paperback, 416 pages
Published Sept. 28, 2021 by William Morrow Paperbacks.
Hench is a lot more serious and deep than you'd expect from some of the flippant descriptions. I went in wanting something as light escapism. That's not what I got, but it was certainly worth a read, and I liked it far more than a few other things I've picked up recently that looked better on the surface.
Content warning proper spoilers - also this is less edited than normal sorry
You know, my day’s been rough, and I don’t want to take the effort to soften this, so take it with a pinch of salt. I like efficiency fantasies a lot, so I had hopes for this. Alas!
Maybe people in offices really do talk like this? I feel like they don’t though. Maybe it’s just that this is absolutely how I talked on the internet as a teenager, but the cod-formal/professional-but-trying-to-sound-sinister register that the protagonist and Leviathan take in dialogue lifts me right out of the story, it’s very unconvincing. Every time Leviathan and Anna have a conversation it feels like watching two badly made chatbots interact. I get that it’s an evil corporate efficiency power fantasy, it’s just, eh. If we saw her deciding to develop it/reflecting on it, or other people reacting to it ever in ways other than ‘unearned fear/respect’, it would feel more intentionally silly and I’d find it less jarring. Some of the lines that are supposed to be cool section-enders straight up do not land, like - “Anna, just because you’ve built unknowingly on top of a graveyard doesn’t mean those bodies aren’t in the ground.”? This is if anything More clunky in context. And everybody working for Leviathan ends up speaking a bit like this! Even in casual conversation - Vesper says “It seems like folly to abandon it now”, in a conversation that otherwise is on of my favourites in the book & has a refreshingly appropriate register for its intensity. At least when Supercollider speaks grandiosely it’s intentionally overblown, like, explaining the concept of chess in a self-absorbed speech. When they do it… I can’t tell! I think the author thinks it’s cool!
I like how the good working environment quickly makes Anna willing to do stuff she feels or felt morally uncomfortable with, and her intense feelings about her boss combine to make the whole thing subtly dreadful. The parallels between her work now and the things she criticises heroes for, and between her and Quantum, or between her weird bad boss relationship & Quantum’s (or Accelerator’s), are interesting and do make me like this book a lot more. And you know, showing the relationship between her and Leviathan as fucked up but still not pulling away from it or plainly condemning it is a balance I do kind of wish more ‘this dangerous powerful man will kill anyone who touches me’ fantasies struck. Her relationship with her best friend feels well-observed - I believed that messy friendship, & the things she focused on when thinking about it.
That said, the fantasy Anna becomes - of someone who always knows the right quip to make the person you’re talking to uncomfortable and ‘win’ the conversation - is not one that has appealed to me since I was a late teenager, so I’m probably harsher on it than I would be otherwise. This is another book that pings the ratfic radar for me, though not as strongly as some previous. There’s a lot of numerically quantifying harm (based on real academic work), offsetting damage through donations to Greenpeace, the kind of nerd fantasies of being amazing at quips and always in control, and also creative and disgusting use of superpowers. I could just be wrong about that.
Anyway. It’s an easy read despite all that! It left me feeling frustrated but it did make me laugh a few times. If you want a competence fantasy about doing efficient, loyal spreadsheet work using your rare ability to know more than others for your hot boss (and your cool cybernetics), causing him to reconsider his personal philosophy and you to grow as a person, read And I Alone Have Escaped to Tell You by astolat.
I'll admit I'm totally burned out on superhero media. For a while, it seemed like every week a new movie or TV show came out featuring Marvel or DC comic book heroes, and a lot of them recently have been really bad (I'm still irritated Doctor Strange was so disjointed). At any rate, this book was a fun change to the standard superhero fare out there. This book is a tale of what happens to all of the innocent bystanders when superheroes go on a rampage to save someone or something, and also describes the underworld of temp agencies that support villains in jobs like data management and tech support. The main character works as a temp office worker for a minor villain, but when a trivial job "in the field" goes terribly wrong, her life is changed forever and she starts down a path working for one of the …
I'll admit I'm totally burned out on superhero media. For a while, it seemed like every week a new movie or TV show came out featuring Marvel or DC comic book heroes, and a lot of them recently have been really bad (I'm still irritated Doctor Strange was so disjointed). At any rate, this book was a fun change to the standard superhero fare out there. This book is a tale of what happens to all of the innocent bystanders when superheroes go on a rampage to save someone or something, and also describes the underworld of temp agencies that support villains in jobs like data management and tech support. The main character works as a temp office worker for a minor villain, but when a trivial job "in the field" goes terribly wrong, her life is changed forever and she starts down a path working for one of the biggest and baddest super villains in the world. This book was a fun alternative take on the superhero genre and I really enjoyed it.
