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How can you not like a novel that stars out with a monster in Tokyo that rightfully Godzilla should sort out? In Resistance passengers of a flight from London to Delhi have developed super powers, and eleven years after, the world is awash with them.

Samit Basu, author of Turbulence gets us to think of what it would be like if we had developed any ability we wanted and had the choice to use it for good or evil. In the realm of both DC and Marvel comics our heroes don't seem to get that choice as they are always on the side of good. Superman has already battled with his dark side while Spiderman has his own reasons for being a hero and protecting the people. But what if you had that choice, used it and others paid the ultimate price for the good guys and bad guys with super powers? This is the idea of Resistance. Here, there is the Kaiju King, an ever so powerful former human who can transform normal everyday creatures to behemoth size ones, kaiju being the Japanese wold for monster. The lobster kaiju is set for ravaging the whole of Tokyo, and superheroes are set to prevent it from terrorising the city.

These super heroes are from all walks of life. Every time the Kaiju King unleashes a monster, super villains come out and only the super heroes can stop them. A Tokyo faction called Team ARMOR are out to protect the city; the product of Norio's research and labours, his specially powered mecha has the ability to ward off evildoers, but he can't do it without the help of his fellow super heroes, Oni, Baku, Raiju and Amabie. Including Norio (Goryo) they all sport tattoos of their choosing, mythical creatures that glow when they are needed to come together to form a sentai battle team like Gatchaman (Japanese version of Battle of the Planets before Sandy Frank).

Baku is a sushi chef with a nightmare-devouring Baku on his arm, Oni has a purple Oni mask on his thigh, while Raiju sports a wolf made of lightning. Norio is a lot like the super hero Batman, as is parodied in this book. He is a millionaire, who does great charity work and lives a lifestyle many only dream of, but he soon tires of all the parties and meeting boring people who only want his money -- Working with Team ARMOR is the only time he feels alive so when Norio discovers that someone is out to kill all supers, he is kidnapped rather early in the story by Tia, one of a mass of female clone supers who want to find out more about him. As the story becomes clearer, Norio has to help others against the threat of enemies who use their powers to destroy everything humanity has built, making this book a fun, well arranged impressive work of fiction that plays on the fear that humanity can improve its future, but also have it destroyed. The question is what people would do if they got powers beyond their comprehension. Resistance is every comic book lover's dream revitalising of the genre as a sci-fi pulp fiction getaway from reality.

Sandra has been published by Hellnotes, The London Vampyre Group, Albedo One, Love Romance Passion and many other publications not excluding Diverse Japan and is enjoying the mild Fall weather.