Well, now I’d like to yammer a bit about Mur Lafferty’s Playing For Keeps.

Fantastic!!

This novel is set in a very recognizable future, where a small fraction of the population has developed super powers. There are the usual players: Heroes, Villains, Police.. But there are also those people who’ve developed.. Hmm.. let’s not call them “powers”. Let’s call them.. special quirks. There’s a chick who will never drop her bar tray. There’s a dude who shoots poop out of his hands. Ooh ooh, and a guy who has ultimate, unquestioned power and control.. over elevators. And then there’s our heroine: Keepsie. Her special power: nothing belonging to her can be stolen.

The story is comfortable and easy to follow. Mur’s performance and writing are really, just delightful. She’s got some teeth, and characters to buy the farm, but it’s not a slaughter fest, which I appreciated. Ooh ooh! And another thing I loved.. Occasionally things would come up in the story, and I’m all like “Wait a minute.. That’s not right because of X Y and Z!!” Then, come to find out, I was right. It’s fun, it’s well put together, and I cared about the characters. Brava! Brava!

I feel a little compelled to say at least something negative, I mean, this isn’t much of an exercise in critique if all I do is gush, right? Hmm, Well, okay, in the beginning, it’s a little hard to keep track of the heroes and their powers. Or, well, the Pseudoheroes. Everyone is very normal, very average (and I think that’s the point) but, I found myself in a couple places wishing I’d kept a list. This levels out though.

Okay, the next thing is not a complaint, so much as a “I hope in the second book she…” statement. Next time, I’d like more in depth exploration of the would be heroes’ powers. We got a great look at them in this book, but if there is a sequel and series to follow (hope hope beg plead hope) then that is one thing I’d like to see more of, How the powers feel to use, how they become instinctive- second nature.. Stuff like that.

Again, we got a great look at that in Playing For Keeps, but I’d like to see even more in the next one.

Seriously, scroll through the entries here, cause there’s a vblog story that’s a lot of fun! And there’s merchandising! That means you can go buy stuff. So, naturally, I compell you. Compelllll compellllll!(Not gonna say it’s adult, compared to other stuff, but there is some violence, some death and some kinda graphic stuff. If you’re SUPER squeamish, maybe have someone screen the “eeeew” bits for you )