Five titles that explore the drawbacks of a superpowered life

Tobias Carroll is the managing editor of Vol.1 Brooklyn. He is the author of the short story collection Transitory and the novel Reel.

At Tor.com he writes:

operating as a superhero or supervillain would, in fact, be incredibly hard. Some of that has to do with the logistics of, say, maintaining a secret identity or operating a mysterious island base. And some involve the challenges of living in harsher world than the shared universes depicted in comics from Marvel and DC.

Carroll tagged five "very different books that might make you reconsider the whole 'power fantasy' aspects of superheroing or supervillainy." One title on the list:

The Dark Dark by Samantha Hunt

Samantha Hunt has been drawn to characters with supernatural talents—or the possibility of them–throughout her career. The protagonist of The Seas is a young woman who may or may not be a mermaid; characters in the book Mr. Splitfoot converse with the dead. Hunt’s fiction juxtaposes the miraculous with the quotidian, and the collection The Dark Dark features a story that neatly encapsulates this, titled “Beast.”

This story’s protagonist develops an intriguing ability: at night, she transforms into a deer. There are some challenges to this, including the fact that she’s indoors when she does so, making getting outside virtually impossible. It’s a metaphorically rich moment, but it’s also a fascinating juxtaposition of the supernatural and the mundane.

Read about the other entries on the list at Tor.com.

--Marshal Zeringue