Matt Carter's debut novel, Almost Infamous, explores superpowers with a distinctive, realistic perspective. If the good guys always win, what will they do when they run out of bad guys?
Aidan Salt, 18 years old and looking for attention, shrugs on a leather jacket and slams a motorcycle helmet onto his head to become supervillain Apex Strike. When his first foray into the public eye ends up killing a C-lister superhero, Aidan's evil alter ego becomes a lightning rod for a secret project run by a cabal of superheroes looking to reclaim some of their former glory.
The heroes round up Aidan and several dozen other potential villains, and cordon them off on a secret island to train them to become the next group of supervillains. Newfound notoriety comes with a price, however: the threat of a mysterious prison hangs over anyone who reveals the secret.
Aidan and the newly chosen baddies get caught up in the superstar lifestyle--full of sex, drugs and rock-and-roll--until they begin to realize just how hollow their lives and victories have become. It's up to Apex Strike to lead his friends in an epic battle against the very heroes who set them up in the first place.
The comic book-flavored Almost Infamous zips with uncanny momentum while Carter performs literary sleight-of-hand, building an ostensibly comic novel that brings with it a surprising sense of poignancy and pathos. --Rob LeFebvre, freelance writer and editor