Gizmo's Reviews: #Saturday Review - Powerless by Tera Lynn Childs/Tracy Deebs (YA Science Fiction)

Series: The Hero Agenda # 1
Format: Hardcover, 308 pages
Release Date: June 2, 2015
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Source: Library
Genre: YA, Science Fiction

Kenna is tired of being "normal".

The only thing special about her is that she isn't special at all. Which is frustrating in a world of absolutes. Villains, like the one who killed her father, are bad. Heroes, like her mother and best friend, are good. And Kenna, unlike everyone else around her, is completely ordinary— which she hates.

She’s secretly working on an experiment that will land her a place among the Heroes, but when a Villain saves her life during a break-in at her lab, Kenna discovers there’s a whole lot of gray area when it comes to good and evil and who she can trust.. After all…not all strength comes from superpowers.

Powerless, by authors Tera Lynn Childs (Fins, Medusa Girls) and Tracy Deebs (Tempest), is the first installment in The Hero Agenda duology. The story is narrated by Kenna Swift, a teenager who has grown up among villains and superheroes. In fact, her own mother Jeanine is a famous scientist who has developed a slew of toys for superheroes, and her father was once one of the best superheroes around before being killed.

"Three days ago, I was an ordinary girl in a superhero world. It wasn't ideal, but it was tolerable. It was normal. It made sense. Black was Black and white was white. Good was good, and bad was...bad. Villains were bad. Now, everything is Topsy turvy. Nothing makes sense."

If that weren't enough, her best friend Rebel Malone (Telekinesis) and ex-boyfriend Jeremy (Technopath) have incredible powers as well. Kenna isn't necessarily powerless thanks to her own mothers secret formula that has made her impervious to all superpowers. Even so, Kenna secretly decides that she will design her own formula that will make her more than normal and thus able to fight her own battles when the time comes.

But, after encountering three villains searching her mother's lab for one of their own, and they don't kill her, in fact one just happens to save her life twice, Kenna begins to question her prejudices towards the bad guys. With her best friend Rebel dating a villain, and her mother vanishing without a trace, Kenna begins the treacherous journey of discovering that things aren't always greener on the other side of the highway. It will take a combination of both villains and so called heroes to join together and discover what the Superhero Collective is really up to.

Let's talk about the secondary characters. I loved Jeremy even though he is clearly a geek with major conspiracy theories which, after you take a moment to think about, don't seem all that far fetched. Rebel is the best friend who has known about Kenna's secret for almost as long as they've known each other. With her dating Dante, the so called villain, Kenna begins to doubt everything she's told.

The romance between Draven, a so called villain, and Kenna is a bit on the predictable side. It was fun watching them hatch out their differences. It was fun watching Kenna stand up for herself and not have rely on anyone to help her. But, almost from the moment they met, you knew they would end up together. There is a bit of a comic relief to the book as well. That comedy comes from Nitro, who is also supposed to be a villain.

Yes, this book is action packed and filled with questions that any good conspiracy theorist would love to acknowledge. Yes, there is a cliffhanger ending that just grabs you by the neck, and forces you not to look away. Yes, readers will love Kenna because she proves that you don't need special abilities to save yourself from those who are much more powerful than you are. Yes, there are plenty of secrets that I will not spill since it's a major point in the story where Kenna gets a major wake up call.

I do have the second book called Relentless ready to go on my Kindle, but will wait closer to the actual release date before posting my review.