SOKOLOFF:
• THE HARROWING by Alexandra Sokoloff
• THE PRICE by Alexandra Sokoloff
Didn’t Naomi Hirahara win an Edgar Award? I think that lifts her above the “lesser-known and unknown talents” rabble.
I knew someone was going to call me on that. She did indeed win an Edgar, but compared to the big names mentioned, I don’t think she yet has their name recognition. Mind you, this is no slight to her talent.
Another superhero anthology already? I’ve known about Who Can Save Us Now? longer than this one, plus this one doesn’t sound quite as good, so this one will have to wait a while.
…you say depressing like its a bad thing.
Being depressed is no fun, but no, it doesn’t mean your story wasn’t good, Michael!
OK I have to step in because you are likely biting on my pisano Lorenzo Carcaterra. That Strega is as much a “hero” even superhero as anyone because who in real life or fiction stood up to Mafiosi in Hell’s Kitchen in the 1950s? As for lesser known talents, Carcaterra’s “Sleepers” even before the Pitt-Deniro flick, has likely outsold Mosley. I think it was a heads-up move on the editor’s part.
Speaking of the editors–is it me or does Chambers’s “Avatar” (I guess the Sweeper–savior of mankind) look suspiciously like Barack Obama? LOL
There’s no slight on Carcaterra at all in my review. He’s not mentioned in the line of “lesser-known talents.”
Yeah but I think you felt his wasn’t a “hero,” and I think that’s unfair & inaccurate.
And I wasn’t being judgmental re: Chambers’s story’s artwork as plainly he wrote the story and it was illustrated well before all of this election nonsense. Yet look closely at the Sweeper’s face and garb. Given the subject matter, it’s a bizarre coincidence.
I had to go back and read my review to make sure, Ruvitoso, but no, I didn’t say, imply or even think that about Carcaterra’s story.