Welcome to the land of "reality", where scientific experiments, accidents, genetic heritage, and alien influences affect the lives of ordinary mortals. Join me as I observe the superhumans of planet earth and their struggles against equally powerful foes.
This review does not represent the opinions of the general public. It reflects my personal thoughts and opinions on the book.
That said, on to the review!
Spider-Man: The Lizard Sanction is directly related to Diane Duane's first novel for Marvel, Spider-Man: The Venom Factor, with references abounding throughout to the previous book. But don't make the mistake of thinking that it's just a continuation of the same story. It's true, Venom heads to the Everglades on the trail of environmental polluters who endanger innocents with their dangerous practices of disposing of hazardous wastes; that ties over from Venom Factor. However, just as the Hobgoblin's blackmail scheme wasn't the only thing in the works in New York, the dumping of radioactives isn't the only thing that's happening down in Miami. It's a small side-plot over all, but it's attached to something bigger. There. I'm not saying anything else.
Ms. Duane is an excellent author whose works I've sampled before. As always she imbues her characters, even her villains, with humanizing qualities that make them much more believable--no small job considering we're talking aliens and experiments gone awry here--and more interesting. She also goes to considerable trouble to describe the lives of those involved with the heroes and villains, such as Peter Parker's wife, Mary Jane, or the Lizard's alter-ego's family, Martha and William Connors. It's easy to see how confused and complicated being the wife of a super-hero or the wife or son of a sometime super-villain can be. This just makes Spidey's efforts seem that much greater and that much nobler, which is really a difficult thing when you consider how noble and great Peter Parker--not Spidey, but Peter--already is.
Spider-Man: The Lizard Sanction is a stupendous work of fiction and one of my favorites from my growing collection of Marvel novels. That Diane Duane's the one who penned it is and additional reason for my pleasure. You know that the work will be filled with real characters with real emotions.
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