Lissa's Review: Heroine Worship (Heroine Complex #2) by Sarah Kuhn

PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY PUBLISHER: DAW RELEASED: July 4, 2017 GENRE: scifi, fantasy, superheroes LENGTH: 384 pages FORMAT: ebook, paperback

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Once upon a time, Aveda Jupiter (aka Annie Chang) was demon-infested San Francisco’s most beloved superheroine, a beacon of hope and strength and really awesome outfits. But all that changed the day she agreed to share the spotlight with her best friend and former assistant Evie Tanaka—who’s now a badass, fire-wielding superheroine in her own right. They were supposed to be a dynamic duo, but more and more, Aveda finds herself shoved into the sidekick role. Where, it must be said, she is not at all comfortable.

It doesn’t help that Aveda’s finally being forced to deal with fallout from her diva behavior—and the fact that she’s been a less than stellar friend to Evie. Or that Scott Cameron—the man Aveda’s loved for nearly a decade—is suddenly giving her the cold shoulder after what seemed to be some promising steps toward friendship. Or that the city has been demon-free for three months in the wake of Evie and Aveda’s apocalypse-preventing battle against the evil forces of the Otherworld, leaving Aveda without the one thing she craves most in life: a mission.All of this is causing Aveda’s burning sense of heroic purpose—the thing that’s guided her all these years—to falter.

In short, Aveda Jupiter is having an identity crisis.When Evie gets engaged and drafts Aveda as her maid-of-honor, Aveda finally sees a chance to reclaim her sense of self and sets out on a single-minded mission to make sure Evie has the most epic wedding ever. But when a mysterious, unseen supernatural evil rises up and starts attacking brides-to-be, Aveda must summon both her superheroine and best friend mojo to take down the enemy and make sure Evie’s wedding goes off without a hitch—or see both her city and her most important friendship destroyed forever. TWO BOUNDLESS STARS

I loved the first one in this series, Heroine Complex. It was fresh and different and I had connected with Evie. But Heroine Worship was different. It follows Annie Chang aka Aveda Jupiter. There’s still just as much danger and mystery throughout this story. Their dealing with the portal and some puppy demons. Even though it was intriguing. I didn’t get that sense of urgency like I needed to finish this story right away. Kuhn is a fabulous writer. But I felt that Annie aka Aveda has a lot of internal dialogue. I know that she’s struggling in a sense with her identity but I just wanted her to be Annie. She should be loving herself and not try to portray someone else. Her relationships have been strained because of that. As the story moves on, you see them all start to work together. Which was good to see, there wasn’t all the drama between. Unfortunately, though, the magic that was in the first one, wasn’t there this time. I didn’t emotionally connect with Annie aka Aveda Jupiter. It’s hard to really fully get into it, without that connection. Overall, I give this Two Boundless Stars. It was ok but it could have been better.