Synopses & Reviews
Part 1: Over twenty years ago, a comet struck the Earth just outside the town of Pederson, Illinois. There were 113 children in utero when the flash hit, and every one of them was affected, gaining extraordinary super-powers as they grew older. The people of the world, initially worried by what the children might become when they reached adulthood, now fear what they will do with the powers they've gained-and who might suffer should the rising stars of humanity start to think they could run the world better(. Part 2: Ten years have passed since the Specials-men and women gifted with incredible powers-had their standoff against the government. Feared, hunted, and yet revered, they have scattered across the globe, only to be forced to come together once more when the Special known as Critical Maas takes the city of Chicago hostage. Now, a small group of her former friends have decided to take it back, in exchange for a pardon from the government. But their actions will not come without a heavy price to pay for the Specials-and the world.
Synopsis
The final act in the story of the Specials, as we follow the remaining superpowered men and women through their later adulthood and eventual deaths. We jump forward another dozen years and see the effects they've had in their campaign to change the world-whether or not it wants to be changed. But now the U.S. government has developed a weapon capable of destroying them, causing them to go into hiding. Will the government be able to systematically hunt them down and destroy them? And with the Specials hidden, what will happen to the order they put in place? Find out as J. Michael Straczynski's epic superhero masterpiece reaches its dramatic conclusion!
About the Author
The son of an American doctor,
Arthur Byron Cover was born in the upper tundra of Siberia on January 14, 1950. He attended a Clarion Science Fiction Writers' Workshop in 1971, where he made his first professional sale, to Harlan Ellison's
Last Dangerous Visions. Cover migrated to Los Angeles in 1972. He has published a slew of short stories, in
Infinity Five, The Alien Condition, Heavy Metal, Weird Tales, Year's Best Horror Stories, and elsewhere, plus several SF books, including
Autumn Angels, The Platypus of Doom, The Sound of Winter, and
An East Wind Coming. He has also written scripts for issues of the comic books
Daredevil and
Firestorm, as well as the graphic novel
Space Clusters. Among his most recent projects have been his best-selling novelizations of the comic book series J. Michael Straczynski's
Rising Stars, and the novelization of Archangel Studios'
The Red Star graphic novel series.