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John Scalzi: Starter Villain (2023, Doherty Associates, LLC, Tom) 4 stars

Inheriting your mysterious uncle's supervillain business is more complicated than you might imagine.

Sure, there …

Fast-paced and entertaining

4 stars

It's a really fun book, well-paced, with a lot of entertaining characters, a story full of social commentary, and some dead-pan humour. I'd probably compare it to Prattchet, with jokes that are much less tired, anchored in a soft sci-fi setting instead of fantasy. My minor gripe with how contrived some of the story felt was ultimately addressed by the story itself, which felt nice.

Why not 5 stars? Well, I do wonder how some of the references are going to age - it is likely neither Spotify nor Zoom will be around in 20 years. Also, just like with Prattchet, it's really just a social commentary and not really a critique: the set-up is there just to poke fun at and expose how ridiculous our society is, but unlike in Scalzi's Interdependency books, there's little in-depth discussion of the issues, as almost everyone is on the same page.