HENCH is a heady mix of spreadsheets and schadenfreude, with cruel beauty in its precision.
Because of the focus on the human cost of “heroes” there are long sections threaded through with the slow process of healing, of Anna coming to terms with how her body has been broken and reforged, accepting new limitations and finding joy and freedom in novel tools. Her cane is a great example, she uses it as an extension of herself, to support her, protect her, and to make grand her expressions since every gesture is fancier when punctuated by a cane.
Anna is very observant of people, both in ways that matter to what becomes the bulk of her work as a hench, and in ways that make the book better to read. Her turns of phrase, particularly when describing someone’s voice or laugh, are perfectly suited to the moment and bring new detail …
4.4
Review to come
Hot damn I loved this book. LOVED. THIS. BOOK.
Ms. Walschots's style is punchy and direct. There's no fat on this book. Ms. Walschots opts to skip the parts of a story that might be mundane and delivers a story with the crisp, action-packed editing of a fight in a Rocky film and the casual obscenity of a Kevin Smith diatribe.
Not to take anything away from Ms. Walschots, but any fan of Mr. Smith's work will be right at home here. Yes, it's a superhero tale, but the protagonist isn't a hero, and isn't super. She focuses on the aspects of superhero-dom that resonate with the same blue-collar vibe as Smith's "what about the independent contractors on the Death Star" speech in Clerks.
There's plenty of space for a sequel here, and I hope to see one in the future... along with a TV show or movie. Because this …
Hot damn I loved this book. LOVED. THIS. BOOK.
Ms. Walschots's style is punchy and direct. There's no fat on this book. Ms. Walschots opts to skip the parts of a story that might be mundane and delivers a story with the crisp, action-packed editing of a fight in a Rocky film and the casual obscenity of a Kevin Smith diatribe.
Not to take anything away from Ms. Walschots, but any fan of Mr. Smith's work will be right at home here. Yes, it's a superhero tale, but the protagonist isn't a hero, and isn't super. She focuses on the aspects of superhero-dom that resonate with the same blue-collar vibe as Smith's "what about the independent contractors on the Death Star" speech in Clerks.
There's plenty of space for a sequel here, and I hope to see one in the future... along with a TV show or movie. Because this book ROCKED.
You remember in the Marvel movies when Tony Stark gets confronted about all the collateral damage that the Avengers do when they are fighting? He decides that they need to be accountable for this and Captain America has a meltdown because he is a whiny little baby who considers himself above the law and this sets up the Civil War movie. I seriously can not understand the point of view that Captain America is espousing in the movie. It makes me angry just to think about how entitled the whole argument is. Team IronMan forever!
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Because I feel that strongly about this, I adored this book. It is pretty much the same argument. Anna is invited to a press conference by her new villain boss because she has been doing a good job. The biggest superhero crashes it and casually tosses her aside. She is …
You remember in the Marvel movies when Tony Stark gets confronted about all the collateral damage that the Avengers do when they are fighting? He decides that they need to be accountable for this and Captain America has a meltdown because he is a whiny little baby who considers himself above the law and this sets up the Civil War movie. I seriously can not understand the point of view that Captain America is espousing in the movie. It makes me angry just to think about how entitled the whole argument is. Team IronMan forever!
via GIPHY">via GIPHY
Because I feel that strongly about this, I adored this book. It is pretty much the same argument. Anna is invited to a press conference by her new villain boss because she has been doing a good job. The biggest superhero crashes it and casually tosses her aside. She is severely injured. Her recovery is long and painful. She gets obsessed with figuring out how much damage superheroes are doing to people like her. One of the biggest villains sees what she is doing on her blog and invites her to join his organization. How can she use her mastery of data and information to help take down superheroes?
I loved this look at how supervillain organizations would work on a day to day basis. Where do you get the guys that get beat up in every fight? Where do you find secretaries? How do you make sure you don't set off the booby traps in your office? What emergency procedures are activated if your boss is captured? Is there a retirement plan?
This book makes the characters confront their notions of what is evil and what is good. Is it good to save one person if you hurt many more during the rescue?
Anyone who loves superhero movies and books would likely love this story.
This review was originally posted on Based On A True Story
