Description
Madison Oakes is a lot of things.
She’s 23. She’s a big eater. She’s a powerful telekinetic. She’s the government-backed superhero “Heartforce,” trained since adolescence to join the ranks of the PHL. She’s second generation, even, upholding her late father’s Hero legacy.
They’re also a butch, nonbinary trans lesbian, and their Hero team’s very first official “LGBTQ2+ Champion.” Or at least they were, briefly, as a cynical PR move, before getting reassigned in Director Hagen’s obsessive schemes to infiltrate the supervillainous Korps¿ who don’t seem anything like what the sheep-bear’s always been told, actually.
Now she must choose: Does she want to be a part of Hagen’s machinations? Does she want to be a Hero at all? Motorcycling across Canada to find answers, is Maddy on a collision course – with her coworkers, her self doubt, family secrets, and Dad’s so-called “legacy” – that can only in a Change of Heart?
Cover by Shapeless Ink
Author: Grace Reed
Style: Literary Work
Content: Novel
Pages: 252
ISBN: 978-1-61450-652-2
Parental Rating: NC-17, some sexual scenes
Publication Date: November 2024
pj wolf (verified owner) –
I love that the protagonist to Change of Heart, a Korps Universe novel by Grace Reed, is fat.
Let me explain.
Madison Oakes, who prefers Maddy, is starting her career as a Hero (with the capital H) in Ontario, Canada. Their father was a Hero who went by Heartwood, and he died tragically in the line of duty. When Maddy’s powers manifested, she was quickly pushed into taming and training those powers so they could take up the mantle of their departed father, and since she’s also non-binary and trans, act as a public face for Ontario’s Heroes, the local government sponsored superhero team. Maddy is… maybe less than enthused about that.
To return to that opening statement, Maddy is a sheep-bear hybrid, and as such, is fat. They have a significant appetite, and there are various portions of scenes where Maddy is eating, and is no less capable a hero for that. And perhaps this makes me, someone who is also fat, like this story a bit more than I might otherwise. To have a fat protagonist that is fat, and have that not be a plot point in any respect, is kinda gratifying. This is not to yuck anyone’s yum or anything, but often fatness is seen through either a fetish lens (Let’s get that person FATTER) or as some kind of moral failing (they really let themselves go and just cannot stop) and it’s nice to have Maddy… exist, fat, in her own skin and fur (and wool?) and it’s just something about them, not anything else.
It also helps that Maddy certainly fucks in the story.
On the downside, I really wish that the author, Grace Reed, had the confidence that the reader would have read the chapter immediately preceding. The book is unfortunately rife with recaps and betrays the story’s origins as a serialized narrative prior to being assembled for publication.
Having said that, I really like this book and also where it interacts with other characters in the Korps Universe, or at least the one that exists in novels. Due to the wandering nature of the second half of the book, Maddy ends up criss-crossing both Canada and the US, searching for somewhere to feel productive when she happens to play a minor role in a huge event that is happening in other books. To quote the author in the acknowledgments: “It’s always fascinating to come up with a character, and then work out how to figuratively mash their action figure together with all the others—accompanied by “pew pew” or making-out noises, of course, as the case may be.”
In short, I really enjoyed spending more time in the Korps Universe. I like Maddy as a character, and since this is book 1, I’m looking forward to seeing more of her adventures! And if you like superhero stuff, I think you’ll enjoy this book, too.