Title: Heroes: Saving Charlie
Author: Aury Wallington
Pages: 261
Premise: This book fills in a blank from the popular first season of the television show “Heroes”. Namely, the six month period of time that takes place in the episode “Six Months Past” (or at least, I believe that is the episode title). For those not familiar with the show, Hiro, the bumbling social reject from Japan, has discovered he has the power to bend time and space, and is in America to try to use his power to stop an explosion in New York. During the show, he ends up in a diner where he becomes smitten with a cute waitress named Charlie, however, the serial killer Sylar murders her. Hiro decides to use his powers to teleport back a day to try and convince Charlie not to come to work the next day, but overshoots it and ends up six months in the past. He then tries to use these six months to his advantage to try to win Charlie’s heart and save her life. It is these six months, and events that transpire, that the book outlines. The book boasts itself as the “untold story of Hiro and Charlie”), which seems to hint there will be romance and something more then the 30 minutes you get to see in the show, which I was pleased to say there was.
Favorite character(s): Hiro and Charlie
Least favorite character(s): Lloyd (the jealous ex-boyfriend)
Review: For starters, I have to say that there is no reason to read the book if a) you have not seen the show or b) you are not a fan of Hiro in the show. This is a fan-book, and as a fan, I’m taking it as it is. That being said, I really liked this book. Without being too overly sentimental about it, I will say that the slowly budding love story between Hiro and Charlie was so sweet and so touching… I rarely like romantic novels, so I’m not sure if it was just the characters that touched me or I’m just growing to like romance novels, but it was a truly tender story. And even though I knew how it would end, having seen the show (and those who have seen it will know what I mean when I say it was difficult to continue knowing what lay ahead), it was the journey and the full story that wasn’t told in that episode that kept me reading. That being said, it was far from perfect, and the one big problem that sticks out in my mind is that for about 50 pages of the novel, Hiro is trying to piece together multiple time periods of information he has seen to try and discover some sort of greater truth (I have a hard time explaining it because the book had a hard time explaining itself), only to have nothing about that diversion solved, resolved, or even remotely explained. In fact, it left me more confused then when I started. Overall, I could have gone without that, even if it did make for some character development.
To long, Didn’t read?: A classic story of nerd meets girl and they fall in love. Great love story with a few plot holes, but only hardcore Heroes fans need apply.
Rating: 4/5 stars

mood: Romantic