Review: Hollow City, by Kai Wai Cheah
[easyazon_link identifier="B07Q3HBHPS" locale="US" tag="upstreamreviews-20"]Hollow City (Song of Karma, book 1), by Kai Wai Cheah[/easyazon_link] is part of Silver Empire's superhero universe line. While it's been discussed in terms of this version of the Punisher, while this may end up as a Punisher origin story, our hero is way, WAY too sane to be Frank Castle.
The vibe as you read the novel is more Michael Connelly doing a noir superhero novel, with gun porn that outdoes Larry Correia. (No, I'm not exaggerating, and you did not misread that. Gun porn that would make Larry Correia blush).
Deal alert: On the date of this review, Hollow City is only $0.99 on Kindle!
The story
Adam Song is the superhero Amp. As former Marine Recon, when Adam's powers kicked in, he joined the Halo city Police department SWAT team. As a door-kicker attached to a team dedicated to taking down super villains, he has a relatively high kill rate: six kills in six years.
During a raid, Adam kills a dirt bag who has it coming. Unfortunately, the dead idiot is the son of a local gang lord. Now Adam has a bounty on his head. The politicians are throwing him under the bus. The cops are abandoning him. And now Adam's family is under threat.
When a man is left to his own devices to save his family, the criminals are going to wish that Adam still had a badge to keep him in check.
The characters
Publicly, Adam Song seems to have the powers of Marvel's Bullseye -- he always hits what he aims for, with preternatural reaction time. That's what everyone else thinks, too. But it goes beyond that, and he has a very simple, straightforward approach to handling everything -- it's handled by the book. I love the byplay between what the public thinks he can do, what he says he can do, and what he actually can do. It's the usually conflict of the civilian mindset versus the mindset of people who actually get shot at with some regularity.
Why, yes, Cheah has spent time in the military. Why do you ask?
And then there's our hero's family... I await someone to bitch about Kai Wai Cheah using "Asian stereotypes" as he writes his novel in his native Singapore. Heh.
There are a bunch of cute bits as well. They're not SWAT teams, but STAR teams (Resident Evil, anyone?). The investigator is Herbert Franks (cute Cheah. Very cute). Cheah also has bullet storm haiku... no, I'm NOT kidding.
The world
Imagine if Baen did a superhero novel and it was one part Connelly, one part Correia. You've got smart police tactics by a superpowered former soldier as part of a SWAT team, but you also have the problems of the politics of "Primes" (they're not superheroes or mutants, they're Primes). It becomes an interesting mix of politics, powers and police. When I reference Michael Connelly, most people should think of his hero, Harry Bosch (yes, now an Amazon Prime show). And the police department in Halo City is very much like the corrupt, politics-ridden (but I repeat myself) legal system of Bosch's LA. It helps with the noir feel of the novel, as it constantly refers to Halo City as the Hollow City, dark, soulless and corrupt....
You know, Chicago.
(Okay, if you're looking for a direct parallel, it's probably if San Francisco were run by Chicago politicians, down to the demographics, and "Grand Park" instead of SF's Grant Park.)
Once again, as with the first book in the series, (Morgon Newquist's Heroes United) it's a superhero world that feels very real. Screwups are not tolerated, leaving a realistic feel to the narration -- such as referring to an egomaniac "hero" who was going to livestream an arrest... so the criminal set a trap and put three rounds in the sucker's face. Stupidity is its own death penalty. The politics are realistic enough to make me want to strangle the politicians -- even down to having a Black Lives Matter group that's against Primes. And I love the line "Politics is never personal until it happens to you," I may need to steal it.
And the tactics are solid. The guns are detailed and make sense given the use of force required. The fact that Adam has three guns, as well as a taser, is one of the better carry policies I've seen of a hero in a novel for some time.
The politics
The politics here are very much based in the world. But see if you can take these elements and stitch together a left or right-wing viewpoint. I dare you.
Politicians are bastards
Guns are good, especially if you know what you're doing with them.
Family is important.
Our hero is a cop, and the other cops aren't the source of all evil.
Capewatch has nothing do with BLM. Honest.
Content warning
Gunplay. Lots of gunplay. If there was a language problem, I didn't notice.
Who is it for?
If Harry Bosch were an Asian superhero, and Michael Connelly had a sense of humor, this is the book you'd end up with -- a Superhero Baen novel. If you enjoy anything put out by Baen, or Harry Bosch, or Astro City, or Jon Bernthal's portrayal of the Punisher in Daredevil, you're probably going to enjoy this one.
My only problem? There is a bit of a cliffhanger. But then again, it did say book 1. For some reason, it does NOT piss me off anywhere near as much as others have.
I wholeheartedly recommend this one.
Why read it?
[easyazon_link identifier="B07Q3HBHPS" locale="US" tag="upstreamreviews-20"]It's just plain brilliant. These are the superheroes we need. And I think we've done enough penance with Marvel's comic book output in the last decade that we deserve Adam Song and the rest of the Heroes Unleashed.[/easyazon_link]