It's Superman!

'It's Superman!' is an example of that rare commodity - a superhero novel. That's right - it's not a comic book; it's an honest-to-goodness novel about Superman.

It's a bit of an odd fish. It's written in the present tense, and set in the 1930s. In that pre-WWII world, television will be the next big thing, a polician named HItler is coming to power in Germany, and the Kent farm does not yet have electricity. America is in the grips of the Great Depression. The novel approaches its story from a number of characters' points-of-view, most notably farm-boy Clark Kent, newly recruited reporter Lois Lane, New York City Alderman Lex Luthor, Lois' photographer boyfriend Willi Berg, and a couple of others.

There's not really much by way of plot. The author chooses to reinterpret many staples of the Superman mythology: Metropolis is replaced with New York City, Lex Luthor is a rising political power in that city, Clark travels around with a man framed by a crime he did not commit, slowly developing his powers. Eventually, the main protagonists come together in the last quarter of the book, and SUperman is revealed to the world.

Superman/Clark is not presented as the paragon of virtue we're accustomed to seeing him as. He's a conflicted teenager, basically a good guy but who makes some questionable moral decisions. For example, the first time he is seen in public, he is breaking his friend out of prison! It makes for a slightly unfamiliar read; this is certainly not the Superman we know.

The author does make a painstaking effort to portray Depression-era America in great detail; from references to "scientifiction" instead of "science fiction", to his descriptions of clothing items worn by Lois Lane that I'm not entirely sure I can identify, the references are continuous and really do plunge you into the era, whether you like it or not.

Is it enjoyable? Well, yeah. Sort of. If you're not a comic-book fan (or, more specifically, a Superman fan), you probably won't get much from this book. It's not the most compelling or well-written piece of literature on the planet. In places, it's fairly dry, and it lacks a certain soul, although it is primarily a character piece. If you are a fan, though, it's certainly worth a try.