The Side of Good (Ackley-McPhail, ed)

The Side of Good, Danielle Ackley-McPhail, ed., 2015

First off, this is a bit of a cheat for me, because this is only half of a book. The printed edition of The Side of Good is actually a flip book: if you flip it, you will find The Side of Evil. If you order the ebook, you will get two downloads, each with its own cover (as seen above).

As the names might suggest, this pair of books are anthologies filled with stories of Super Heroes and Super Villains. I get the Heroes precedence and read their tales first.

Editor Danielle Ackley-McPhail has assembled seven stories by Gail Z. Martin and Larry N. Martin, Bryan J. L. Glass, John L. French, Walt Ciechanowski, Kathleen O'Shea David, Robert Greenberger, and James Chambers.

The stories range from the non-powered to the super-powered to the oddly-powered (is it really a superpower?). They not only deal with their heroics but how their actions impact their own lives and the ones around them. And when does it get to be too much?

If I had to pick a favorite, I might go with "Making a Difference", by Robert Greenberger, which reads like an old indie-comic low-powered hero on a motorcycle story, emphasis on old. "Ghost Wolf" by Gail Z. Martin and Larry N. Martin, would come a close second. For fans of Kathleen David, if you're expecting puppets to play a role in her story, you won't be disappointed.

You won't be disappointed with The Side of Good unless you're, say, Lex Luthor. In that case, flip the book over.

* * *

Current reads:

  • ebooks: mostly short story anthologies, flipping back and forth, The Side of Evil or The Weird Wild West
  • hardcover (for commuting w/o an ereader): Once Upon a Time (she said)
  • manga: started getting One-Piece books from the library. Number 11 has been "in transit" for over a week now.
  • in the pool: old paperbacks and sci-fi mags that I don't mind if they get a little wet and won't cry over if they fall in. Right now, an old issue of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction from 1987

Reminder: for anyone stumbling across this site. These entries aren't really meant to be reviews. I mostly write them for myself because I have a tendency to forget about some of the books I've read -- either about the characters or plot of a book, or sometimes even the book itself. But writing summaries is boring, especially for anthologies, and some of my friends actually like reading this blog, so I'm trying to make it more enjoyable to read, which is all I can ask in a book.

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