The Web of Arachnos (City of Heroes)

List Price: $7.99 Discount Price: $0.99

Customer Reviews:

Not bad, but not great [Posted on 2005-12-11]
It was... okay. Not a page-burner by any stretch, but if you're really into City of Heroes, it's not a bad read, either.

The book introduces us to Marcus Cole (aka Statesman) and Stefan Richter (aka Lord Recluse) and takes us through their origin at the Fountain of Zeus, the downfall of their friendship, and through the first major battle of good-versus-evil for Paragon City. Along the way, we get to meet the Dark Watcher, Elementar, Vambrace, and even Maiden Justice, grandmother of the famed Miss Liberty. All of the events take place during the 1930's in a time when villains were diabolical and heroes were few and far between.

As an interesting story of origins and a historical background for the City of Heroes game, the book was okay. As a standalone novel, though, it falls a bit short in a few areas.

The writing style, while not quite bad, is not as good as it should have been. The number of big men in the book that have fingers like sausages is amusing. There's not much depth to the characters. Everyone is good or evil. Stupid or smart. Small or huge. Straight-and-narrow or guilty-as-sin. Maybe the author was shooting for Golden Age comic book-type simplicity to go with the time period in which the novel is set, but it usually comes off as very predictable and common. There are no real conflicts in the book, other than those solved by fists and bullets. No inner turmoil, no real climax except when the unstoppable force meets the movable objects (an outcome that's a foregone conclusion), and not much suspense to make you have to read the next chapter to find out what happens.

Some of the details required quite a bit of suspension of disbelief. A fabled fountain of immortality under a site with millions of dollar's worth of undiscovered archaeological curiosities strewn about intact within an easy day's row of Crete? Stefan's transformation from Marcus Cole's closest friend to the twisted and murderous Lord Arachnos was a bit hasty and implausible. He went from Cole's loyal confidant to a backstabbing murderer with fascist ambitions in less time than it took Anakin Skywalker to go from saving the Republic to killing Jedi younglings. And the same hasty transformation happened to Marcus Cole as well. When we meet him, he is stealing priceless treasures of the ancient Library of Alexandria from a museum. One sip from the Fountain and he goes from being a criminal to putting away criminals. And even our new hero, upon closer inspection, has some curiously glossed-over flaws. He escapes justice for the crimes he committed by monetary bribes and payoffs. He enlists the aid of a crime family that, by the end of the book, the reader should still not be convinced is as legitimate as the author tries to lead us to believe.

I am still rating the book three stars because I believe that it serves its purpose adequately--to give us a glimpse of history that got us to the Paragon City we virtually live in today. I just hope that the next novel will give us a lot more reason to care about our favorite characters in City of Heroes and a lot more reason to come back for more. Ideally, I would like to see a novel that a non-player could read and that may even entice him or her to give the game a try. Unfortuantely, by that standard, this one doesn't quite measure up.

(The Freedom Phalanx is due to be published in April 2006 and is available here at Amazon.com. According to the excerpt in Web of Arachnos, it will be set in the mid-1980's.)

Defined by the game [Posted on 2006-02-25]
It is very hard to write a compelling book placed in a world the writer themself did not invent. Just see any of the various Magic: the Gathering novels for a good example of what happens when a writer fails to carry off a convincing story.

The Web of Arachnos, on the other hand, weaves a compelling adventure about two inseperable friends who wind up dire enemies. The deterioration of their relationship and the creation of both a superhero and a supervillain is told with compassionate insight into what drives people to choose lifestyles and priorities most of us would label as "evil".

An excellent study of human nature set in the universe of a popular online game. What more could a modern reader ask for?

The book is weak and doesn't always make sense [Posted on 2006-03-04]
As was described in an earlier review, the transformation of bandit Marcus Cole into Statesman was not adequately explained. I also want to know why Stephan Riechter, who becomes Lord Recluse, grows into a monster with metal-tipped spider legs on his back. This is not explained well either. There is also a scene where a non-super-powered reporter, who has been taking some martial arts classes, karate chops a large steel pipe or beam and bends it in two with her bare hands.

Also, the superheroes that come to aid Statesman pretty much come out of nowhere. Elementar seems extremely powerful and it's surprising that he did not do anything with his powers until Statesman came along.

I could go on if I felt like refering back to the book, but I don't. It's just not a very polished story in my humble opinion. I hope the author's own original works are better than this.

Nice to have some background [Posted on 2006-03-14]
It's nice to finally have some good background written on City of Heroes.
And by one of the best game-related fantasy author, no less.
I raced through this book with delight. I hope you will enjoy it.

Very Well Done [Posted on 2007-06-13]
As I read the reviews for this product, my heart sank a little. I am, myself, a fan of the CoH/CoV games. So, like I said, I expected very little from the book as a result except for a backstory to add to my enjoyment of the game.

However, after receiving the book, and beginning to read, I was immediately captured by the writing style of the author. His descriptive wording and appropriate word use were the first items to catch my attention. However, after a chapter, the story was riveting.

As I said, I had read the previous reviews on this, and if I may say, perhaps some of them are overly critical. Keep in mind, for example, that the book is centered on two specific characters, those of Stefan Richter (Lord Recluse) and Marcus Cole (Statesman), and so therefore, mentions of the exploits of any other heroes prior to their appearance in the novel would be unwarranted. And, it would not seem illogical for someone with great powers to be eaither a) unaware of the vastness of them, or b) in an era when the world was just over the first industrial revolutions of America, afraid to show any level of supernatural ability, since the demonstration of such would instill fear in a great many people (including the politcial regimes of the day).

Also, as to Recluse's metal spider legs, since he is a technocrat and obviously a fan of the scientific, it is not unthinkable that such a person would either a) augment natural appendages which grew as a result of his transformation, to be fitted with metal, or to b) have created that metallic set of appendages.

Finally, though the characters might seem predictable, and "lightweight", the fact is that the author is playing on what we should expect. The great war hero, power hungry villain, megalomaniac Nemesis, plucky reporter, etc...are all the types of people we can relate with. Their characters are well fleshed out in the novel, and overall, it is a great read!

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