A Hundred Thousand Worlds by Bob Proehl

There’s a lot to like in Bob Proehl’s debut novel, A Hundred Thousand Worlds, and if the author occasionally tries a little too hard or the book suffers a bit in trying to cover its audience bases, the end result remains a heartfelt coming of age story set amidst the fondly but realistically portrayed world of comic book writers/artists and convention goers.

The story follows a mother and son (Valerie and Alex, respectively) as they drive from NYC to LA to reunite Alex with his long-separated father, Andrew Rhodes, though Alex does not know this at the start of their trip. Years ago, Val and Andrew had co-starred on a fan-favorite sci-fi show entitled Anomaly, and why Val left the show, Andrew, and LA — and why she is now returning six years later — is slowly revealed as she and Alex cross the country. Their trip is punctuated with ... Read More

The Nobody People by Bob Proehl

Avi Hirsch is an investigative journalist whose specialty is reporting on bombings. He’s obsessed with bombs and the people who make them. This preoccupation has led to the loss of a leg, but that doesn’t slow Avi down too much.

Avi’s latest obsession is with a video recording of a church bomber. There’s a couple of things that seem strange about it. One is that Avi has seen this same guy on two videotaped bombings and he should have died in each. The other weird thing is that matter seems to act strangely when this bomber is present. It’s almost as if the guy can nullify matter.

As Avi is on the bomber’s trail, some people come to visit him and tell him they’ve caught the bomber. These odd folks are faculty members at a school for kids with supernatural abilities. They call themselves Resonants and they want Avi to visit the school and write a news art... Read More

The Somebody People by Bob Proehl

I wasn’t crazy about Bob Proehl’s The Nobody People. While the premise was intriguing (kids with supernatural powers being raised and trained in a boarding school without the public’s knowledge), the novel, for reasons I’ve described in my review, was not compelling. I struggled to finish it but, in the end, I was curious about where Proehl was going with the story. For that reason, I picked up the sequel, The Somebody People, and I’m happy to report that I found this story more entertaining than its predecessor.

Several years have passed since the events of The Nobody People. The Reson... Read More