The Society of Super Secret Heroes: The Great Cape Rescue (review)

Finch and his three best friends have spent their whole lives playing superheroes, but now that they are going into fourth grade they reluctantly agree that this is something only young children would do. Just when they think they've got the habit kicked, Finch begins hearing a voice in his head, which he determines to be emanating from a towel that was adapted into a superhero cape years before. Finch is deeply relieved when his friends also hear the boastful voice of the towel, which claims thousands of years of experience with various masters, and the four form a secret superhero club with the towel serving as mentor. As there aren't any damsels in distress or burning buildings, the boys content themselves with such missions as finding friends for their new teacher. Even the most inexperienced readers will predict that, when the towel is stolen, the boys will discover that whatever superhero powers they've been calling on were in them all the time. However, Finch is such an affable, well-developed character that he saves the book from its own predictable core. His well-intentioned interventions in the lives of others (from his teacher to the classroom hermit crabs) rarely go as planned, but Finch's wry sense of humor, earnestness, and generosity are enough to garner him fierce allies in his friends and family, who help him resolve each new problem. Though Shalant sneaks in a moral lesson about thinking being preferable to fighting, she does it so subtly that it never detracts from the novel's rollicking and adventurous feel. A sequel is all but guaranteed; in the meantime, fans will have to content themselves with some of the other "heroes with capes" stories mentioned herein (Sinbad and Superman, for example) while waiting to see who or what the boys and towel will save next. Black-and-white illustrations are tidy but slightly cheeky, adding a pleasingly but not overwhelmingly comic touch.